I am responsible for an extremely sensitive real time transaction system.
My company operates in a bit of a panic mode due to the nature of the revenue flow. We ma*e contingency plans for even tiny things. The CEO is absolutely brutal over any thing that smells li*e ris*.
What really burns is the lac* of a decent budget.
It's called being prudent. And you can *iss my hairy balls.
* my "cay" *ey just bro*e. Cats + water glass with straw on des* = straw-now-cat-toy and wet *eyboard.
CentOS is widely used in datacenters due to it's red-hattyness, it's Long Term Support, and conservative adoption of whizbang.
It's by far my favorite distrobution for important servers.
I have already had two meetings over this and had my team start their proposals for alternate LTS distros and a migration plan. I am sure I am not the only one.
If the CentOS project manages to remove this single point of failure I think confidence will return. But I think I'll keep my projects going for a while just in case.
Agreed. Bill is speaking out because he wants super cheap low quality labor.
Have you ever been on the other side of an outsourced (as in india/thialand/china/japan) sw dev project? What a NIGHTMARE. Awful code, long hours of conf calls just to explain we want "push" instead of "pull"... Then to wake up the next day and have it wrong still.
MS does nothing without it's own profit margins in interest. It's corporate psychopathy. Can you say Enron?
Here here!! This is more corporate interestes above the common peoples.
Suggesting that hacking can incur a death penalty because of the BILLIONS involved is VILE!
We so far have kept our government from killing citizens over money, is this what we want now? I thought life was precious and beyond monetary value?
So, we change laws so hackers get death for their billions in losses, but CEO's and other's at the "helm" or in places of power get carte blanche to do whatever they like in the "course of business", lining their own pockets, making billion dollar mistakes, or outright stealing?
I guess America's much vaunted christian morality goes out the window when it comes to money.
A message to John Tierney: Your suggesting that constant virus checking and a vague "cost benifit analysis" is enough to incur the dealth penalty makes you a soulles moron. Shame on the grey lady for even publishing your crap.
Also, I do want to add, although however unpleasant, we cannot on one had bash the RIAA/MPIAA has having outdated out-technologied business models, then support photogropers.
Same deal: owning and controlling the distribution has been made technically impossible and I don't want the government nor courts crippling or controlling use of technology just to support another out-technologied business model.
Agreed. This is more big business attempting to sway the govt and public opinion to their own desires. On one hand they lay people off, on the other they complain of not enough labor. Simply put they don't have enough wage slaves and the outsource to India routine hasn't panned out.
I also do agree eventually there will be a problem here in the US.
During the wallstreet created bubble, so many people flooded the market looking for a quick buck... Fresh grads demanding 6 figure salaries and barely able to code, and even that in only one language and platform. Now these disaffected people are either retraining for other markets, or struggling to even get a desktop support job.
Good people are still hard to find, and our colleges are STILL graduating students with such a limited set of practical skills that it's amazing that people actually pay for these educations.
Add to this a market that demands skills, responsibility, and expertise that only those in the realms of doctors are required to have. On top of that, the re-training on constantly changing technologies! For what? If you are very good and very good at keeping your job, you may pull down 150k in a big city like NY. Your Doctor friends beat you by a couple hundred thou per year. Mind you they have life and death issues to deal with, but honestly, you'd think the owner of my company was being skewered with hot fire pokers each time we have an outage that costs revenue.
I have 13 years of experience in my field. I can program in 8 major languages without resorting to the docs, and several others with a little book help. I luckily have only been out of work for 3 months my entire career. But guess what? I have saved my bonus money for the last year, and will continue for one year more... Why? I am quitting and going back to school to study biochemistry.
Screw linux, screw ibm, screw sun, screw oss, screw the internet you never loved me anyways, screw 24x7 pager support, screw wall street, you couldn't pay me to screw microsoft, and Apple I will always love you, but screw you too.
Well, I'd have to whole heartedly disagree. Adware and destop advertising software is more likely to be uninstalled if it's troublesome. They do care about what they do to computers.
