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". . . muttering something about uptime."

"Shit, we're dealing with a sysadmin."

But you're leaving out the previous 20+ years spent developing systems that were never
finished.

Nope, the clock on that 14 year period counts that prior work on AAS as part of its time period. In reality, the contract for ERAM was awarded in 2003 so if you didn't count the groundwork that was laid by those previous systems you'd have to say that ERAM development took from 2003-2009.

Six years for two million lines of code. When you put it that way it doesn't sound so outrageous, does it?

But you're leaving out the previous 20+ years spent developing systems that were never finished.

And that's how we ended up with COBOL.

Which has proven itself over and over again. It's stable, reliable, and easy to maintain. COBOL runs the world, for good reasons.

For 33 years the government has been trying to replace the 60 year old air traffic control systems. Three different systems have been tried. The first was a complete write off, meant to be an IBM designed Unix based system, it went overdue by years and billions and was killed off in 1994. http://www.baselinemag.com/c/a/Projects-Processes/The-Ugly-History-of-Tool-Development-at-the-FAA/ The Second named CARTS began in 1996, meant to be a replacement for the aging radar systems the program did replace the older systems in some airports, but again the program was killed for cost overruns and stalled production. http://www.fiercegovernmentit.com/story/tracon-air-traffic-control-modernization-faces-prospect-more-schedule-cost/2013-06-02 http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-05-31/air-traffic-upgrade-over-budget-facing-delays-report.html In 2003 they revived the project with compartmentalized implementations of an integrated system in order to see short term improvements. The first system, a replacement for CARTS renamed STARS) went in in 2012 and it is costing 60% more than expected, with the remaining systems set to be developed and implemented over the next 13 years. The next system to be implemented, ERAM, is already overdue by 4 years, over budget, and according to FAA reports, subject to critical failures and instability. http://www.airtrafficmanagement.net/2013/06/nextgen-over-budget-delays-certain-report/http://www.fiercegovernmentit.com/story/eram-continues-undergo-critical-failures/2012-10-02 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Next_Generation_Air_Transportation_System

Google is your friend, turning up this 2008 advice column.

Abstracted:
- 1. Retain a lawyer, don't go it alone.
- 2. Cooperate—carefully, the BSA's attorneys stay on retainer by maintaining a high recovery rate.
- 3. Don't let the BSA's rhetoric intimidate you.
- 4. Don't rush out and buy any software.
- 5. Preserve evidence with confidentiality.
- 6. Find your allies.
- 7. Create a compliance plan.
- 8. Negotiate non-monetary aspects.

Whatever happened to the concept that you'd just push your cart through an RFID portal, everything in your cart would be interrogated, and you'd get an immediate bill? Wal-Mart was behind that. NCR demonstrated it in 2004. That was a more promising idea.

Vision systems for checkout are available. There's LaneHawk, for recognizing big items at the bottom of the cart, and VeggieVision, for recognizing vegetables on a scale pan. Automated checkout is getting better.

The future of retail looks more like WebVan. WebVan was a flop, but not because of customer acceptance. WebVan was popular, but the operating costs were too high. "Soap.com" (acquired by Amazon) is now doing the WebVan thing of delivering routine items. But now, with Kiva robotic order picking, it's profitable. Kiva's system is now doing about 10% of online order picking in the US. Costs are about 1/5 of human picking.

Delivery uses less fuel than driving a ton of car to the store to move a few pounds of merchandise. At $4 per gallon and up, Soap.com's shipping rates (Max of $5, free for orders over $39) look really good.

The future of retail is online ordering and delivery. Been to a record store lately? A video rental store? A bank branch? A travel agency? Look at all the vacant retail space that will never again be occupied.

It's not like anything bad's ever happened when critical systems are rolled-out untested, unprepared, or irresposibly.

I mean it's not like someone's life is ever put in jeaopardy by minor software glitches, especially in hospitals. ...on a side note, Googling "IT disasters" leads to some very interesting results.

-Matt

• By phone: 1-888-NOPIRACY
• Online: Business Software Alliance reporting form
• For management: What to do when you receive a BSA audit letter.
• Download OpenOffice
• Download Linux (Debian)

Folks that quit in the middle of things are quitters.

