PMS/PBX Down, unrecoverable?

[Moshimoshi]

We're having what appears to be a non-sensical problem with our PMS-Link between our PBX and an IOLAN box down to a Springer Miller systems interface box.

Essentially, the SMS (Springer Miller Systems) interface box uses a DIGI Card Serial card to connect with multiple interfaces (MICROS, PBX, Call Accounting, etc..) and the SMS tech made some change, and the PBX/PMS Link failed. We restored everything back to where it was before we started tinkering, both in software and hardware, and now the PMS-Link refuses to come back up.

I've tried busying-out the PMS-Link, Resetting the IOLAN, changing ports on the Interface machine, and even Springer Millers support is completely nonplussed by the issue.

The only indicator I have from the PBX side is:

Physical Link State: Up
Protocol State: Down

Maintenance Busy? no
Data Base Swapping? no

On the Springer Miller Interface side, I see:

No response from Lucent Definity to Periodic messachecking port - Empty!

It's been three or four days now, and our Hotel can't use its phones, SMS doesn't seem to know what they changed that caused the issue, and I want to rule out that it is on our side. I need to get this up and running however possible! Absolutely any and all help is welcome!

 

[avayastrongman79]

What about rebooting the SMS?

 

[MasterRacker]

Has SMS turned on debug logging on the Lucent interface?

Have you gotten Avaya / Your Avaya Business partner in to look at the serial port on the Definity?

Avaya's timing expectations on the serial port for a hospitality interface are really finicky.

(As an aside, if the interface was working, why was SMS tinkering with it?)

_____
Jeff
[small][purple]It's never too early to begin preparing for [/purple]International Talk Like a Pirate Day
"The software I buy sucks, The software I write sucks. It's time to give up and have a beer..." - Me[/small]

 

[Moshimoshi]

Thought of that - here's what we've done:

Rebooted individual interfaces on SMS

Rebooted SMS Interface computer completely

Uninstalled and reinstalled Digi board and Port Server

Busyout/Release PMS Link

Busyout/test long/release PMS link (Long test seemed to go forever and was cancelled out...not sure that this is a good sign)

Some swapping of serial ports among those we know that work

Still no good, I still get Physical link (UP), but Protocol on PMS down, I can ping (and telnet to) the 10.150.31.41 (IOLAN) from anywhere in the network, so I know its reachable, but its still no good. We're certain the PBX can send the data over our network, and SMS seems to indicate it can at least see the port, but no data is flowing.

 

[Moshimoshi]

MasterRacker

I will take these recommendations into consideration, since we need to get this up soon. As for why we were tinkering to begin with, our PMS link was only 'half' operational in that we were experiencing a PMS link-drop (minimum) 20 times a day, which interrupted checkin data transfer, housekeeping, etc. And were aiming to fix it.

I see that "debug" is on on the individual interfaces, but I don't know that they've started a debug against the PMS link from the PBX

As for PMS settings, I have some documentation that indicates (from the Lodging Administration menu) I should have access to PMS link parameters, but this doesn't appear, which threw a wrench in manual adjustment. Is this normally blocked out of the CUST login?

 

[MasterRacker]

I've probably reached the end of what I can suggest. In my case the system I used to support was directly serial cabled from a 16 port serial board to a G3si serial port. What the Definity expected to see on the serial port re ACKs/NAKS, packets, timing, etc. was really touchy.

In 3 years I was supporting that SMS system, we had 4 major PBX interface outages. 3 times it was solved by Avaya folks changing serial comm parameters / swapping hardware. One time it was solved by SMS changing some timing/retry parameters.

I seem to recall there is an interface debug mode but there is another deeper debug logging feature that can be turned on that logs every byte of traffic. I no longer work there and don't have access to my incident logs, so I can't provide any further detail. Good luck.

_____
Jeff
[small][purple]It's never too early to begin preparing for [/purple]International Talk Like a Pirate Day
"The software I buy sucks, The software I write sucks. It's time to give up and have a beer..." - Me[/small]

 

[Moshimoshi]

Found the solution to the problem. Problem was SMS.

The tech support I was working with not only claimed to have reset everything to their original settings after the initial changes that fubarred it, But I was also told that they had already tried all of the baud rates available for the PMS link, and apparently they did not. I can't make those changes, since its in the back end of their software and they won't give us access to it.

Looked at the IOLAN port configuration, looked at SMS, then called a buddy of mine over at SMS who I use to work with a lot as a night auditor, he made a quick change, moved the Baud to the rate I pointed out was set up in the IOLAN, and surprise, our link works again.

I am extremely disappointed right at this very moment. We had almost a week of outage due to one support tech's sloppiness, and from what I was told, he was one of their veterans.

SMS is slowly settling on me as a Caveat Emptor, but that is just one mans opinion. This ticks close, thank you all for the help! I feel as though I may have wasted your time, granted the answer.

 

[MasterRacker]

Glad you found it. Those interfaces can be finicky and sometimes you have to start from the beginning and go through every setting with a fine tooth comb.

It's dissapointing to hear you were down for week. Where I used to be, things would go ballistic if an outage lasted more than a couple of hours. I can't believe you didn't get more follow up from their end with an outage that long.

_____
Jeff
[small][purple]It's never too early to begin preparing for [/purple]International Talk Like a Pirate Day
"The software I buy sucks, The software I write sucks. It's time to give up and have a beer..." - Me[/small]

 

[ken07734]

are you using an 8400 data mod for the link? if so, try checking the settings on it and or swap that out.

 

[lomboye]

what are the settings you had for your IOLan? We want to convert from a serial interface to an IOLan in preparation for our upgrade from a G3r to a S8730. We also use Springer Miller -> Aceleport 4p -> IOLan -> PBX