We Don't Have The Answer You Want

[Jay 2K Winger]

This technically happened to my CW "Newish" but I got pulled into it in a way.

So, at The Client, there is a limitation to the size of the files you can attach to an email. This is not unusual. Any email client has that kind of limitation. Let's say that the limitation is at 40MB.

Newish gets a call from the Sucktomer in question. He'd been trying to send these files to a few people, and had to break it down to several different emails, and managed to get the information to everyone except one person, who didn't get the last file, which was 50MB, and thus unable to be sent due to the limitation on [Secure Network].

SC wanted to know how he could get that file to the recipient. Newish told him his options:

1-- Have one of the other recipients forward it to her (since they were not on [SecNet] and thus had different (larger) limitations)
2-- Break the 50MB file into smaller files, if possible, and send them to the user that way.
3-- Contact The Client's data-transfer office, who will download the 50MB file onto removable media, take it to the recipient, and upload it to her computer.

Naturally, none of these options worked for SC. Newish came to me, asking what else she should tell him. After getting the story from her, I told her, "You gave him all the correct options. If he won't accept any of them, that's his problem. Those are his options." Newish agrees, said she told him those options, but he won't listen.

I'm not a supervisor, so really, speaking to the SC for Newish won't really get us anywhere. Newish does speak to Gobber (supervisor) and Batty (manager), relating the story, and they agree those are his options. Eventually, Batty gets on the phone and repeats what Newish told him.

SC still wasn't happy, but hung up, saying he'd find a way to make it work.

I should mention that one of the things that SC said to Newish was "it's after 5 o'clock, it should go through!" ... As if the file limitation were somehow related to the amount of current network traffic like that. It's a hard limit that's just in the system. ITSD can't override it. We can't change it either.

The only way it could get changed would be to send it up to the overall network admins, who won't just change it because one guy doesn't want to use the data-transfer office.

[Marlowe]

But... but... you're meant to do Magic and fix it for him! He's the customer! Clearly you have the power to magically teleport his data all over the world at the click of a button, but you just won't and it's BAD CUSTOMER SERVICE and you should be ASHAMED.

...That's how it works, right? Right?

*hides*

[emax4]

I wod suggest a corporate Dropbox account, but even moving it to the Shared folder requires thought and basic instructions. If he couldn't do any of the three options, he's S.O.L. I hope he realizes his circumstances if the people who need the file can't get it.

[Yfandes]

Did they even try to compress it?

[draco664]

Did they even try to compress it?

None of that technical talk here!

[suburbandecay]

I hate people that try to send more that 20MB through email. Email is not a file transfer protocol, and I am sick of giant attachments clogging my mail server.

[Jay 2K Winger]

I wod suggest a corporate Dropbox account, but even moving it to the Shared folder requires thought and basic instructions. If he couldn't do any of the three options, he's S.O.L. I hope he realizes his circumstances if the people who need the file can't get it.

Due to the nature of The Client, and that this was on The Client's secure intranet, Dropbox is not an option. They also block file storage sites like Dropbox, Google Drive, and similar on the Internet as well. They take infosec VERY SERIOUSLY.

Did they even try to compress it?

To be honest, I haven't seen much file compression done at The Client. I think the access to that feature is restricted to certain offices, like the data-transfer folks.

[ComputerNecromancer]

Could be worse. Many years back (late 80s) we had moved everybody from an old Nestar *disk* server (ie you could have virtual disks mounted from the server, but they were either shared read-only or exclusive accesss read write) to an actual *file* server (Netware).

But company email between the offices still used the old mail setup on the Nestar setup. Which was an Apple II with an Applecat modem (1200 baud *half duplex*).

We had set things up so we could use more modrern gear to move files for network updates and stuff and were planning to get everyone onto a mail system that'd use a modern machine for connections. But that wasn't going to happen for a year or so.

Enter one of the sales critters who decides he needs to send a spreadsheet to something like 40 people, spread over all 4 offices. It's only a meg or two...

First clue we had of the problem was when someone from one of the branch offices called asking why they hadn't gotten any email in hours.

So we go digging and discover that the poor apple has been working on sending this sales drone's email *all day*. A quick calculation shows that it'll be finished in about 4 or 5 more *days*.

Y'see each message got sent individually, so that meant *40* copies of the file.

Needless to say, we jumped thru some hoops to get the message killed, and "had words" with the drone and his supervisor (care to guess how much a 6 hour long distance call runs?)

And we used faster modem over the "update" setup to get *a* copy of the fie to each office with notices to the appropriate folks about where to find it.

Yeah, it was partly a matter of being stuck with older technology. But it was also a matter of the sales drone not bothering to *think*.

[wolfie]

But company email between the offices still used the old mail setup on the Nestar setup. Which was an Apple II with an Applecat modem (1200 baud *half duplex*)..

Enter one of the sales critters who decides he needs to send a spreadsheet to something like 40 people, spread over all 4 offices. It's only a meg or two...

Y'see each message got sent individually, so that meant *40* copies of the file.

I believe it's situations like this that spawned the expression "never underestimate the bandwidth of a station wagon loaded with backup tapes". If you're dealing with a 1200 baud modem, you send megabyte files via "sneakernet".

[draco664]

Due to the nature of The Client, and that this was on The Client's secure intranet, Dropbox is not an option. They also block file storage sites like Dropbox, Google Drive, and similar on the Internet as well. They take infosec VERY SERIOUSLY.

Not seriously enough if their employees are having to use email to send files around...

[mhkohne]

Not seriously enough if their employees are having to use email to send files around...

The thing is they've cut off every other way of doing file transfers that the users can do on their own. So the users do what they can (email). The advantage to email is that the it guys can put content scanning on the mail server.

Infosec doesn't mean cuttingg everyone off completely, it just means keeping them inside the building.