What if it's a 13 year project? I'm serious. This project started in 1981 and was killed in 1994:
http://www.baselinemag.com/c/a/Projects-Processes/The-Ugly-History-of-Tool-Development-at-the-FAA/

Could you tough it out for 13 years? 10 years?

I've seen people burn out in 18 months of 6-7 day 50-70 hour weeks. I was one of them. I'm not sure if you have ever experienced one of these train wrecks. Get yourself involved in one and then let's talk.

Like MySpace does? http://www.baselinemag.com/c/a/Projects-Networks-and-Storage/Inside-MySpacecom/5/

Actually, outside of the discussion of architect vs. developer, Brooks doesn't address "managing seasoned programmers" a lot, which was the poster's question.

As you can see from this article and from this list, I have a lot of books I can recommend for IT management in general, starting with "The Mythical Man-Month". ..bruce..

Everything I have ever heard in the past and everything I could find from looking around just now indicated that they have no bizarre "save your receipts" requirement.

This in an interesting piece of communication. The author has recently taken an interest in the BSA, including this recent article that promotes their Fear Uncertainty and Doubt message.

Quoted in the fine article are a director of enforcement for the BSA and as counterpoint noted analyst Laura DiDio. Ms. DiDio was originally famous for her role promoting the Amityville Horror hoax. These days she is perhaps better known for her astonishing (and curiously persistent) analysis of the SCO debacle in which she promoted SCO's position in front of the press and wound up a creditor in their bankruptcy(pdf) for her trouble. Her employer is alternately given as Yankee Group and G2 Computer Intelligence.

One can only wonder whether Erika Chikowski bothered to check her sources or if this is a case of envelope journalism.

I read all the way through the article. I want my five minutes back.

If you're going to trudge through it at least skip the ads and vote it down.

In 2002 scandal broke out when it was found that a European Commission proposal on software patents was actually written by a BSA official, as discovered by whistleblowers who found evidence in the Microsoft.

And this would be a worthwhile part of the article if she hadn't omitted the final "Word document".

This in an interesting piece of communication. The author has recently taken an interest in the BSA, including this recent article that promotes their Fear Uncertainty and Doubt message.

Quoted in the fine article are a director of enforcement for the BSA and as counterpoint noted analyst Laura DiDio. Ms. DiDio was originally famous for her role promoting the Amityville Horror hoax. These days she is perhaps better known for her astonishing (and curiously persistent) analysis of the SCO debacle in which she promoted SCO's position in front of the press and wound up a creditor in their bankruptcy(pdf) for her trouble. Her employer is alternately given as Yankee Group and G2 Computer Intelligence.

One can only wonder whether Erika Chikowski bothered to check her sources or if this is a case of envelope journalism.

I read all the way through the article. I want my five minutes back.

If you're going to trudge through it at least skip the ads and vote it down.

In 2002 scandal broke out when it was found that a European Commission proposal on software patents was actually written by a BSA official, as discovered by whistleblowers who found evidence in the Microsoft.

And this would be a worthwhile part of the article if she hadn't omitted the final "Word document".

This in an interesting piece of communication. The author has recently taken an interest in the BSA, including this recent article that promotes their Fear Uncertainty and Doubt message.

Quoted in the fine article are a director of enforcement for the BSA and as counterpoint noted analyst Laura DiDio. Ms. DiDio was originally famous for her role promoting the Amityville Horror hoax. These days she is perhaps better known for her astonishing (and curiously persistent) analysis of the SCO debacle in which she promoted SCO's position in front of the press and wound up a creditor in their bankruptcy(pdf) for her trouble. Her employer is alternately given as Yankee Group and G2 Computer Intelligence.

One can only wonder whether Erika Chikowski bothered to check her sources or if this is a case of envelope journalism.

I read all the way through the article. I want my five minutes back.

If you're going to trudge through it at least skip the ads and vote it down.

In 2002 scandal broke out when it was found that a European Commission proposal on software patents was actually written by a BSA official, as discovered by whistleblowers who found evidence in the Microsoft.

And this would be a worthwhile part of the article if she hadn't omitted the final "Word document".

