OutageNotice

OutageNotice streamlines the process of sending Outage Notices. This allows System Administrators and support teams more time to attend to their systems and also, and more importantly, more time to focus on the content of their outage communication.

The Lone Sysadmin has a great write up on Outage Notices.

“I hate outage notifications that don’t actually say anything. Sure, I’d rather know ahead of time that something is going down, but there are several other qualities that I think any communication like this should have. The key is to put yourself in the customer’s shoes. What would you like to know if you were them?”

The Lone Sysadmin’s essential outage notice communication requirements include:

• Why is this happening?
• What affect to users?
• Who is doing the work?
• Be postive.
• Provide updates.
• Be honest.
• Don’t apologise. Thank.

Read the full article How to Write An Outage Notice.

Similar thoughts from 37 Signals in their manifesto Getting Real, Publicize Your Screwups.

Seth Godin also picks up on the honesty requirement in Three important lessons from Dreamhost.