More and more of companies are bundling ad software with applications users use for free. These are applications users want, conciously download, and applications that developers deserve compensation for. If it's clearly stated "ad software included" why the complaints?
Personally I never found it difficult to remove the software from the more up-and-up companies who bundle adware, although some of companies make stuff that I would akin to viruses. The only caveat is that what I downloaded and used for free is usually disabled in the process which is fair as I am no longer receiving the advertisements that subsidize their development.
IMHO: Companies that demonstrate that their software is removable, that users clearly agree to it's installation will have to be removed from spyware/adware software. I even suspect that there may be legal repricussions if they don't (IANAL).
Oh, and moderators, the parent of this thread was anything but insightful.
I'd have to say that perhaps their buying out of the NYC public school system and assimilating the schools into the M$ collective is probably more interesting of a topic.
Even more interesting is that Joel Klein (who was the head of the JD's antitrust division and responsible for prosecuting M$) ais now the schools chancellor. He's reported as saying he'd made up with good ole Bill-Borg.
Well, I have to agree. I didn't go into depth, and you have definitely added to the point.
The 'glamour' is gone and reality as set in, we have a long way to go and things aren't quite as magical as we thought they might be. Our focus as a race has not been inter-stellar travel or perhaps we might already have capable technology. It's been about impression, war, power, etc. Also about taking our first baby-steps too remember. We still don't understand gravity, only it's symptoms. We have a long way to go.
So, most of us dreamers started dreaming other dreams. More shall we say romantic ones. If we are relegated to the fantastical, lets pick something more umm, human and less harsh and far away, something more fun perhaps even. Anyways, it's all conjecture.
Perhaps someone will discover or invent something truely revolutonary and perhaps things will change.
I have always thought this type of problem was bound to happen. The Linux development process has become large and always has been organic.
I think our focus should not be on what SCO is up to, they are on their last legs anyways. We just end up increasing the hype and prolonging their slow and just death as a viable business.
Instead we should be focusing on a method to prevent additional occurences of others IP ending up in Linux or other OSS projects.
Space travel as discussed in science fiction has become something that we no longer hope for in our lifetimes. This was not the case 50 years ago, we thought we would be traveling the stars! Now we know better.
Perhaps this is people reaction to that. Perhaps if people are to be relegated to remote dreams they like the more romantic notions of elves and wizards.
It certainly isn't hard to get a small mind into unsult hurling mode.:)
That's what politicians do to some extent. No one ever gets elected who doesn't tell people what they want to hear. Why would anyone vote for someone that tells them things that they don't want to hear or don't believe in? Talk about nonsensical.
Does the comment you mentioned regarding the local's here include you?
I'll refrain from entertaining your attempt to incite a flame war.
I beleive sir you miss my point and are spewing nonsensical and off topic remarks about things most poeple in the civilized world have never seen. Wherever you live must be an interesting place, espcially if you are so familiar with the acumen of donkeys sipping yogurt out of farmers nipples.
Oh, and Mr. Smarty Pants, you spelled acumen as accumen.
Why does the use of 'local' vernacular (eg. $$$ or:q!) label Georgy as an idiot. I mean, this is/.
Why do you also assume that points made were stolen, misinformed, or parroting, the latter is much more accurate of your post btw.
Where do you find fault with Georgy's platform that does not relate to grammar?
Language is polymorphic and changes all the time. It's a shame that some people are so stodgy about the use of it.
If $$$ makes a more clearer point, adds intended emphasis, shortens the time taken to digest/read/transmit the information, why should you not use it?
Did you ever study communication theory?
What's the difference? She obviously is well spoken and written.
Regardless, Georgy *is* working the geek beat, but honestly is that a problem? Good for her, maybe some Californian geeks will drag their fingers away from their keyboards and go vote. Her platform is refreshing, real, and definately thought out.
I think i'd fall out of my chair faint if she won tho. I am a pessimist after all.