...from three major universities seems to say there's no problem at all with electronic voting and people trust it MORE than paper ballots.

OK, the internet killed the record store. What kills me is that the music labels are still searching for the magic formula. I was reading in Baseline (www.baselinemag.com) that Sony finally dropped its digital rights management protection on CDs, clearing the way for greater digital distribution. Is this the beginning of the end? http://blog.baselinemag.com/security/content001/encryption/sony_abandons_drm_and_its_about_time.html

Here! The technology can still help, but it doesn't make up for stockers and floor employees who can identify problems before they occur. POS and tracking reports will never help make up for an employee who knows how important it is to keep these items in stock. Then again, when your employees are saying "I don't care; If Wal-Mart doesn't care for me, why should I care?" you might have bigger problems than keeping tabs on your stock turnover.

That's the right subject line, but for completely different reasons.

Best Buy is the company that reportedly exposed its customer data through an insecurely configured wireless network. And the company whose employees apparently used an internal site to fool customers. And the company involved with obstruction in overly aggressive MSN sales. In my opinion, they have always had dubious ethics.

They've done a very good job of creating an image of a "retailer that wants to fire customers".

This is from a year ago (July 2006):

Google runs on hundreds of thousands of servers--by one estimate, in excess of 450,000--racked up in thousands of clusters in dozens of data centers around the world.

If this figure is accurate, a million boxen nowadays doesn't seem out of reach.

Here's a reference, but it hardly supports your argument.

From the article:

But ongoing maintenance, development and support costs rocketed out of control. Between 1996 and 2001, about $688 million was spent on the program. Of that amount, $250 million went to the computer systems. Support, such as call centers, accounted for $300 million. The remaining $138 million went to advertising and public outreach programs to encourage compliance.

Although it was originally planned that the CFIS II development phase initiated in April 2002 would take nine months, after three years it is still under way......The cost of CFIS II was originally estimated at $32 million but is now expected to be at least $87 million.

It is a rather polarized issue, and I don't fully trust the numbers from either side of the debate. For a firearm owners perspective, look here. The numbers should be verifiable, as they reference government websites in Myth's #5 and #6, so if you're going to do any research, please try to find the sources they referenced first. I should note that the next reference corroborates most of the myths.

I thought that it would take me most of the day to try and pull together semi-reliable information on how many of the firearms used in crimes are handguns instead of long rifles (I'd guess mostly handguns), and even more time to determine how many were registered (likely most were stolen or imported from the US by criminals). I got lucky, though, from a Wikipedia article, here's a PDF from Statscan.

Between 1997 and 2000, there were 365 homicides committed with handguns. In 30% (110) of these homicides where the handgun was recovered, more than two-thirds (69%) of the handguns were not registered.

Handguns were used in about 3 in 10 firearm homicides until 1990. Between 1990 and 1992, homicides using handguns increased significantly, representing half of all firearm homicides during those years. This proportion has remained relatively constant until 2000, when handguns accounted for six in ten firearm-related homicides. In Australia, some researchers have attributed increases in the use of handguns in homicides to the introduction of new, more restrictive firearm regulations - "offenders tend to use firearms that are easily concealable and available on the black market, such as handguns".

http://www.baselinemag.com/article2/0,1540,2082921 ,00.asp

According to the article, it started in Perl, then to ColdFusion and now it's using the .Net stack. I guess they pushed the limits of each platform to the breaking point. To me, it sounds like Tom needs to spend more time thinking about his code instead of worrying about being everyone's friend.

ZenShadow: I'm still haunting you from that earlier MySpace thread. Here is a little more evidence: http://www.baselinemag.com/article2/0,1540,2084131 ,00.asp
I'm not trying to lie to you, only show you the true path, that .NET does not scale well and MySpace is looking at alternatives.
Welcome to my foe list, how DARE you doubt me!

article here with no ads

Case in point: Akamai. If you are a big Web content provider such as Google, Yahoo or CNN, you can afford to use Akamai's services, which house content in places near the end users. If you are a startup, you may not be able to use Akamai. Take it one step further: If Congress says there's no fast lane, does that mean Akamai can't exist? Hmmm.

print friendly version, because their page layout is a little too far on the "hey, if we add more adverts, we'll make more money!!1!"/WiReD-more-colors-are-good end of the scale.

