Eoghain McGinley

Title: Technical Support Analyst, O2 Shop
Business Area: Energy, Utilities & Telecoms (EUT)
University: University of Ulster, Northern Ireland
Major: BSc Hons Computer Science
Year started: 2007

I work within the Energy, Utilities and Telecoms (EUT) sector on the O2 Shop project. Logica created this system over seven years ago and, since it went live, we’ve provided the technical support. As part of the support team, I log incidents like failed user transactions or connectivity issues with external services, working out the causes and how they can be fixed.

It’s also my job to fix bugs reported by 02. These fixes usually involve Java development and are released overnight so they don’t affect system users. Other responsibilities include working on active change requests and updating support documentation. It’s a varied role and a good one to start off in as it gives me a broad insight into how large IT projects operate.

Monday
Tuesday
Wednesday
Thursday
Friday

Monday

Today was slightly different from other days. I arrived at 16.00 as we’re working on an overnight release. We generally begin the release at 23.00 and finish up around 03.00. Our transport home is paid for and we get the following day off to catch up on our sleep.

I’d completed the bug fixes over the last three weeks, helping at both the development and testing stages, so all that remained was the final planning and then the testing of the live system to make sure the changes had been applied correctly. By 21.00 we were ready to begin but, just as we began the work, the Logica system encountered a network issue. As a result, we couldn’t access the 02 Shop live servers. This made the release impossible so we made the decision to reschedule it for next week. I left the office at 22.30 so I’ll be working normal hours tomorrow.

Tuesday

Today we had two incidents that needed to be logged and investigated. The first involved a user who couldn’t cancel his mobile insurance; the second involved incorrect credit card check responses. To resolve the first I needed to extract and examine the Broadvision logs. I discovered the problem was down to an incorrect XML response so passed the case on to our messaging middleware provider to investigate further. Sorting out the issue with the credit cards meant changing the status of the file in our Oracle database. When a correct response was returned late in the afternoon, the case could be resolved.

In the afternoon I worked on the 02 Shop stub server. We use this server for testing purposes. By simulating responses from the Shop’s external services, it allows us to place test orders without actually putting them on the live system. But it’s becoming dated now so needs a rebuild. It’s my job to complete this over the next few weeks.

Wednesday

This morning 02 reported that one of their database configuration tools wasn’t accessible. My investigations showed that the server hosting the application hadn’t been shut down correctly. I solved the problem by carrying out a Broadvision restart on the specified server.

During lunch I played five-a-side football with EUT colleagues. Over the summer we meet up in Regent’s Park but today we went to a nearby sports hall. I got involved earlier in the year and it’s been a great way to meet people outside of my immediate team while getting a break away from the computer.

I carried on reconfiguring the stub server in the afternoon and then, at 17.00, the Project Manager from another 02 project mentioned he needed to finish a task by the end of the day and was running out of time. I offered to help and stayed a bit later than usual to get the job done. It’s a good idea to help out others when you have a bit of free time as the favour will always be returned.

Thursday

We had our weekly team meeting this morning. This lasts about an hour and is held every Thursday to catch up on the week’s work and discuss future work. Then it was back to the stub server until lunchtime.

After lunch I met with three other members of the 02 team to discuss a change request sent in by 02 which involved upgrading our system to Java 1.5. We worked out what tasks we needed to complete over the next few weeks. I was given the job of splitting up our test environment so that users would still have access to the application while we shut down a section of the system to update the version of Java.

I started work on this task straight after the meeting and someone from the technical design team showed me how to split the test environment. The technical design team have a wealth of knowledge and are always willing to share their skills and expertise.

As I’d arranged to meet a friend at 17.30 I left a little earlier than usual. Logica are quite flexible around working hours and I had a shorter lunch break today to make up the time.

Friday

I planned to travel back to Ireland this evening so worked from home in order to make the flight on time. Logica provide remote access so that users can access the network from home and, depending on your project, you may be able to work from home on particular days. I tend to work from home once a week.

I had another support case to log, investigate and resolve this morning. But once I’d dealt with that I got back on to the job of splitting the testing environment for the Java uplift. I took a break at lunchtime to go for a jog, but by 17.30 I’d put the finishing touches to the work ready for release on to the testing environment on Monday afternoon.

 

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