Aside from the typical cracks about immaturity, towing the line, yadda yadda, there are lots of things I can reccomend. Here are a few.
1: You are young, it is not uncommon to feel this way. Buck up, it does get better. Self mastery in times like these is a character trait that you will need to really succeed in life.
2: Try specializing. Take a few extra courses allowing you to go into hot fields like BIOINFORMATICS or controls systems. The areas of I.T./C.S. that seem to still be doing well are these specialized support areas.
3: The internet bubble is broke and lots of people now have a bad taste in their mouth. Don't get hooked on a dead dream, it was doomed from the start. If you are serious about Internet technology, make sure you get lots of experience and be prepared for atleast 5 years of hard work for low pay to gain experience. Also be prepared to face a telco and more of a corporate environment.
4: Diverisify your skill set. Be sure you are not the typical grad whom can only write crappy little utilities in c and java apps and thus thinks they are hot shit. Know how to be an SA, know the hardware, know how to develop in the top languages (C/C++, Java, Perl etc.) Study software archetecture and gain exposure to multiple platforms. This makes you much more likely to get a job, especially getting an interesting one.
5: Work. Get a job, get experience. Even if you have to work for a pittance, gain experience. It takes a few years, but it is unreasonable for people to assume you walk out of college and get a slammin high paying interesting job right away. It doesn't work that way, not for doctors, lawyers, no one. It takes about 5 years after school to really get going in any field.
6: Get a mentor. This is very important. Meet whith him/her once a month over lunch/dinner and discuss what you have done that month to progress your carreer. Discuss your hurdles, what you fail at, what you succeed at. Get more than one mentor if you can.
Being one of these somewhat quirky, highly individual, 11 year *.com techies, I have some insight on this issue.
First, the type of person mentioned in this article is more like a corporate myth in the sense of an urban myth. I have rarely come across such useless people and have never tolerated them in my environments. If the author of this article had spent the time it took to type it on interviewing the candidate I am sure he could have avoided the whole situation.
Frankly there is some merit to what the point the author is trying to make, altho not perhaps the exact point.
There is little tolerance in the corporate market right now for individual thinkers, loners if you will, and especially to guru's seeking lots of perks even if it is for lots of good work. This is somewhat understandable, I mean, how many of you have had engineers over-use the flexible schedule you allow them? How many of you have had to insist that your employees wear their shoes when running around the office, not sleep under their desk, or to get some dandruff shampoo? I am sure there are plenty of these cases.
Unfortunately, the cattle of corporate culture have had a bit of a knee jerk reaction to the whole 'crash' and the climate is rediculously herd-like. This is not the answer, and frankly this type of extremism won't last just as the type of free-wheeling internet company culture didn't.
To give you an example: The vendor of our new billing, provisioning, and CRM system had informed one of our developers that they had completed his assigned project for him: integrating a web based filemanager into their system. Of course QA signed off on it but it was never really tested. Four days before the launch, it was noticed by a support person and brought to general attention that the program authenticated but didn't work at all. Basically, the vendor did a small portion of the work.
Being the most Sr. technical person and the most proficient developer in house (I run R&D and Eng.), I end up being the 'buck-stops-here' guy. So, I spent that Thursday, Friday, and Saturday working from home 18 hours per day to complete the integration work, full regression testing, and documentation.
On monday, the CEO calls me and his other direct reports into a meeting at 9:00am. I was expecting significant praise for getting a tough project done in time to save the launch date of a 7 month project. What I got instead was a general message to send to my staff and the rest of the company that we must be at the office working from 9:00am till 6:00pm mon-fri regardless.
When I asked him how he would address the issue of me working from home (we have a very interruptive workplace) in order to complete the a key task on time and extensive use of my personal time, he basically responded that he wanted me to do the work at the office (including the Saturday work) and made some comment about being paid the big-bucks... This discussion degraded into him sharing his perception that all of the technology group was over-paid and under-performing. He made some exeption for me, saying I worked hard just was over-paid. He also has the impression that job market is so bad that we must accept his perceptions. All of us made cases in return and he waved them off without further discussion (he is a pretty bad manager when it comes to conflict).
