API status pages inaccurate

[jla3378]

valighthouse.statuspage.io reports that as of Dec 1, 20:15 EST all maintenance has been completed yet as of 22:27 EST all endpoints that were under maintenance still are unusable despite valighthouse.statuspage.io showing "all systems operational"

I hope the slick SaaS marketing that led to licensing the status page from Atlassian is worth the enterprise licensing cost because if outage info isn't up to date to the minute, is that not a waste of money at the least, and purposely misleading to the public that has a right to transparency on the state of government IT systems paid with appropriated funds at the worst?

[jla3378]

"If we say prod is up and nobody bothers to check, does it really need to be up?"

[jla3378]

Except when someone like a Congressional representative office or OIG comes poking around trying to make sense of any IT dysfunction and conveniently, there's a record of outages, down to the minute? Nobody really has to check if those records are actually accurate, surely? "All Systems Operational" Dec 1, 20:15 EST? Looks good on paper, eh?

[jla3378]

valighthouse.statuspage.io shows "No incidents reported today" for 2 December but I am reporting that at 00:18 EST APIs are still down. Again, what is the point of a status page with dates and times if they do not correspond with reality and why are they are being presented on a page using a SaaS licensed dashboard paid out of appropriated funds? Unless I am mistaken and Atlassian gives pro bono enterprise products with enterprise support out of the goodness of their Y Combinator honed venture capital hearts.

[jla3378]

The SES officials who have any decision making roles who think of the olympics instead of the last few weeks of monotonously repeating: "no blockers" when they hear the term "sprint" need accurate information to before even starting to think about policy.

Christ. in the Bay Area the massaged numbers are shown to idiots exit liquidity angel investors and the public but in most cases the higher ups know full well what's going on because there is literal money on the line. What's on the line here? The reputation of an agency best known for "not my problem" and "good enough for government?" Understandably, shortcuts look even more tempting so who cares about giving higher ups made up numbers?

[jla3378]

If VA were a company, it would have a flagship mobile app.
I have half a mind to submit a FOIA request to find out who said that because wow, a fresh frontend being such a priority while backend languishes in a hell of "meh, who cares good enough" is the type of backwards shortsighted advice I expect from a stupid Wharton grad consultant.

Do the higher ups get dazzled by the sleek modern front end while you just neglect to be up front with how dysfunctional the backend is?

[jla3378]

I was joking when I said it but in reality McKinsey partners are absolutely rolling in the federal dough while giving advice like "better mobile app" and not any of the actual structural dysfunction within the VA. Did McKinsey tell you to license modern looking SaaS interfaces and say "the numbers don't matter, just show the fancy dashboard to the higher ups" because apparently consultant aspirants in the Ivy Leagues are a dime a dozen and they

All

Sound
and
Think

Exactly

Alike

[jla3378]

fine, when I mistakenly studied at Columbia I only interacted with less than a dozen students with consulting internship or who said wanted a big 4 job so the sample size for me is admittedly a bit small so who knows, maybe consultants are geniuses and it's the VA's fault for choosing the one consulting company that everyone knows sucks and all the rest are outstanding forces for good.

Honestly I can't blame them because if I could get paid very good money and be a part of the professional managerial class just to vomit up ideas gleaned from the first 2 results of Google and be delusional to think I'm mAKINg A DIFFerEnCe I totally would too.

[jla3378]

[jla3378]

To be clear, I am not insinuating the VA directly gives consultants the bennies, it merely finances their habits of the freshest supply from South America.

[jla3378]

Oh but wait, when it's the overpaid professional managerial class, suddenly federal contracting requirements of drug free employees suspiciously go out the window. Could it be that there really are different tiers of government treatment? Surely not. That would mean everything I've been told is a lie and surely the government would never ever lie. Surely.

[jla3378]

Would the same Department of Veterans Affairs that denies me timely access to medically necessary care in contravention of provisions found within Title 38 CFR/USC also be the same one that just blatantly makes up "small white lies" about the state of their appropriated fund IT systems? No, it can't be. The government never ever lies.

[jla3378]

@evansmith seeing as you've approved backend changes, why is it that a front end is so important over accurate and reliable metrics on uptime?

[jla3378]

What McKinsey is doing is a kitchen nightmares episode where Gordon gives the restaurant a fresh coat of paint but nothing really changes from the managers/owners.

A slick app cannot hide how dysfunctional backend is.

[jla3378]

@ryan-mcneil @freeheeling I see you two approve backend changes as well. Why the fake numbers? Oh I see, you will probably say they're not fake? Then why is the VA paying for a turnkey status page presenting bunk metrics that make IT look better than what it is in reality?

[jla3378]

I just want to know, is it malice (not my problem/somebody else's problem/lmao I work from home scrolling Facebook) or incompetence in professionally managing an enterprise IT backend?