ChoicePoint is an aggregator. As much as 20% of their data could be inaccurate. Employers (for instance) make decisions based on ChoicePoint data, even though ChoicePoint "suggests" that they independently verify the accuracy of any negative reports. (Of course, it may work the other way also: 20% inaccuracy suggests that ChoicePoint will give subscribers false positive data, too.) Is this important? Well, Baseline Magazine wrote a nice article on this last year, http://www.baselinemag.com/article2/0,1540,1825320 ,00.asp
http://www.baselinemag.com/article2/0,1540,1825287 ,00.asp
and I was really impressed with the fact that a Home Depot employee spent a week in jail for crimes he did not commit.

Security is only half of it; Accuracy is the other half.

ChoicePoint is an aggregator. As much as 20% of their data could be inaccurate. Employers (for instance) make decisions based on ChoicePoint data, even though ChoicePoint "suggests" that they independently verify the accuracy of any negative reports. (Of course, it may work the other way also: 20% inaccuracy suggests that ChoicePoint will give subscribers false positive data, too.) Is this important? Well, Baseline Magazine wrote a nice article on this last year, http://www.baselinemag.com/article2/0,1540,1825320 ,00.asp
http://www.baselinemag.com/article2/0,1540,1825287 ,00.asp
and I was really impressed with the fact that a Home Depot employee spent a week in jail for crimes he did not commit.

Security is only half of it; Accuracy is the other half.

You could at least post the update that the Vet's are now suing the VA.

The following article shows how a company can actually save money in the long run if they took SOX seriously enough.

Kimberly-Clark: Benefitting From SOX
http://www.baselinemag.com/article2/0,1397,1858071 ,00.asp

The FAA has a long history IT disasters, dating back to the early 1980's. Whatever happened to the Advanced Automation System,
originally contracted to IBM and EDS in 1981 and still not deployed? Taxpayers have spent about $40 billion on that one, with still
very little to show for it.

A brief history of FAA competence. Not the best source, but then the government isn't good about revealing its failures.

http://www.baselinemag.com/print_article2/0,1217,a =25163,00.asp

I'd suggest collecting magazine clippings and/or URL's about other major companies that have successfully switched to Linux and Open Source. Here's a few links to get you started.

Etrade:
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1916119,00.as p

Amazon, Ebay, Wal-Mart, Dell, American Greetings:
http://www.forbes.com/2002/10/08/1008linux.html

Cendant:
http://www.cio.com/archive/070105/cendant.html

Merril Lynch and Credit Suisse First Boston:
http://www.forbes.com/2002/03/27/0327linux.html

Boscov's
http://www.forbes.com/2002/07/17/0717casestudy.htm l

The Chicago Mercantile Exchange:
http://www.baselinemag.com/article2/0,1397,1828002 ,00.asp

wonder how Linux idealists feel about their cute little OS being deployed in machinery of war?

Look, nobody wants to fight a war. But, if you are gonna fight a war, you wanna win!

Given that, you use the best tools available. God forbid, we should use the Windows CE that has been such a bitch in intelligent cars! http://www.baselinemag.com/article2/0,3959,833424, 00.asp?kc=BAZD103019TX1K0100547

'nuff said!

http://www.baselinemag.com/article2/0,1540,1783104 ,00.asp

Anybody has "prior art" on this?

without the annoying phrase "hacker hunter", can be found here:
http://www.baselinemag.com/article2/0,1397,1774393 ,00.asp

The NYPD uses a system very much like this, called COMPSTAT.

More about the history of the program here (clicky)

Here's an excerpt from the NYPD website:
"Among the Command and Control Center's high-tech capabilities is its computerized 'pin mapping' which displays crime, arrest and quality of life data in a host of visual formats including comparative charts, graphs and tables. Through the use of MAPINFO software and other computer technology, for example, the CompStat database can be accessed and a precinct map depicting virtually any combination of crime and/or arrest locations, crime 'hot spots' and other relevant information can be instantly projected on the Center's large video projection screens."

