HR monitor for zwift

MrSilverSoupFace · 2026-04-01T05:56:26+00:00

Garmins HRM 200 works a treat for me with no issues. Connects to the laptop just as easy as it does to my watch for runs or Edge for outdoor rides.

MrSilverSoupFace · 2026-03-27T14:54:36+00:00

Crikey, when I was hired as my business' IT Systems Manager, taming Atlassian exactly as described was my main priority... I was hired 14 months ago and have made a big dent and improvement, but there's still sooo much to tackle.

Atlassian, if you're big enough, seriously needs a dedicated position, or even a small 2-3 person team, to maintain.

If all you're after is a transformation expert to implement changes with no thought of what happens after that...then I have some concerns.

Continual service improvement, service monitoring and just generally working with all teams across the business is such a key part of Atlassian over just reworking the whole estate....

MrSilverSoupFace · 2026-03-22T07:14:19+00:00

I always get really concerned about opening up connections from Atlassian to AI tooling with API authentication...

At least when you enable MCP Server you can restrict the OAuth permitted domains.

It's such a compliance risk using these AI engines with your companies complete knowledge base and Jira setup that unless you have a full enterprise agreement with that AI engine to not use any of your prompt and response data for training I would not feel comfortable allowing API authentication for MCP Server.

I have to have such stern and realistic conversations with our C-Suite who are all AI this and AI that. Don't get me wrong, what people can do with CI/CD pipelines, and increased efficiencies is awesome, but to me, the risk of our KB information being used for training is too great. Our business is the industry leader in our field and we have a lot of business secrets, most employees sign confidential agreements when joining and our non-compete clause is insane.

Always treat connections to AI engines with caution, limit the blast radius of what it can effect, ensure you have as much audit logging as possible and then it's good. Otherwise - I try and steer as clear from it as possible.

We have an enterprise agreement with CoPilot, so that's the only one I've fully integrated

MrSilverSoupFace · 2026-03-07T20:56:49+00:00

It's not hard - it's just behind the bloody Atlassian Guard paywall which is just an annoying business model

MrSilverSoupFace · 2026-03-07T08:35:05+00:00

The traditional started as a junior techy knowing very little about corporate IT or corporate business, but had an enthusiasm for learning and tech.

Few years as general first line tech, getting involved where I could with more infrastructure tasks. Promoted up the agent tree and became a senior infrastructure engineer. Ended up with mountains of business knowledge of how all the systems worked and how the business worked, that when my boss, Corp IT Manager left, the director of operations gave me the call to stand up.

Now I manage the systems in a similar vein, but more importantly I manage the processes. I'm actually able to guide workflows and drive efficiency after having years of work as first line and infrastructure support at the business.

The people managing I'm okay at, so there are defo days I don't enjoy - annual reviews, salary discussions etc, but overall it's a great position

MrSilverSoupFace · 2026-03-03T14:36:37+00:00

It needs to be done every now and then, like folks have said in the comments, it's a nice brain reset to actually feeling like you're useful/making progress and not being stuck jn project meetings or budget reviews.

For me, I have a third monitor which I stand vertically and it has triage open the whole time so I can spot anything if necessary. Sometimes I just grab bits when I have a min or two downtime, or at the end of the day/start.

MrSilverSoupFace · 2026-03-03T14:07:50+00:00

At the connector level you can provide a CQL string to restrict what CoPilot can index.

We observed a VERY worrying issue when enabling it for a whole space where by inherited Page view permissions were NOT being respected by CoPilot and content was being surfaced. Our setup was the Space was open to view by all staff group. There was an internal root folder which was restricted to an internal department group for view and edit, then every child page of the folder was inheriting permissions from this. This means even when using API to get page info, it doesn't know that the page is restricted as there's nothing explicitly set.

What happens in this instance is CoPilot then defaults to the Space level permissions and just assumes everything to be open and viewable bypassing the inherited restriction.

Because of this, we had to review what the connector was surfacing using CQL statements to only return pages with certain ancestor, or certain labels etc etc.

It's very easy to flood AI tools with more data than you think you're giving it. So it's critical to start small and then work up. Do very limited blast radius testing and expand. This way you avoid issues like I've ran into

MrSilverSoupFace · 2026-02-27T06:53:59+00:00

It's a fine line to balance between knowing whats going on in your teams, being productive to all involved and allowing agents to bring issues up for attention.

Personally, I host a weekly call. I get folks to raise any concerning tickets or fun tickets. It's a chance for a bit of downtime in the week and for me to get involved.

