Should HAL go paperless?

[bdcbbq]

I always print an itinerary for all my trips, with copies of air, hotel reservations etc, and keep it in my laptop bag. Mostly for peace of mind and place to jot notes. I've never really had a cause to use it, but I guess old habits die hard ;)

 

I download them all to my TREO and keep a back up copy on the disk in my wallet. :D

[jhannah]

And when you print the docs off the internet, you use YOUR paper not theirs. :D

Yes, you do. One sheet of paper, front and back, for the express boarding pass.

[unclerich]

And when was the last time you thought about your "passbook" savings account? And going to the bank so they could 'enter' your interest?:)

 

Richard

[fcorey]

I download them all to my TREO and keep a back up copy on the disk in my wallet. :D

 

for work travel i do keep some stuff on my blackberry...but there is no way I carry it on vacation, my wife would hit me over the head with it...or worse yet toss it overboard :eek:

[RuthC]

And when was the last time you thought about your "passbook" savings account? And going to the bank so they could 'enter' your interest?

Um, I still have a couple of those accounts.

One of the things that concerns me about e-documents is what happens the day when there is a complete system/power failure. True, it won't happen often, but when it does it's doing to be a doozie of a difficulty.

I'm remembering August, 2003 when there was a huge power failure in the eastern half of the United States. Trying to check in for the cruise from NYC was a challenge. Among other things, I was glad for those pieces of paper in my hand.

[Sunshine91]

Herb - paper or plastic? OMG! I like the way you think. Had a good giggle at that one. And I agree with you.

Sail & KK - Someday you will be required to give up those numbers. Social Security recipients MUST have their benefit checks direct deposited, a form of e-banking. Just curious - how do you handle bill-paying on longer cruises? I guess that's probably best for another thread.

Ruth - You are absolutely right about systems failures. There HAVE to be back-up procedures in place. E-docs will only work if the cruisers print the forms themselves. That way there is still a hard copy, just like the ticket booklets of today. I don't see how we can go completely paperless, because we still depend on that e-juice to run the computers.

[fcorey]

Um, I still have a couple of those accounts.

 

One of the things that concerns me about e-documents is what happens the day when there is a complete system/power failure. True, it won't happen often, but when it does it's doing to be a doozie of a difficulty.

 

 

RuthC, I understand your concern. In one of my old jobs I was part of a team that designed a hospital records system. Because we were dealing with confidential medical records there were security, as well as reliability concerns. Such a system can be built, but requires careful planning. Power failure is the easiest to take care of. Personally I have discovered that having a generator to power the essentials in an emergency is a good thing especially in the cold winters up here :)

[cruznon]

I'm sure that e-docs are inevitable, but I much prefer the arrival of docs in the lovely blue pleather wallet. It's so exciting to have those docs in hand...then there's the docs dance.

 

e-docs...bummer

[bdcbbq]

for work travel i do keep some stuff on my blackberry...but there is no way I carry it on vacation, my wife would hit me over the head with it...or worse yet toss it overboard :eek:

 

My wife would take hers with her. She has Scrabble installed and loves to play it. She would spend quite a bit of time curled up, with a cup of coffee playing it on sea days, while I was in the casino.:)

[SnorkelBear]

I'm okay with HAL going "paperless", but won't the cost of all those bidets be prohibitive?:rolleyes:

[sail7seas]

Sail & KK - Someday you will be required to give up those numbers. Social Security recipients MUST have their benefit checks direct deposited, a form of e-banking. Just curious - how do you handle bill-paying on longer cruises? I guess that's probably best for another thread.

 

 

:) Unless my thinking changes by the time we receive SS Checks......if that ever actually happens and they don't run out of money.......

 

I'll probably open a separate account just for that use and keep our other funds elsewhere.

 

Seems every day we hear about someone who had their laptop stolen from their car or house and it contained information that was not encoded and they were never authorized to have downloaded onto their computers.

 

Remember all the veterans records. Sovereign Bank had a biggie theft of information recently. Not a week goes by we don't hear of another security breach of our carefully protected information.

[RevNeal]

SnorkelBear ... you BEAT ME TO IT ... by seconds!!!!!

 

When I read Brian's Thread Title I started laughing and clicked on to respond: "if not paper, then what are we expected to use ... our hands??? Won't that cause Norwalk problems?????" :D :rolleyes:

[kryos]

And when was the last time you thought about your "passbook" savings account? And going to the bank so they could 'enter' your interest?:)

Wow! I forgot about that. Yep, a blast from the past. :)

 

Blue skies ...

 

--rita

[kryos]

Um, I still have a couple of those accounts.

One of the things that concerns me about e-documents is what happens the day when there is a complete system/power failure. True, it won't happen often, but when it does it's doing to be a doozie of a difficulty.

Not a concern at all. I am sure HAL has a very sophisticated backup/recovery mechanism in place. I am sure they also have redundancy built into their system. The info is stored in several places not in any way linked, but backed up and synchronized on a regular basis ... perhaps daily, perhaps even hourly. If a massive power failure struck which took out the entire database (perhaps causing physical damage to the disk array by a surge, etc.), the system would automatically switch over to one of the backup sites ... located in another building and probably another state, and continue running from that. When the original site was back up ... repairs or replacement drives in place, the data would be synched from the backup site and then switched back over.

 

Believe me, HAL wouldn't be caught with their pants down in a situation like this. They have too much money tied up in those reservations and if they would theoretically lose the database before a cruise, they could leave themselves open for major fraud ... people claiming to have reservations, but actually didn't.

 

True, you and I are probably very careless in backing up our information on our pc's at home. I hate to admit this ... but I've never done a full backup of my database here at home. But even I take some precautions ... like sending important files via email to myself at work, and then storing them on a network drive there ... a drive that is automatically backed up every single night ... by this handy robotic system called ADIC ... a system our union fought like hell against, but is now actually proving to be a blessing.