Of course I will do what is asked. I am quirky, individual, driven, but am a team player. I also know how to make a point. The next time this sort of thing happens (which is often), I'll insist on being paid the OT in my contract. I'll also go back to making him personally call me when he needs help from me on my time when the operations team is unable to fix a problem.
Altho this sounds like so much bitching, my friends in similar situations all tell similar stories. Even tho they are successfull, productive, typically over-worked, gurus, they are treated like they resemble the man mentioned in the article above. It's unfortunate, but this is reality for many. Far more real and far more common than type type of situation portrayed in the article on embedded.com.
How do I handle it? Patience. For now, I just wait. The *.com boom had an end, the *.com crash will too. I try to show good work, productivity, and I try to be more agreeable. I keep my more innovative ideas to myself, saved for a time when they are more acceptable to the herd.
Wait, so you suggest that it's just so simple to change e-mail addy's? MAPS/RBL ORBs have become over-zealous, so now I have to tell hundreds of people and move my addy?
Come on, sometimes that's just unfeasable. Most users also are not aware of the blockages.
What do you do about the BGP4 subscriptions, altho it does not work well and useage is not terribly wide spread, it causes an even worse problem.
All and all, it is my experience that there are other ways to fight spam, especially for ISP's.
Packet filter your users when they connect/dialin so as to only permit relay via your own servers (log for legal action)
Put chokes on floods of incoming mail, track most recent mails and do simple comparisons in order to identify potential spam. (Sound's hard but not really).
Only permit users to relay X amount of mail in a given time b4 disallowing further relay's for a 'timeout'.
Work closely with other ISP's and lots of other things.
Again, considering MAPS/RBL/ORBs over-zealous behavior I just dont see a need for them and think it is a terrible abuse of power when they do such broad scale black-listing.
Slashdot Mirror
Hah! New keyboard revenge:
No, sir, *you* suck.
I am responsible for an extremely sensitive real time transaction system.
My company operates in a bit of a panic mode due to the nature of the revenue flow. We ma*e contingency plans for even tiny things. The CEO is absolutely brutal over any thing that smells li*e ris*.
What really burns is the lac* of a decent budget.
It's called being prudent. And you can *iss my hairy balls.
* my "cay" *ey just bro*e. Cats + water glass with straw on des* = straw-now-cat-toy and wet *eyboard.
PFFT!
It's about money. No budget for Redhat.
This whole story is unnerving.
CentOS is widely used in datacenters due to it's red-hattyness, it's Long Term Support, and conservative adoption of whizbang.
It's by far my favorite distrobution for important servers.
I have already had two meetings over this and had my team start their proposals for alternate LTS distros and a migration plan. I am sure I am not the only one.
If the CentOS project manages to remove this single point of failure I think confidence will return. But I think I'll keep my projects going for a while just in case.
Agreed. Bill is speaking out because he wants super cheap low quality labor.
Have you ever been on the other side of an outsourced (as in india/thialand/china/japan) sw dev project? What a NIGHTMARE. Awful code, long hours of conf calls just to explain we want "push" instead of "pull"... Then to wake up the next day and have it wrong still.
MS does nothing without it's own profit margins in interest. It's corporate psychopathy. Can you say Enron?
2c.
Here here!! This is more corporate interestes above the common peoples.
Suggesting that hacking can incur a death penalty because of the BILLIONS involved is VILE!
We so far have kept our government from killing citizens over money, is this what we want now? I thought life was precious and beyond monetary value?
So, we change laws so hackers get death for their billions in losses, but CEO's and other's at the "helm" or in places of power get carte blanche to do whatever they like in the "course of business", lining their own pockets, making billion dollar mistakes, or outright stealing?
I guess America's much vaunted christian morality goes out the window when it comes to money.
