..it’s like cough syrup… and not that prissy grapetty-tasting stuff either. It’s like that cough syrup that you took as a kid; the kind that doubles as ipecac for when you ingested some cleaning product that mom kept under the sink.

• It sucks. No 2 ways about it.
• You know it’s good for you, and so you do it anyway (and it still sucks).
• You wind up being better off for going through the initial agony of it.

I’ve been working on rebuilding our domain here at NewPointe for about 3 weeks now. I’m taking my time on it because, well, it’s not an uber-urgent matter, and I want to do everything proper. A couple days ago I realized that “doing it proper” requires … yeah, you guessed it … documentation.

I stopped working on the domain stuff and fired up a wiki to document everything that’s happened so far with the new domain, starting with the domain itself, and eventually branching out to cover all the member servers. Once I’ve caught up to where I’m at, I’ll resume work on the rebuild and document as I go.

Is it fun? No, not by a long shot. However, the value of having this information typed and accessible is immeasurable.

What if, after the domain is built, I fall ill for several weeks, get hit by a bus, or find myself jobless for whatever reason? Simply put, we’d be hosed. Managing servers, much less a domain, is VERY difficult to do without proper documentation. With documentation, you can ensure that someone can come after you and keep things running, and in ministry world, that’s EXTREMELY important.

I know I’m preaching to the choir on some levels here, but I feel like this was worth taking a break to talk. Now, I’m going back to take some more cough syrup.