TeamCast
September 18, 2001
v. 4.2
Jetnet: http://jetnet.aa.com/
Teamsite: http://10.151.62.137/
"The user IS the content." (Marshall McLuhan)
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Welcome to the weekly e-mail newsletter update for content owners involved in development of the AMR employee portal, Jetnet. If there are additional members of your team who should receive this newsletter, please let us know.
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IN CASE YOU MISSED IT ...
More than half of the people who receive this weekly newsletter aren't in the ITS department, and thus probably did not see the full message CIO Monte Ford sent to the ITS staff late last week. It's republished here primarily as a recognition that one of the best kinds of support we can provide to the company and the national economy is, as hard as it may seem, to get get back to something resembling "business as usual."

Monte wrote: "That subtle roar you hear from time-to-time utside the windows of our building is the sound of an airline rebuilding itself. It is the sound of mobility and freedom. The engines that are thrusting our planes back across the skies of the world symbolize what Don Carty referred to yesterday when he told us that freedom of movement ... just one of the freedoms our nation values so highly. It is our job to provide the technology to keep this airline going -- even in these most difficult of times. Don said it best yesterday ... we are airline people, this is what we do. ITS will deliver on its part of our company's challenge."

That said, let's get back to work. This is what we do.

"MOORE" GOOD NEWS
As most of you know, since the events of last Tuesday, I have been temporarily re-assigned to Corporate Communications. Those of you who receive "HeAAds Up!" are probably sick and tired of seeing mail from me in your Groupwise Inbox.

Well, worry not ... as we move toward full rollout of Jetnet over the next several weeks, the main responsibilities of Content Management and Migration will be transferring into to the more-than-capable hands of Linda Moore of Sarah Wagner's Tools & Standards team. I will still be helping her out, of course, but those of you who don't know Linda will quickly find she is both more pleasant and more organized than yours truly, so you're coming out way ahead!

For the near term, any questions you send to me via e-mail, please be sure to cc: Linda. And speaking of contacting me, I have relocated back up to the 5th floor and have a new cube (5W-5C-72) and a new phone number (ICS/817-963-2009). As of right now, Tuesday afternoon (ooooh ... that was a great old Moody Blues song), my voice mail is working.

Linda will also be taking over distribution of this newsletter starting in October; remember, her personal anagram is "An Ideal Moron," and she's the one who came up with the name "TeamCast," so it obviously will be in good hands.

PRIORITIES IN ORDER?
As further proof that the Portal team, like the rest of the AMR family, has its priorities in order during this difficult time, this morning Diane Dunn posted a "Top 10" list of Portal team priorities, including minor little concerns like "get Staging environment up" and "Complete testing." The #1 item on Diane's list, though, was this ... so take it to heart:

1. Call the special hotline number (1-800-473-6125) to call your member of Congress to support legislation benefiting AA and the airline industry . Please try again, if it is busy or doesn't go through. This legislation is critical to the survival of our airline and our industry.

AND NOW ... THE NEWS!
So, you think we're gonna miss a deadline? Don't count on it. As Jetnet Diane wrote to her team recently, "We've all jumped in to try to cover and identify contingencies, but in light of the week's events, we have lost two days ... but we will plan to continue to have a live site available and production ready on 9/19, [though] will defer the mail drop to Friday 9/21." What that means for content owners is this:

- Everything will be live as planned on Wednesday (tomorrow!)
- Actual users aren't likely to start hitting the site until Monday or Tuesday

This is a good thing, because we do have a number of content updates to make before that time. Most of them are either the responsibility of the portal team (Linda, Erin Marshall and myself) or of Corporate Communications, and those have all been addressed in separate e-mails.

First, remember: even though you can't see Jetnet right now to check your work, you CAN continue posting your material to the Staging area so it won't stack up any further. Corey can let you know if something you posted didn't arrive properly.

Theoretically, the staging environment will be back up for view by Thursday, so if you want to wait until Thursday afternoon to get started, that's fine -- as long as we are up to speed by COB Friday!

Again, the new "Live" Jetnet will be the production environment; what up until now has been the live environment, the staging environment, will be used for testing your material before you post it live. The drop-down menus on your Teamsite interface will also change to reflect this.

Once everything is in place, updating your material live will be the simple matter of "Getting Latest" from your work area in order to capture the changes you've made to staging, and then pushing those out to production.

A special issue of TeamCast will be distributed when staging and production are both ready for viewing.

Now here's the really good news ... your passwords for accessing the production environment will be the same as the ones you are currently using for staging. As soon as the production environment is up, you should log in, even if you don't have any changes, to make sure this is the case. If you have any problems, contact both Linda and me with the details.

That's all for now; of course, as soon as information on the specific time and date Staging again becomes available is out, Linda or I will get it to you. In the meantime, thanks again for your cooperation and good work.

JUST FOR LAFFS ...
There is a school of thought that humor is inappropriate in times of crisis ... and I will agree, to a point, that some types of humor are crass at best and callous at worst. But there's an old proverb that says "laughter is the best medicine," and old proverbs become old proverbs because they have some truth to them. So here goes ...

This story has been making the rounds of "internet humor" mailing lists for some years, and may be part of that burgeoning class or "urban legends," but decide for yourself.

An airline gate agent in Denver got plenty of good karma points for being smart and funny, and making her point when confronted with a passenger who probably deserved to fly as cargo.

During the final days at Denver's old Stapleton airport, a crowded fight was canceled. A single agent was re-booking a long line of inconvenienced travelers. Suddenly, and angry passenger pushed his way to the desk. He slapped his ticket down on the counter and said, "I HAVE to be on this flight and it has to be FIRST CLASS!"

The agent replied, "I'm sorry sir, I'll be happy to try to help you, but I've got to help these folks first, and I'm sure we'll be able to work something out."

The passenger was unimpressed. He asked loudly, so that the passengers behind him could hear. "Do you have any idea who I am?"

Without hesitating, the gate agent smiled and grabbed her public address microphone. "May I have your attention please?" she began, her voice bellowing through the terminal. " We have a passenger here at the gate WHO DOES NOT KNOW WHO HE IS. If anyone can help him find his identity, please come to gate 17."

With the folks behind him in line laughing hysterically, the man glared at the agent, gritted his teeth and and made a comment that cannot be reprinted here without the corporate e-mail smut filter setting off alarms. But you can imagine what he said. And without flinching, the agent smiled and said, "I'm sorry sir, but you will have to stand in line for that too."

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TeamCast is an informal, internal publication for content owners on Jetnet, the forthcoming AMR employee portal. It is not associated in any way with Interwoven, creators of Teamsite.

The content of this newsletter is proprietary and not to be shared with any individual not already on the distribution list. Do not forward without permission. © 2001 AA.

Contact information:
Mick Doherty
mick.doherty@aa.com
817-963-1816 office
817-919-2870 cell

Just to see if anyone reads this far down, here's today's poll question: should we put Linda's home phone number on this list so she's available 24/7 to answer your questions?