Don't panic! The definitive guide to IT troubleshooting

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  Article

  App support is a reciprocal process

  Some users learn the ins and outs of an application like the back of their hand, so rely on them, as well as application owners, to help resolve issues and uncertainties that aren't the result of app failures. Set up a feedback system, and be sure to fulfill IT's half of that feedback loop. Read Now

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  Article

  Combine incident management with IT gurus

  The IT staff only has so much time in a day. Although a comprehensive monitoring process and incident management system will prevent and potentially resolve most issues, systems can't catch everything. Rely on admins to improve systems and applications where bottlenecks appear. Read Now

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  Some success goes best unacknowledged

  The best incident management goes unnoticed by users -- if a problem is sorted without a hiccup, users don't know how lucky they are. Ensure your system is as mature as possible by implementing strong IT troubleshooting practices that prioritize user experience, and develop a reporting and analysis routine that can prevent issues from recurring. Read Now

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  Resolve more than just one issue

  It's important to resolve an active issue as swiftly as possible to keep users up and running productively, but it's more important to ensure that said issue doesn't come back again. Find patterns in errors, and set up simple workflows for the admins on the help desk frontlines for IT troubleshooting finesse that ultimately builds up the incident management process. Read Now

1Take maximum advantage of tool capabilities

IT applications don't work the same way they used to, so IT troubleshooting methods shouldn't either. Ensure that the tools you use can see into distributed architectures and locate more than just immediate failures. This set of articles offers advice on log management and reporting, as well as how to best implement AIOps for better visibility and preventative action.

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  Broaden the scope of log gathering and reports

  Relying on manual log management and reporting systems makes IT troubleshooting more than troublesome. AI and machine learning capabilities embedded into next-gen tools can increase the visibility into and coverage of a system. Read Now

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  Monitoring with AI automates root cause analysis

  Root cause analysis is a vital part of IT troubleshooting and incident management. Tools with intelligence built in process data to evaluate errors and discover the bottleneck culprits that cause them -- the necessary information IT admins need to prevent last-minute panic. Read Now

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  Intelligent cloud management tools ease implementation

  AI-based cloud management tools do much of the heavy lifting when it comes to cloud application monitoring. For the broadest view and keenest insight into the cloud environment, AI tools walk past big-picture metrics and focus in on granular details. Read Now

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  Smooth IT troubleshooting with proper log storage

  Use a dedicated space to store and parse out log data. Monitoring alerts can eat up a lot of storage space, so it helps to enforce time-sensitive rotation policies that dictate how much data can live in long- versus short-term storage spaces. Read Now

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  Up the monitoring ante on container ops

  Containerized applications and microservices don't operate in the same way as monolithic applications, so monitoring and log management tools, as well as IT troubleshooting methods, have to adjust to match. Instead of relying on an old tool that doesn't quite fit the bill, instate a more targeted system that looks at the right data through the right lens. Read Now

2QA in the right environment for fewer issues

Some tools need time to gather data but pay off in the long run. And some issues never surface when quality assurance (QA) testers have an environment that matches production. These articles share techniques to deploy resilient, bug-free -- or nearly so -- applications that keep users happy.

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  Let software take care of itself -- mostly

  Self-healing architecture and software stacks resolve issues on their own and, sometimes, even predict conditions that could cause errors and prevent them from occurring at all. Self-healing architecture starts with monitoring, but admins have the final say on how to set up its IT troubleshooting processes. Read Now

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  Take time to play the long game

  Predictive analytics is anything but immediate. It takes time for a tool to collect enough data on app performance to provide meaningful information on its operation. But distributed applications on multiple platforms have a lot of moving parts, and it can be difficult -- to nearly impossible -- to keep track of them without this help. Read Now

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  Mirror the production environment for QA success

  No software or tool can ever be guaranteed to be bug-free, because QA can't predict every possible configuration that a user might put together or encounter, but a staging environment that exactly mirrors production is the best bet to get as close as possible. Read Now

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  Easily recreate the cloud architecture to stage testing

  When operating in the cloud, ops can exactly mimic the production environment to stage the application for testing. The benefits of the cloud include simple environment recreation and additional automation capabilities -- for a much lower cost than doing it on premises. Read Now

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  Improve app resiliency without breaking the bank

  The cost to buy new hardware for the sake of increasing application resiliency is prohibitive, not to mention the time-consuming install and spin-up process. Resiliency can be improved without additional servers if you take advantage of these five opportunities. Read Now