We have scheduled an upgrade of our internal email system to improve performance and add new features.

Date: Sunday, August 28th, 2016
Start Time: 12:00 AM CDT (GMT -5)
End Time: 2:00 AM CDT (GMT -5)
Maintenance Scope: Steadfast Email System (all steadfast.net email addresses)

Customer Impact:

During the maintenance, steadfast.net email addresses may be unavailable for up to 2 hours.  Email support requests will not be received promptly, but they will be processed when they are received after the maintenance completes.  This may cause temporary error messages and delayed responses to emailed tickets and ticket replies.

This maintenance will not impact any customer services or customer email systems.

If you need assistance during the maintenance, or if you have any questions about this planned work, please contact us via our helpdesk or by calling (312) 602-2689 or (888) 281-9449.

We have scheduled emergency maintenance to patch a critical vulnerability that affects all Steadfast Public Cloud hypervisors.  This issue only affects hypervisors managed via our public cloud control panel at https://vm.steadfast.net/.

Date: Sunday, August 7th, 2016
Start Time: 12:00 AM CDT (GMT-5)
End Time: 5:00 AM CDT (GMT-5)
Maintenance Scope: Rolling reboots of hypervisors

Customer Impact:

To minimize the impact of these reboots, we will perform migrations of all virtual machines to alternate hypervisors.  All currently supported templates should be able to migrate without a reboot.  In case a template does not support online migration or migration fails, affected virtual machines may experience up to two reboots during the maintenance.  Wherever possible, VMs will be moved once and left on the destination hypervisor.  In certain cases, VMs may need to be moved back to the original hypervisor in order to maintain service level commitments.

Please note that the maintenance scope noted above indicates the time required for the entire maintenance period.  Each VM should reboot no more than twice, though the reboots may occur at any time during the maintenance window.

Please note that customers with private hypervisors will be contacted separately to schedule hypervisor maintenance if required.  These hypervisors will not be rebooted until direct arrangements have been made with each customer.

If you need assistance during the maintenance, or if you have any questions about this planned work, please contact us via our helpdesk or by calling (312) 602-2689 or (888) 281-9449.

We have scheduled an upgrade of our help desk software (https://support.steadfast.net).  This update addresses minor bugs.

Date: Saturday, July 2nd, 2016
Start Time: 12:00 AM CDT (GMT -5)
End Time: 1:00 AM CDT (GMT -5)
Maintenance Scope: Help Desk at https://support.steadfast.net

Customer Impact:

The ability to submit tickets via email and the help desk, as well as the ability to view existing tickets and knowledgebase articles will be unavailable during parts of the maintenance.  Any requests submitted via email will be processed immediately after the maintenance is complete.

While the maintenance window has been set for 1 hour, we expect the upgrade process will take less than ten minutes to complete.  We are allowing extra time for testing and to deal with any unexpected issues that may occur.

If you need urgent assistance during the upgrade, please call us at (312) 602-2689.

We have scheduled an upgrade of our R1Soft Server Backup (formerly Idera Server Backup or R1Soft CDP) platform software on cdp01.steadfast.net to version 5.14.3.  This update introduces a revised disk safe format, adds support for XFS filesystem per-file restoration, and improves performance throughout the user interface.  There are several minor changes to the user interface, including new backup and verification status columns that appear on the servers list, an expanded server detail page, and an actions drop-down menu which replaces many individual action icons in some list views and gives expanded access to disk safe and policy operations from the servers list.

This upgrade is being performed during the daytime, mid-week, because it is the lowest utilization period.

Date: Tuesday, June 21st, 2016
Start Time: 3:00 PM CDT (GMT -5)
End Time: 6:00 PM CDT (GMT -5)
Maintenance Scope: cdp01.steadfast.net Backup Server

Customer Impact:

Backups will not be performed and restoration services will be unavailable during the maintenance period. This maintenance will not impact customer equipment or services other than backup tasks.

This maintenance window is expected to take substantially longer than usual because disk safes will need to be converted to the new data format prior to allowing new tasks to run.  Due to the large number of disk safes present, this may take several hours to complete.  Based on previous tests, we believe the three hour window is appropriate.  Any tasks that would have occurred during maintenance will be run immediately after it completes.

It is safe to upgrade the agent to version 5.14.3 before the manager has been upgraded.  There are no important changes to the agent in this release.

The full release notes may be viewed here.

If you have any questions regarding this maintenance, or for assistance in upgrading the agent on your server(s), please feel free to contact us via our helpdesk or by email.

We have scheduled emergency maintenance on our distribution switches in Edison, NJ to correct an issue that could result in unplanned loss of network services.  Due to the urgency, this work is scheduled for tonight.

Date: Friday, June 3rd, 2016
Start Time: 12:00 AM EDT (GMT -4)
End Time: 2:00 AM EDT (GMT -4)
Maintenance Scope: Distribution switches in Edison, NJ

Customer Impact:

During this maintenance we will be reintroducing a previously failed device into our virtual chassis configuration following repairs that were conducted earlier today.  To reduce the risk of similar issues in the future, we are also adding additional redundancy between the devices.  When the device is reintroduced, it will start in a disabled state to prevent an impact on traffic and be fully enabled after the system is confirmed to be stable.

There is no expected impact to customer traffic as a result of this maintenance, though some brief periods of localized inaccessibility and sub-optimal routing may occur.  The process is expected to take about 30 minutes to complete.  Additional time is being allowed in case of issues with the process and for testing following the work.

If you need assistance during the maintenance, or if you have any questions about this planned work, please contact us via our helpdesk or by calling (312) 602-2689 or (888) 281-9449.

We have scheduled emergency maintenance on a core router in Chicago, IL to correct an issue that could result in a router crash.

Date: Tuesday, April 12th, 2016
Start Time: 12:00 AM CDT (GMT -5)
End Time: 2:00 AM CDT (GMT -5)
Maintenance Scope: Core router in Chicago, IL

Customer Impact:

During this maintenance we will perform minor routing engine changes to mitigate a problem that could cause the router to crash.  Completing this work will prevent the crash and keep it from occurring in the future.  The other routers in Chicago and Edison are not experiencing this issue and do not require maintenance.

There is no expected impact to customer traffic as a result of this maintenance, though some brief periods of localized inaccessibility and sub-optimal routing may occur.  The process is expected to take about 30 minutes to complete.  Additional time is being allowed in case of issues with the process and for testing following the upgrade.

If you need assistance during the maintenance, or if you have any questions about this planned work, please contact us via our helpdesk or by calling (312) 602-2689 or (888) 281-9449.