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Hot Fix Hell ! - from now i'm calling Microsoft UK

7.50pm Friday - I'm writing one of my patented massive sql queries when I get a nice error "Server: Msg 4414, Level 16, State 1, Line 1 Could not allocate ancillary table for view or function resolution. The maximum number of tables in a query (256) was exceeded." I find that it is actually KB 828269.

So I jumped on the phone at about 7.59pm to 13 20 58 (Microsoft Support Australia) and request the hotfix.

8pm Friday - I'm then informed that they can't find the hotfix file on the server and I need to call back Monday to get this resolved (even though I impressed upon the Support Professional that our developer(s) were working over the weekend to delivery the system.

After calling a few other Australian numbers & an unreachable MCS consultant I decided to take this offshore.

A quick email to MCMS MVP (even though the hotfix was for SQL Server)Spencer Harbar (www.mcmsfaqs.com) got me the phone number of Microsoft UK Support.

1.55am Saturday - Supprisingly the phone was answered within 1 ring by a person(!) and they quickly took my request, created a case, transferred me to the SQL Team and then things started getting wierd...

Mike @ Microsoft Tech Support started taking the mickey out of me for working so late, he then told me without having to look up his records exactly where on www.microsoft.com I should look; the fact that I don't actually want that hotfix and there is a better 'security roll-up' I should download that included another 20 builds of fixes and the fact that it is publicly accessible.

He then took my mobile number; keep in mind I'm in Australia and he's in the UK and said he would call me in a few days to make sure the installation went OK and my problem was resolved.

As much as I love Microsoft Australia I think as I do most of my work between 6pm and 2am I'll just call Microsoft UK from now on.

2.11am Saturday - At the end of this the hotfix I applied only increased the number of tables/views I could reference by 4.

Time for a re-write.


Posted Oct 03 2004, 07:20 PM by anguslogan


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