Yea, sorry about that, I didn't bother to check what was in the copy-paste. It was supposed to be this

While Windows 2000 is adequate for my home computer to surf the web and read email (after proper precautions are taken) it is absolutely NOT adequate for flying an airplane. I am not worried about worms and viruses infected an airplane running Windows 2000 (and I'm not sure why it was mentioned in the article as it really isn't related) but I am worried about the stability of the OS and the implications it may have.

Slashdotters, please, listen: Windows 2000 and XP are remarkably stable. My brother and I leave our computers on for months without problems. As much as it hurts to admit it, Win2k and XP are fine operating systems for reliable extended use if you can properly secure them (merits of opensource/personal preferences aside). Don't get me wrong - they certainly can be annoying, but they hardly crash. In fact, the FAA has been running computers on Windows for years now, including on Windows 95 (if my professor was correct, and he's pretty bright). They had recently tried to upgrade the systems, and one participant said "It may have been the greatest failure in the history of organized work." Click here for details.

The real problem with using Windows is that it becomes a security risk out of the box. Even if we ignore the massive amounts of exploits, it's far too used at this point, and it would be much easier for an attacker to start with all that background knowledge than to have to learn a proprietary system. I've had a lot of fun with the recent PCs that read blood pressure/customize teddy bears/etcetc with Win2k that stores have started to stock recently, but it is usually remarkably easy to get them to drop to the desktop - we all know how Windows works.

While that also applies to Linux (although to a much lesser extent), in Linux, anyone can fix a bug. In Windows, the inability to update the code is the worst part of using such an old system. What happens if stuff goes wrong? Can you wait for a bug fix? Using OSS software would alleviate many of the security problems and aid maintainability, which is what you should have said. Saying that you don't trust Windows 2000 not to crash is a nothing more than sharing a misinformed opinion about MS products, not debating technical merits. I enjoy Slack and SUSE as much as everyone else here, but I try and keep my emotions centered on people, not OSes.

Ada
Ada mention
You won't be alone.
Once you get over the ugly syntax, you'll really like Ada.

Random bugs

http://www.mtholyoke.edu/~rzdalea/cs100/software_d isasters/sd.htm
http://www.baselinemag.com/article2/0,1397,1544403 ,00.asp

Also google for Therac-25

Think I'm wrong? How many CEOs know what they are doing? Do they know how the product is made, what problems are encountered? No.

Do they know what challenges their company faces on a fundamental (as opposed to the hazy/theoretical) level? Do they realize that by simply removing useless employees and streamlining their business practices they can save much more than "outsourcing"? They rely on their VPs and Middle Managers to cover up the truth ("Doing great, Boss!!"), while the CEO plays golf and plans the next merger so he can trigger the merger clause in his contract and get paid a few extra million.

These people are no more qualified to fix our economy than you are.

Link to general review, videos and pictures here

Right, although that wasn't the intention. If that's the kind of problem I should expect when a simple electrical component goes wrong I think getting locked in my new luxury car is going to be the least of my worries!

Perhaps this is a better reference for the iDrive BMW problems (check out the vids at the bottom) -- although in fairness the car was recalled.

When you combine the story in the post with the article above you start to get a pretty scary picture.

Right, although that wasn't the intention. If that's the kind of problem I should expect when a simple electrical component goes wrong I think getting locked in my new luxury car is going to be the least of my worries!

Perhaps this is a better reference for the iDrive BMW problems (check out the vids at the bottom) -- although in fairness the car was recalled.

When you combine the story in the post with the article above you start to get a pretty scary picture.

here's an even more entertaining Sun related article.

my favourite bit "For one thing, McNealy notes, Sun's versions of open source software do not violate SCO patents; and, are more reliable than "unwrapped" software taken straight from the source code open to all developers.

... like the driver named Conley, who bought a BMW.

This article's old news, I know, but it's worth rereading. This guy didn't know how to operate his brake lights, or his phone, and such. Clearly, even cars are too technical for people, so it shouldn't surprise you if people have trouble with their Microsoft Windows products.

Sometimes you really do need a techie to open your car windows for you.

Don't buy a BMW unless you like crashes... Baselinemag