Indosoft deploys contact center solutions all over the world. We prefer that our clients purchase server hardware from vendors like DELL, directly. With so many things changing, it is always a challenge to get everything in order. Call center solutions have too many moving parts. We use Ubuntu, Asterisk and our call center software Q-Suite. We have a nifty installer which keeps track of all our SVN, database and OS deployment packages. It is still a challenge due to the sheer complexity of the world of call centers.
In one of our recent deployments, we were forced to upgrade to Ubuntu 9.0x because DELL had moved on from the world of DELL 2950 servers to a newer generation hardware. Everything looked great and we completed the install in 2 days and had them working well during our testing period which lasted a day. Next day morning when the contact center shift started and the first agent of the call center tried to login, Apache seg faulted. We restarted Apache and nervously watch the call center operation and everything worked well for the rest of the day. The day after morning, again as the first call center agent tried to login, Apache seg faulted. A quick restart and the day goes by without any hitch. There is very little tolerance for disruption in contact centers as it disturbs their rhythm. In this case, there was little disruption to the smooth operation of the contact center but eye brows were being raised. Of course some of our bright computer scientists were able to identify the issue. Apache kept is DBI connections alive overnight but MySQL closed it. When Apache tried to connect it failed and something did not handle the error properly. The solution was in place but the watch of the contact center continued for a week .
As you all know, clients start questioning about the quality of the call center software, its maturity, our capability to deploy call center solutions etc. It appears like everyone is so on the edge. It is incredible. Everything seems to be on demand and ‘Just in time’.