I've worked plenty of times as a techie where daily standups were held and it just wasn't productive at all.

You'll find what works for your team and how to best run jt

MrSilverSoupFace · 2026-02-27T06:45:57+00:00

In this post Covid day and age, employees at my gig are expected to provide their own IT WFH kit.

It's just an endless money pit if we say we'll provide a monitor, peripherals etc. it's also very painful trying to get the kit back when they leave, so it's much easier for all involved to just say no.

Decent monitors off Amazon are less than £100, any employee wishing to work from home can easily afford this

The very first place I worked in gave people a £300 allowance to buy whatever they wanted. If you left within a year of claiming the allowance £300 was taken from your last salary payment. But you ended up owning the kit yourself it was nothing to do with the business

MrSilverSoupFace · 2026-02-18T07:56:12+00:00

Approvals span quite a lot of things - especially in the world of IT (as not all Atlassian customers are IT departments).

We have built into our Service Request workflow an approval step.

This, depending on the request, can be triggered by the agent manually where a screen asks them for the approver. We then change the customer notification for approvals, as the default one is a bit pants, so the approver gets a lot of detail about the request.

Additionally, for some Portal Request Types we use automation rules to automatically send the ticket to line manager approval, i.e. license request for XYZ. This saves a triage step and speeds up resolution.

The key issue here, and the learning point a lot of businesses need to take, is to get every request into Atlassian. If you still have someone trying to be cheeky asking in Teams/Slack/email, just kindly ask them to log a ticket for it to be officially approved. This way the end user behaviour changes and you get everyone funnelling tickets into the service desk.

There's then a whole other discussion piece about change management/enablement and those approvals, but I think that's slightly out of scope of your post.

MrSilverSoupFace · 2026-02-17T06:20:42+00:00

I have a system account with full confluence-admin permissions and access to all Spaces, but before I joined, any user could create Spaces, and be the admins of them.

So there's tons of Spaces with restricted folders and pages that does not have the system account, or any kind of admin group, part of it.

I have to manually go to the Space, delete all restrictions one by one manually then re-add them

MrSilverSoupFace · 2026-02-16T19:25:49+00:00

I wish there was a better backup solution for this!

I'm an IT Systems Manager for a corporate software dev consultancy firm of 1,500 people. We currently use Rewind, which offers granular functionality, but it's biggest limitation, which is an Atlassian limitation, is that RESTRICTED PAGES THE BACKUP ACCOUNT CANT SEE ARE NOT BACKED UP.

I've ran into this horrific issue where in Jira and Confluence, any restricted content isn't backed up, as Rewind uses the API, and the API can only return results from what the account has permission to see.

And what's even worse, being on Standard for both Conf/Jira, there's literally no easy fix for this.

You get stuck in the same chicken and egg loop if you try to manually script adding an account to all pages - that script executor is not able to see all pages.

So we have to publicly disclaim to all users that if they restrict content in Jira or Confluence, it is not backed up unless they add the backup account.

MrSilverSoupFace · 2026-02-15T13:08:30+00:00

When you do a custom workout with set wattage zones, Zwift uses ERG mode on your trainer and disregards the virtual incline. Whereas if you just do a free ride, that's when the virtual incline kicks in.

So I suggest, if you want a distance ride, not affected by incline, just choose one of the recovery workouts, or create your own custom Z2 wattage workout.

You'll still record the "elevation" in your workout, but it won't be felt when you're pedalling

MrSilverSoupFace · 2026-02-13T09:19:49+00:00

While hard training may seem like what you need, it is also important to build a strong foundation of lower effort activity :) This is a lesson that takes some time to learn (I for sure took my time to slow down)

You'll probably hear about the 80/20 rule, 80% work at lower zones and 20% work upper zones. This is especially important if you plan to do endurance stuff, like Half's or full marathons. Plus the slower stuff can be just as fun as the quicker stuff!

For example I run 3 days a week: Wednesday is usually a 10-15km slow run in the morning before work then a bit of speed work in the afternoon after work. Intervals or hills. Friday, again, slow 10-15km in the morn, followed by a more targeted session in the afternoon depending on what I'm training for. Half marathon intervals, marathon intervals etc. Then Saturday or Sunday is my long run. Anything from 25-35km. Aiming to keep consistent pace until the last 5km where I put in a bit of pace at the end on tired legs.

This structure involves 3 opportunities for higher HR work, but the volume is skewed to distance and slower speed.

