Most IT problems are not hard because the answer is hidden. They are hard because the evidence is scattered.

Logs live in one place, tickets in another, monitoring somewhere else, and whoever is troubleshooting has to ride the whole range to piece it together.

A lone rider keeping watch over a herd of longhorn cattle
The roundup

Before every cattle drive came the roundup

Cattle spread across open country had to be gathered into one herd before anyone could move them anywhere. It took a full crew and a lot of long days.

Troubleshooting works the same way. Before you can fix anything, you have to round up the evidence.

What changed

AI changed the roundup

Using AI, I started pulling data from different sources into one place and correlating it. Problems that used to take hours of digging showed their cause much sooner. Issues got resolved faster and with a much higher success rate.

The idea

That is the idea behind Lone Herd

One experienced hand with the right tools can gather and move a herd that used to take a whole outfit. The tools do the riding. You still decide where the herd goes.

The toolsWhat I use to gather and connect data, and why.
The workflowsHow the pieces fit together day to day.
What worksAnd what does not, including the dead ends.

Lone Herd is where I share what I have learned. It is for small IT teams and anyone else running short-handed.

Lone Herd badge: a longhorn steer head in a ring
Lone Herd

Gather it. Connect it. Move it.