SeptimusDova wrote: »

Gina thank you so much for your dedication to the playerbase.

Solar storms at levels g4 and g5 are disruptive to backhaul circuits. Any DS3 or higher Microwave path is a feedpoint into the system. I am very tired my friends so I will post the graphs. I will answer any questions pertaining to solar weather after I rest. On the graphs you will see K4 which coincides with NOAA and NASA and GOES.

UrQuan do you work backhaul?

K index


7 day indice below




When High frequency radio is mentioned that is referring to 1.8-30Mhz radio traffic.

Backhaul and space diversity systems and wave-guide systems with degraded magnetic isolators can act as transmission paths for voltage induced by Solar variances. waveguide to radio, radio to mux, mux to bes56, bes 56 to CLN. Its been awhile since I was in a NOC or a backhaul site. Some .gov sites we hardened to help prevent damage to equipment. Running spares often became an issue due to tired techs and contractors trying to adhere to the five 9's. Parts would be used and not annotated as such. the used were put back in a box and would not be turned in on time. Which created problems. The wiltel FAA site in AZ had this issue on 2004 and so did the riverside site. Level3 com. I am not sure how they handle their operations.

Supply voltage side on some sites were filtered and regulated via DC. But that is not the topic of this thread. I feel sorry for the affected companies and for the providers. If indeed their systems were damaged it can get expensive. Even more so if they were running any old Nortel systems.

I've been working in industry a long time & while I understand some of what you are saying can you clarify a few things?
Personally I can't remember a single outage on the carrier level due to "solar disturbance".
Are there notes on this happening or happening frequently at various locations?
You state "are disruptive to backhaul circuits", are there not multiple pathways & failovers? Is there no redundancy? (both on the carrier side & ZOS's side)

Traditionally, many larger companies have multiple carriers so if Verizon goes down, AT&T is still up & vice versa; you just have to reroute the traffic & everything still works.

I'm sure everyone would like to believe that ZOS has their own data center but more than likely they have probably rented/leased a co-location aka colo so they don't own the location or the (internet) pipe coming in, they may not even own the servers, & definitely don't own the infrastructure which SHOULD contain multiple ISP's with failover & redundant paths which baffles me why it apparently doesn't due to us being down.

This makes troubleshooting a bit of a pain (as it's a vendor contacting a vendor contacting a vendor contacting...you get the point) but drastically cuts cost for them as they don't have to pay 24/7 staff for support. Instead they enter a contract with the on-site services people where ZOS may pay for added support. This will allow them to not be responsible & yet hold someone else accountable during an outage. This is fairly standard industry practice, is one of the things I really hate & think sucks about the industry.

Per the level 3 outage map that was posted earlier, and assuming the information of the servers being in Texas is correct, it shows issues being in Austin & Plano currently.

The OC-whatever & DS-whatever lines that are running underneath are just cabling right? So the cabling shouldn't be affected, it should just be the circuitry in the telco room at the colo & that room should be shielded by being a metal room or something that would not be conductive/affected by the "solar disturbance".

qpviper1qp wrote: »

Just figured out everything guys! Did some research into level 3 and turns out the president of the company's name is Molag Bal! Can't believe we didn't see this coming!!

Now you will go blind, age 30 years and live in a cave talking to chosen ones. Have fun with that. On the bright side you'll meet three cool companions and a weird English dude.

I think what they are going to find out about the Level 3 outage had to do with the microburst that knocked down power poles in the Phoenix Arizona metro area. A lot of rain occurred in a short amount of time soaking the downed power lines, causing voltage EMP spikes that cascaded throughout the system knocking out power across the network. One of Level 3's hubs is in that area.

Is it just me or do we look at a major Cyber Attack? I know you cannot just take guesses. But what I see when I see the outtages is that all major centers of US have been affected. Also some that harbor military installations.

But of course you would see the outtage best where there is intense use and network infrastructure.

https://imgur.com/a/9fNKD#0

robwolf666 wrote: »

Really? So, how come everyone can obviously get online to talk about it? Or is it a server specifically for gaming?
Oh well, guess I'll be waiting patiently...

Different internet services use different methods of communicating, a forum will use different ports and configurations to a web site which will also use different ports and configurations to a game, sometimes a network can have issues connecting to some ports/configurations while other connections pass through fine, sometimes you could have a game, a forum and a standard website running off the same IP address and the network only goes down for one of them, it all depends on what protocols are being used and what protocols are being affected by the outage.

qpviper1qp wrote: »

Just figured out everything guys! Did some research into level 3 and turns out the president of the company's name is Molag Bal! Can't believe we didn't see this coming!!

mmd

ZOS_MichaelServotte wrote: »

@Runs : All major updates with information relaterd to this maintenance have been devtracked, this way players can find them easily right here.
Also, we are making sure we are using the maximum of tools at our disposal to let players know when the maintenance is over: Facebook, Google+, Twitter, Service Alerts & the Service Alert messages on the game launcher.

Thank you @ZOS_MichaelServotte and @ZOS_GinaBruno for being the watch keepers through the night (and morning). It's reassuring to have Devs hang with us.

SLy_Kyti wrote: »

Pretty interesting but I'm sure the thought of it gives English grammar teachers nightmare's.

Was that intentional?

Belidos wrote: »

ViscousSummer88 wrote: »

at the end of the day Level 3 are not the only supplier, the data centre they use is not the only data centre.

For all intents and purposes in that area Level3 IS the only supplier, they own a large majority of the Backbone network, and almost all internet traffic in that area goes through them no matter which ISP you use, it wouldn't matter whether ZOS uses AT&T, Verizon, ComCast or any other provider, they all go through Level3's network. So no they don't really have a choice in the matter.

After figuring out I wouldn't be playing ESO for awhile I turned on the Roku streaming player & TV - got a real slow connection, thought what da heck? booted up the laptop and it sat there spinning like my car does in winter. Came back to forums to see it was a Lvl 3 outrage. It messed with more than just ESO. I have Comcast in the NW and this outrage affectedly made me pick up a book. It's a nice book though!

Funny now, sources reporting that Battlefield 4 is having login issues across all platforms.

Miss my darkshade pledge last night and get banished cells today... most liked dungeon to most hated dungeon... screw you servers... screw you.

Enodoc wrote: »

Laplace wrote: »

So... What happened exactly? I got kicked from the server last night, my guild's Skype chat said they all did too, so I just rage quit and went to bed.

Somebody spill coffee in the server room?

@Laplace Major outage at the network provider, Level3.

So NSA got carried away, again.

@ZOS_JessicaFolsom , @ZOS_RichLambert

I guess Gina is gonna need to sleep in today a bit, after working all night. Make sure she has a big cup of coffee when she gets in.

ZOS_MichaelServotte wrote: »

@SLy_Kyti it's already the morning around here.

Gina will get some well deserved sleep, and I'll be there to keep you updated as soon as I got news for you. Meanwhile I'm reading this thread and I just found the best picture ever. This is disturbing.

However, I have to ask @ZOS_MichaelServotte which picture?