As a co-worker and friend of Bob's I reiterate every word, when he left
Boeing he left a hole there in more ways than one, I had no idea talking
to him that he was sick, struggling in any way, he never let it on. his
friendship and contribution will surly be missed.
thanks Jim for filling in the holes for us.
RIP Bob
Carmen
On 2/10/2023 8:55 AM, Jim Marshall wrote:
Bob Richards will be missed by all up here in the greater DC area. When I was
the Data Center Technical Lead at the US Office of Personnel Management,
2001-2013, after retiring from the Air Force. I'd read Bob's posts and knew he
was well qualified. He and Rebecca were in Atlanta where Bob was working for
Suntrust Bank. He was let go and immediately I asked if he would be interested
to come to this area and work for my Systems Services contractor. He said yes
and he was hired, onsite and got to work in no time. This was in the late
2000s.
He worked with the team maintaining our z9BC Parallel Sysplex providing a 24/7
system for the US Federal Retirement & Healthcare Systems and also then OPM did
95% of all the Federal Background Investigations. It was an operation covering the
entire world. Bob and the team made my Disaster Recovery Plan come true when they
would fully recover our Sysplex at IBM Sterling Forest NY, in 24 hours with only up
to 5 seconds of Data loss and be able to run a 72 hour test of our worldwide
operation without impacting the 24/7 production systems in DC.
Bob did z/OS and really made me look good when the Data Center achieved 5 years
of Continuous Operations, including all the Database systems with only
unavailability of our system including all applications for 4 hours per week.
In 5 years we only had 28 hours of systems unavailability of which 18 hours was
due to UPS batteries which were 13 years old; non-IT management would not
spring for the money for new batteries until....
I retired in 2013 and tried to get Bob to apply his 8 years of Air Force
service into a Federal Job but he enjoyed what he did and if hired he'd fill my
old job which was strictly hands-off despite being an ACE Systems Programmer.
Bob knew the end was coming but worked up until a week before it was time.
My heart goes out to Rebecca and know she will miss Bob terribly. He was one
class act, a knowledgeable professional and fun to be around. He and the team
sure did make me look good in the eyes of the CIO, non-IT Management and our
retirees of which approximately 500K Federal Retirees are located overseas.
Thanks Bob and to Rebecca for supporting him on all those Sunday Mornings from
0500-0900 to do upgrades and changes getting all system up by 0900; speak about
pressure
Jim Marshall, USAF(Ret)
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Carmen
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