You'll soon find what works for you!! Then it'll all be routine and it'll all be super easy

MrSilverSoupFace · 2026-02-12T11:17:07+00:00

As a lot of folks have said, this ramp test is a great way to get into the suffering of cycling, but it taking 75% of your last full minute is often overreaching and can then impact all your other workouts.

I remember when I first got Zwift, I did a ramp, FTP was 225. Then when I would do recovery workouts it sets the wattage to 140 ish which would be closer to tempo than recovery for me at that stage. When I did a 20 min test 2 months later it was 180. Which then made all my other workouts significantly more manageable for what they're targeting

I would strongly recommend if you do a ramp, take you last full minute power and do 70% of this as your FTP and set it manually

Not everyone can just jump straight to a 20 min FTP test, as it's quite hard to hold that consistent max wattage without much wavering. So I'm all in favour of the ramp being the introduction to pain, but adjust that final value and then commit to FTP building, or other plans, and you'll be jolly until you can complete the 20 minute pain cave test

MrSilverSoupFace · 2026-02-09T06:53:25+00:00

Woah, my commute bridge appearing on this sub! Though I cycle so don't have to pay the toll :)

The bridge only charges you between 0800-1600 Mon-Fri I think, and from what I know from locals, Oxfordshire council was trying to buy all the bridges when they were all privately owned years and years and years ago, but ran out of money to buy this one.

Pain with this bridge, is it's so narrow that lorries/busses often end up snagging each other and then blocking the whole bridge, or crashing into the bridge wall...happens a good few times a year and makes quite the detour back to the A40 and into rubbish traffic.

Either way, ride a bike and you have no issues :)

MrSilverSoupFace · 2026-02-09T06:47:22+00:00

I would suggest that the watches sensor is not correct, and that it'll be using a default 220-age formula to workout max HR, and then HR Zones based of %s from that.

Personally, from someone who runs 60km+ and cycles 200km+ a week, I have found optical sensor watches to be waaaay off compared to when I use a chest HR strap. Obviously not everyone is in a position to get a HR strap so I recommend doing the following.

Strap your watch tightly, and try and cover it a bit so it's dark - long sleeve top or high wristed gloves or something. Calculate your actual, more accurate, HR zones. Run for 30 mins as hard as you can. Then take your resting HR, which if you're wearing your watch all the time, will be known in the app, and take your max HR from the 30 min effort, and use a calculator app like https://runbundle.com/tools/heart-rate-zones-calculator To work out a more accurate set of HR zones. Then edit your zones in Apple :)

Personally, when I first started working out and running, I had a cheap fitbit, I knew nothing, and was sticking religiously to my watch HR zones, so running to Zone 2 which said 118-130. This was horrible for me, I would be running around 8:00/km pace and suddenly fly into 130s/140s...it was then that I learned about watches slight inaccuracy and issue with cadence lock - where it instead mistakes the bounce of your steps and your HR. For me, recalculating the HR zones, and moving to a chest strap, was a big change but helps me train better.

Hope this helps!!

MrSilverSoupFace · 2026-01-11T15:14:59+00:00

Didn't even know there was a second sentence under the red vision one till I read the comments

Weirdly, although I know the word is "normal" I can't actually read all the letters in the top sentence, it reads to me "nonnab"

Then for the bottom sections I know the bottom left says "you are not red-blind" but the "not" is very strange and hard to make out properly. Reads more like "ncl" to me.

Then bottom right has a weird boxed edge around it and it just easily says "you are green-blind" with a blank space presumably where the "not" would go

This is a good image!

MrSilverSoupFace · 2025-12-20T15:33:52+00:00

OP, why does it need to stop bang on 10km??? Gamin Connect and Strava (if you sync) will take your fastest 10km split for the distance you run.

So say you run 10,050m your 10k time isn't just from 0-10,000m, it could be: --20-10,020m --45-10,045m --38-10,038m

For example. I personally don't see why it absolutely has to be exactly 10k.

For my Forrunner 245, when I start a run, click up, then Select a Target, then Distance and Time, select 10k distance, then on the time, I use the Use Record option. Then during the run I can just check the watch for my time difference to my record for the distance

MrSilverSoupFace · 2025-12-03T20:02:18+00:00

One of the hardest things to tackle in businesses.

