Walsh-Howard Consulting
WHC is an engineering consultancy for organisations with business-critical IT. We investigate faults and make controlled changes across servers, networks, databases and application code.
Why WHC
A slow application can be caused by a query plan, a storage limit, packet loss or a decision made years ago in the application code. We follow the evidence across those boundaries instead of passing the issue between specialist suppliers.
Services
Work can cover a single investigation or the delivery and continued operation of a complete system.
We design and run Linux and Windows estates on physical servers, virtual platforms and public cloud. Our work includes consolidation, capacity planning, high-availability design and live migrations where downtime has to be tightly controlled.
We design firewall policy, segmentation, VPNs and secure remote access. Our work also covers operating-system hardening, incident investigation, WAF, SIEM and intrusion-prevention systems.
Routing, IPv4 and IPv6, fibre connectivity, TLS certificate automation and difficult network diagnostics are all within scope.
When an off-the-shelf product does not fit the workflow, we build the missing part. That may be a Windows desktop application, a REST API, an integration between established systems or a staged replacement for legacy software.
We investigate slow applications using measurements from the database, operating system, network and code. For search-heavy and e-commerce systems, the work can include indexing, filtering, faceting, relevance, catalogue data and customer-specific pricing.
Magento integration and high-volume product discovery are particular areas of experience.
AI is a force multiplier, we use it extensively in all aspects of our work and the code we build. We build automation that leaves a clear record of what happened and why. Current areas include document collection, financial reconciliation and repeatable data processing. When AI is useful, we add explicit review points for output that affects customers or business records.
Email migrations, deliverability, SPF, DKIM and DMARC sit here, as do self-hosted collaboration platforms, web servers, reverse proxies and multi-domain hosting. We also provide independent architecture reviews, vendor assessments and recovery work on projects that have stalled.
For technical reviews, we document the assumptions behind each option and identify the operational work the chosen system will require.
Where we help
A production system has to move
We begin by mapping dependencies and deciding how data will remain consistent during the cutover. We test the new environment under expected load and rehearse the rollback procedure before production moves.
The fault has resisted previous attempts
Logs are useful, but they are only one source of evidence. We reproduce the behaviour where possible and instrument the affected path. Database timeouts sometimes trace back to packet retransmission on a single network route.
Performance has become a business problem
Response-time distributions and resource measurements show where time is spent. A query that is fast in isolation may still create contention when hundreds of workers issue it together. We benchmark changes against the original workload.
A technical decision needs an independent view
We can review an architecture, a supplier proposal or a recovery plan without being tied to a platform sale. An apparently cheaper licence can be outweighed by an expensive exit path. The client receives the reasoning and trade-offs behind our recommendation.
How we work
We organise the work around the risk of the system rather than a fixed consulting method.
We compare the documentation with configuration, traffic and observed behaviour. We investigate unknowns before production work starts.
We keep changes under version control where the platform allows it. The people responsible for the service can see what we tested, when to roll back and what remains uncertain.
We write runbooks that explain normal operation and likely failure modes. They describe how to recover the service, rather than only showing its intended architecture.
Contact
An initial conversation is enough to establish whether we can help and what technical information will be needed next.
Email WHChello@whconsulting.frS.A.R.L. Walsh-Howard Consulting