 

Businesses, unlike you and me, can't afford a lax attitude concerning their disaster recovery options. There is too much at stake. Don't ever worry about HAL losing all the information. It won't happen. Not in this day and age of relatively low cost backup schemes.

 

Blue skies ...

 

--rita

[xpcdoojk]

I like my cruise documents. I like to read thru them. If it was on my computer screen I would look at them like I did about half of the replies on this thread (I didn't read em:D ). I find reading the documents very educational and I want to receive mine. As far as check in goes, anyone with access to a computer that doesn't do everything online before they leave for the cruise deserves to be stuck in the line for the terminally slow. :p

 

jc

[Himself]

I don't have a problem with E-Ticketing. I have used them on Airlines for several years. I usually download a receipt from the website at the t ime I order

[RuthC]

[FONT=Comic Sans MS][SIZE=3][COLOR=royalblue]Just a quick question for Frank and Rita---you didn't address this part in your posts:[/COLOR][/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=Comic Sans MS][SIZE=3][COLOR=#4169e1]How is HAL supposed to process all those e-documents at check-in when there's no electricity? How do you access all those back-up systems you're talking about when you can't run the darned things? [/COLOR][/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=Comic Sans MS][SIZE=3][COLOR=#4169e1][/COLOR][/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=Comic Sans MS][SIZE=3][COLOR=#4169e1]That check-in in NYC during the power failure was a mess, but at least there was a paper trail. The balance of what needed to be done could be handled once on board, but ya had ta get there first. [/COLOR][/SIZE][/FONT]

[bepsf]

[quote name='RuthC']
[FONT=Comic Sans MS][SIZE=3][COLOR=#4169e1]How is HAL supposed to process all those e-documents at check-in when there's no electricity? How do you access all those back-up systems you're talking about when you can't run the darned things? [/COLOR][/SIZE][/FONT]

[/quote]

[FONT=Garamond][SIZE=4]They could run an extension cord from the ship...[/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=Garamond][SIZE=4];) :D[/SIZE][/FONT]

[RuthC]

[FONT=Comic Sans MS][SIZE=3][COLOR=royalblue]Of course, Brian. How silly of me. :rolleyes: And they could borrow all the power strips they want from the passengers bringing them for all their own electronic equipment. [/COLOR][/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=Comic Sans MS][SIZE=3][COLOR=#4169e1]Just don't let anyone onboard until the processing is finished. Or else something's gonna go pheept! :D [/COLOR][/SIZE][/FONT]

[Randyk47]

E-docs or no e-docs there'd be a real problem checking anybody in if the computers went down. Remember e-docs are just another form of the "mailed" documents that you download from the Internet rather than have them mailed to you. The information on the computer at the terminal is the same and is not directly impacted by how you got your documents.

[fcorey]

[quote name='RuthC'][FONT=Comic Sans MS][SIZE=3][COLOR=royalblue]Just a quick question for Frank and Rita---you didn't address this part in your posts:[/COLOR][/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=Comic Sans MS][SIZE=3][COLOR=#4169e1]How is HAL supposed to process all those e-documents at check-in when there's no electricity? How do you access all those back-up systems you're talking about when you can't run the darned things? [/COLOR][/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=Comic Sans MS][SIZE=3][COLOR=#4169e1][/COLOR][/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=Comic Sans MS][SIZE=3][COLOR=#4169e1]That check-in in NYC during the power failure was a mess, but at least there was a paper trail. The balance of what needed to be done could be handled once on board, but ya had ta get there first. [/COLOR][/SIZE][/FONT][/QUOTE]

The hospital system we built had two generators the size of semi trailers, each had two diesel powerplants in them and a UPS system with battery power. When they lose power, the computer and critical systems run on battery for about 60 seconds, but there is capacity on the UPS for about 90 minutes with everything running. When they are running on UPS it triggers a transfer switch that starts up the generators, cant miss when that happens all 4 smokestacks come roaring to life. Once the generators are spun up and running at full power (about a minute) the power is then fed by them rather than battery. They stay running as long as power is off, once power has been restored and up for 5 minutes the transfer switch then moves back to the street power source and begins to shut down the generators. Each generator had a diesel tank with about 800 gallons. I dont remember offhand how long they could run but I know it was more than 24 hours.

Brian, extension cords! Why didnt I think of that one ;)

[RuthC]

[FONT=Comic Sans MS][SIZE=3][COLOR=royalblue]So, Frank, what you're saying is that as long as we're checking in for our cruise at your hospital there's no problem. [/COLOR][/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=Comic Sans MS][SIZE=3][COLOR=#4169e1]Is that it? :confused: [/COLOR][/SIZE][/FONT]

[fcorey]

RuthC, I'd be more than happy to design a system for HAL, I may even accept cruises as payment ;)

[HeatherInFlorida]

I love E-Docs! We had them our last 2 cruises with Celebrity and as someone else said, once over the initial shock I really found them much better than the mailed docs.

Once your print them they look no different really. Everything is exactly the same as mailed docs. And my pleather doc case is still in wonderful shape. I just dump them in there.

I thought the baggage tag thing would be an issue, but it's not at all. They slapped those on so fast at the pier I barely noticed!

Overall, I found it very efficient. If there's anything wrong at all with the docs, it's no time at all you get your new ones. I printed out 2 sets so I'd have a back-up.

Much as I usually balk at change of any kind. this was one I found very acceptable if not preferable!:D

[herb]

I'm going to buy myself a dark blue "pleather" document holder at Staples and when my e-docs are ready to be printed out I will put them in there. :D