I had a strop on Twitter again about My Oracle Support, and I just want to document why.
Someone on Twitter pointed out to me that the “active” real-time SQL monitoring reports weren’t working. It’s really easy to demonstrate, so I ran through it, and sure enough it was broken. When you opened the report in a browser, some of the dependent files (Javascript and a Flash movie) were missing, giving a 404 error.
I opened a service request (SR) on My Oracle Support (MOS). The first hurdle was the “Problem Type”. It’s mandatory, and the list of options is crap. Keep in mind that what you pick launches you into a load of automations, so picking the wrong thing is painful, but you typically have to because there is no “none of the above” option to pick… I decided on a performance related option, since the issue was a to do with the real-time SQL monitoring feature, even though I know this was not about the performance of my database…
I gave a link to a working example, and uploaded a generated report and the output from the Chrome developer console, showing all the 404 errors. It was a pretty self contained thing, so I was sure it would be understood as soon as a human saw it. This is what happened next…
An automated response.
Another automated response.
Another automated response.
Another automated response.
By now you can imagine I’m getting a little annoyed, so this is my response.
This was followed by a repost of my original post. Word for word. Seemed rather strange, but ok…
This was followed by three automated messages saying the same thing.
I was about to go supernova at this point, but I managed not to lose my shit.
Finally we have someone claiming to be a human!
I get asked to look at something that wasn’t directly related to the point of my SR.
I can feel the rage building.
The following day the person actually runs my report, which was uploaded in my initial SR opener, and it works for them. They update the SR. Once I see the update I try and sure enough it works for me now too. At some point between me opening the SR and this last interaction the “missing” files on http://download.oracle.com/otn_software/ have become available again. I tell them to close the SR.
Thoughts
Remember, this is about as simple an SR as you can get. I posted a test case to demonstrate it. It was really self-contained and simple. I don’t want to think what would happen with a “difficult” issue.
The “Problem Type” selection during SR creation is a problem. I understand MOS want to use it to help automate the gathering of information, but it needs a “none of the above” option, or you are *forced* to pick something you know is wrong.
The automated messages are terrible. I ranted about this before, which resulted in this post.
MOS Auto Responses : What’s my problem with them?
After that post I got a message from Oracle wanting to talk about it. That resulted in this post.
My Oracle Support (MOS) : Where do we go from here?
The messages that came out of that meeting were really positive, but it’s over 2.5 years later and if anything it’s got worse…
Someone from Oracle Support has reached out to me, so I have a call with them tomorrow. I’m not sure this call will result in any positive change. It feels a bit like groundhog day…
Overall, My Oracle Support (MOS) is a terrible user experience, and Oracle should not be charging this much money for this terrible service.
Cheers
Tim…
PS. It’s 2022. Why can’t people call me “Tim” rather than “Timothy”?
PPS. Please Oracle, stop breaking URLs…
PPPS. Please read the follow-up post here.
I suspect a relatively significant percentage of MOS ticket owners have difficulty categorizing their SRs and at times I end up putting mine in a “basket of deplorables” where I hope I can eventually commune with a human.
In plenty cases I can solve problems by just using the support website (aka Metalink). The few times a year I need to raise a SR, I start with drinking some alcohol, meditate for 5 min. Then I start on the SR and am wondering what rabbit hole they are going to send me. But even when I manage to get a human and it is at times handed over between engineers who asks me to repeat the same thing the previous engineer asked me to do and the results were already uploaded, I would voluntarily report to firing squad to be put out of my misery. My record is that the SR became so long (Severity 1, follow the sun), they opened a new SR. They should have applied “select distinct text” on the original SR.