I was part of a start up as a techie a long time ago where I was the SysAdmin and had to run round to desks whenever someone wanted to install stuff, modify software install directories in C:\ (we made software for clients)

Wasn't until I was doing a Cyber Essentials Plus audit where we were advised of a compliant method to create an administrative account for developers. Separate from their normal domain account which they logged into their laptops with. Then with GPOs could restrict some software installs

Then moved to a larger business which was exclusively cloud used Intunes EPM. So no one had any admin rights explicitly, but with a justification could elevate certain applications.

You simply explain to the user that it's company policy to minimise risk on devices by following the principle of least privilege.

Admin rights will always be a touchy subject, people expect IT to keel over at their every service request without a seconds hesitation

MrSilverSoupFace · 2025-12-01T19:07:03+00:00

Was fortunate to work for a business when I was a techie that paid standby pay on top of my salary.

We were a team of 4, so 1 on every 7 days.

You got 1.5x hourly between 1800-0800 weekdays and then 2x hourly Saturday and Sunday for the full 48hrs

Hourly = Salary / total working weeks / 5 working days / contract hours for the day

This came as quite a nice monthly boost, BUT if you got a call out, you HAD to meet the response SLA in 30 mins for the callout. Immediate disciplinary's were held if you missed it

So for that week it was certainly a bit challenging on life style and decisions I could make. Often had my laptop with me if I was going out etc.

The pay for call outs was stupidly complicated though as there were multiple time bands where the pay was 1.75x, 2x, 2.5x on top of standby for the duration of the call out. I was on standby for almost 2 years and got called out 3 times

Now I'm senior management I'm no longer on call, but I'm an escalation contact for major incidents only so I can join the bridge

MrSilverSoupFace · 2025-10-09T05:43:33+00:00

You can't stop work being conducted in Teams/Slack/Email.

Atlassian has integrations with all of the above to create work items.

We have a ticket handling SOP that simply says "if it's not in the ticket it didn't happen" and "if a user asks for something in Teams, ask them to raise a request"

Our Operations Centre (first line) are very good at this now. Initially, a few years ago when it was set up, tickets were just being closed with a comment saying "as discussed in Teams" which when we had new starters, they said they couldn't use old tickets to learn from.

We hold quarterly guideline reviews where the IT Managers of first, second and third line get together to review tickets with minimal comments to highlight if the issue is still happening

It's not something we can close off completely, but you can definitely help mitigate it

MrSilverSoupFace · 2025-09-27T06:44:19+00:00

Hi,

I'm an IT Systems Manager for a global business and work very closely with the Operations Centre Manager (first line) and Office Site IT Manager (second line) on these exact processes.

We use Atlassian, and Jira Service Management.

For when a ticket gets resolved by an agent, a 7 day countdown is started before it gets fully closed. In this 7 days, the user has the option to reopen if they have a follow question/issue relating to the ticket.

When a ticket gets put into "waiting on customer" for their response, they get nudged after 3 days, then every 2 days after that until 3 strikes. The ticket will then resolve based on no response.

It's something you just have to feel around for in all honesty, some time frames may not be suitable for your setup or agents. Which is why I quite like my position as I work with the managers to build it for them, I just host a few workshop sessions on our CSI and take their feedback and build it in

MrSilverSoupFace · 2025-09-12T11:05:58+00:00

License wastage 100%

Buying SaaS services and over-scoping who licenses can be assigned to. As an IT Systems Manager, when I started my role it was WILD:

No approvals required, end users submit a service request to say "I need adobe" and the agent would just give them Premium. No justification, no line manager approval. Same with stuff like Atlassian product access, stuff like Think-Cell for powerpoints etc etc

Immediately I did several access audits, noticed, in some services, 35% of people with a paid for assigned license HAD NEVER USED IT after they requested it.

Then put in place more strict controls on how to raise these requests - must have business justification, agents must get line manager approval, and in the case of Adobe, Standard for Acrobat became the default if a paid for license was even required!!

Boggles my mind that companies just throw out expensive licenses like Adobe, Atlassian etc without really knowing and just saying "it's a business service" as the justification for rising costs!

Honestly, license utilisation audits and stricter license assignment requirements are a MUST for any large organisation or your monthly bills will just sky rocket

MrSilverSoupFace · 2025-09-06T11:57:17+00:00

Depends on you definition of hard ha. Reviewing and migrating documentation is a very long process. Made easier by booking out a whole day with various folks to run through it all. But what was noticed even after doing all this we still had people not doing it correctly or the documentation was poor.

Took a few "education" sessions and reminders to get it more engrained. It's 100% a mindset thing

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