NHU-PAC routine outages changed

Following December’s NHU-PAC server software upgrade, NHAIS Services has changed some of the database maintenance routines. This includes changes to some of the scheduled downtimes for the NHU-PAC. These changes are now reflected on the Known Issues page (there’s a link under NHU-PAC’s HELP! tab), whence comes the following:

Routine outages: The NHU-PAC is restarted every Monday morning as part of a backup procedure. Beginning at 6:00 a.m. each Monday you may not be able to connect to the NHU-PAC or may find search functions not working. Service is usually restored by 6:10 a.m. The NHU-PAC is also restarted on the last Tuesday of each month. This is usually done as early as possible in the morning but may happen during business hours depending on NHAIS staff schedules. We will attempt to post a System Messages alert on the NHAIS Notes blog in advance of the outage, which should last less than 15 minutes. Also, it is occasionally necessary to rebuild NHU-PAC’s searching indexes, leading to a brief (5 minute) searching outage to install the newest indexes. This is usually done before 7:45 a.m. on weekdays. A System Messages alert will be posted on the NHAIS Notes blog just prior to the outage.

Next Tuesday (February 22) is the last Tuesday of the month so expect the NHU-PAC to be offline for a few minutes in the morning. This is in keeping with a survey conducted last year about preferred times for routine outages that need to happen during the day; a plurality favored Tuesdays before 10 a.m.