On-call
Being available outside working hours to respond when production systems have a problem, usually in turns with colleagues.
Also written on call, on-call rota, standby, out-of-hours support
Mainframe systems run all day and night, and much of the important batch runs overnight. When something fails out of hours, someone has to respond. On-call means being that person for a period, such as a week, taking turns with colleagues on a rota.
While on call, you keep your phone and a way to connect to the systems nearby. If a job you support fails, the operators or production control call you, often following the runbook's instructions for who to contact. You connect, find out what happened, and either fix it, apply a temporary workaround, or decide it can wait until morning, depending on its impact.
A good handover makes on-call work much easier: what changed recently, what is unusual tonight, and what to watch. So does a clear runbook for each job.
Being on call teaches you the systems quickly, because you see them when they go wrong. Sites usually pay extra for it, and most limit how often each person is on the rota.
Where can I learn this hands-on?
Right here, at ZedBank. You take a junior job at a simulated bank and learn each part of the work by doing it, with Zed beside you. There's nothing to install.
Start at ZedBankRelated
- Production supportKeeping live systems running: diagnosing failures, fixing what broke, and getting the service back.
- IncidentAn unplanned interruption to a service, or a drop in its quality, which is logged, prioritised and worked on until the service is back.
- RunbookThe written procedure for operating a system or responding to a known failure, step by step.
- Critical pathThe chain of dependent batch jobs that decides when the whole batch run finishes; any delay on it delays the finish.
- OperatorThe person who watches the running systems, responds to messages, and starts, stops and recovers work.