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 How to get software problem resolved in a sensible time frame

Hideyuki Yahagi's profile image
Hideyuki Yahagi posted Wed February 19, 2025 02:53 AM

Hello,

There is a reproducible bug in LPP on IBM i 7.5 that we have asked STSC to resolve.
However, 376 days (4 escalations along the way) after the report, it still has not been resolved.

Does anyone have ideas or escalation paths on how to get this resolved early?
Any help would be appreciated.

Thank you.




Feb. 21, 2025 update

Thank you very much for your useful comments and answers.



Malloy-san,
 
Thank you for sharing your experience.
 
> ...during our 3 years for this problem, we met monthly with IBM Managment and Lead Developer responsible for this area of the code to talk about priorities, impact and overall status.
 
We (and most people) cannot wait three years.
And it would be difficult to have monthly meetings with IBM personnel except for critical issues.
 
Satid-san,
 
> Are you certain that in your case the solution must only be from IBM SW fix? 
 
Yes, unfortunately, we are aware that no alternative S/W exists.
One of the reasons for this is that I understand that my case occurs only in Japanese (DBCS) environment. Furthermore, this was an extension of the IBM i's own functionality, and no alternative solution could be found.
 
Schramm-san,
 
> If you would like to discuss this issue further, you can reach out to me privately with the case number.
 
Case number is TS015414926.
I would appreciate it if you could let us know if there is anything I can do for this case.

Rich Malloy's profile image
Rich Malloy IBM Champion posted Wed February 19, 2025 09:42 AM

I'm sorry to hear that....we once had a bug that was deep down in SLIC related to some temp storage issues we were having; it took roughly 3 years for IBM to resolve. Sometimes, depending on where the issue is and how often / impactful they think the issue is to customers will often dictate the speed in which they can or will resolve an issue. And sometimes, depending on where the problem is, you don't want them to 'rush' thru it......Having said that...during our 3 years for this problem, we met monthly with IBM Managment and Lead Developer responsible for this area of the code to talk about priorities, impact and overall status. I think regular communication and expectation setting is vital with problems like this.  No, this doesn't help get the problem fixed sooner, you're doing all you can per se, but..try asking for ongoing monthly meetings with the dev person/team involved etc. 

Satid S's profile image
Satid S posted Wed February 19, 2025 07:41 PM

Based on my past experience with IBM i since its time of OS/400, some issues can be addressed equally effectively with alternative solution that is not from IBM producing SW fix.  Are you certain that in your case the solution must only be from IBM SW fix?  If you provide sufficient details of your issue, someone may be able to suggest alternative(s) to address the issue without having to wait for IBM's response. 

Tracy Schramm's profile image
Tracy Schramm posted Thu February 20, 2025 08:48 AM

If you would like to discuss this issue further, you can reach out to me privately with the case number.

Tracy Schramm

Manager, IBM i Global Support Center

Database / Data Access and Language and Utilities Teams

ace ace's profile image
ace ace posted Fri February 21, 2025 05:47 AM

> 376 days...

Don't feel alone ; P mine for ICU (somewhat in the same area of languages and scripts) is 300 day old; but I have received an answer yesterday that apparently they are trying to fix at least the CVEs, so at least some action! (despite I think that the technical debt regarding unicode processing is accumulating badly at this point)... 

Tracy Schramm's profile image
Tracy Schramm posted Fri February 21, 2025 05:11 PM

Hello, We will continue communication via case updates to TS015414926.

Thank you,

Tracy Schramm