January 2014 Summaries

Chef is a tool that automates configuration and installation of packages on various operating systems, including Windows. It allows users to add new servers confidently and quickly by providing a reliable process for deployment. Chef has great Windows support, making it easier to extend its coverage to include Windows servers. The use of Chef enables the automation of tasks such as creating directories, controlling services, and running scripts, which can be easily replicated on both Linux and Windows platforms. Additionally, Chef provides features like installing Windows features, using Windows installers, and automating IIS sites and applications. These features make it easier to deploy and manage servers in a production environment.

The Postmark email service experienced a major four-hour outage from 4:49am to 8:49am EST, which was the longest outage since its launch in 2010. The outage occurred due to an update to a database table that caused a background services failure and resulted in messages being queued but not sent during the downtime. Despite initial attempts to recover the table, it took manual intervention and recreating the table from scratch to resolve the issue. Fortunately, there were no reported lost emails, and sending and inbound functionality was restored after four hours. To avoid similar issues in the future, Postmark plans to have a plan B in place for unexpected problems and is working with Percona to identify potential solutions.