A message to John Tierney: Your suggesting that constant virus checking and a vague "cost benifit analysis" is enough to incur the dealth penalty makes you a soulles moron. Shame on the grey lady for even publishing your crap.
Exactly.
Also, I do want to add, although however unpleasant, we cannot on one had bash the RIAA/MPIAA has having outdated out-technologied business models, then support photogropers.
Same deal: owning and controlling the distribution has been made technically impossible and I don't want the government nor courts crippling or controlling use of technology just to support another out-technologied business model.
2c.
Agreed. This is more big business attempting to sway the govt and public opinion to their own desires. On one hand they lay people off, on the other they complain of not enough labor. Simply put they don't have enough wage slaves and the outsource to India routine hasn't panned out.
I also do agree eventually there will be a problem here in the US.
During the wallstreet created bubble, so many people flooded the market looking for a quick buck... Fresh grads demanding 6 figure salaries and barely able to code, and even that in only one language and platform. Now these disaffected people are either retraining for other markets, or struggling to even get a desktop support job.
Good people are still hard to find, and our colleges are STILL graduating students with such a limited set of practical skills that it's amazing that people actually pay for these educations.
Add to this a market that demands skills, responsibility, and expertise that only those in the realms of doctors are required to have. On top of that, the re-training on constantly changing technologies! For what? If you are very good and very good at keeping your job, you may pull down 150k in a big city like NY. Your Doctor friends beat you by a couple hundred thou per year. Mind you they have life and death issues to deal with, but honestly, you'd think the owner of my company was being skewered with hot fire pokers each time we have an outage that costs revenue.
I have 13 years of experience in my field. I can program in 8 major languages without resorting to the docs, and several others with a little book help. I luckily have only been out of work for 3 months my entire career. But guess what? I have saved my bonus money for the last year, and will continue for one year more... Why? I am quitting and going back to school to study biochemistry.
Screw linux, screw ibm, screw sun, screw oss, screw the internet you never loved me anyways, screw 24x7 pager support, screw wall street, you couldn't pay me to screw microsoft, and Apple I will always love you, but screw you too.
Lemme hear your molecules talk. Yeah, lemme hear your molecules talk...
So long as all the stars have big umm, accoutrements, and run around in hot spandex outfits I'll watch it.
Well, I'd have to whole heartedly disagree. Adware and destop advertising software is more likely to be uninstalled if it's troublesome. They do care about what they do to computers.
More and more of companies are bundling ad software with applications users use for free. These are applications users want, conciously download, and applications that developers deserve compensation for. If it's clearly stated "ad software included" why the complaints?
Personally I never found it difficult to remove the software from the more up-and-up companies who bundle adware, although some of companies make stuff that I would akin to viruses. The only caveat is that what I downloaded and used for free is usually disabled in the process which is fair as I am no longer receiving the advertisements that subsidize their development.
IMHO: Companies that demonstrate that their software is removable, that users clearly agree to it's installation will have to be removed from spyware/adware software. I even suspect that there may be legal repricussions if they don't (IANAL).
Oh, and moderators, the parent of this thread was anything but insightful.
OMG!
http://www.beosmax.org/main.php
I love BeOS, as would most developers. Great platform, sorry to see that it's been so marginalized.
BUT, why would anyone want to deface the page?
It's really gross too.
Some *ssh*les need to get real lives.
rr
Hello,
I'd have to say that perhaps their buying out of the NYC public school system and assimilating the schools into the M$ collective is probably more interesting of a topic.
Even more interesting is that Joel Klein (who was the head of the JD's antitrust division and responsible for prosecuting M$) ais now the schools chancellor. He's reported as saying he'd made up with good ole Bill-Borg.
Very interesting.
BTW, go troll elsewhere.
rr
Hello,
Well, I have to agree. I didn't go into depth, and you have definitely added to the point.
The 'glamour' is gone and reality as set in, we have a long way to go and things aren't quite as magical as we thought they might be. Our focus as a race has not been inter-stellar travel or perhaps we might already have capable technology. It's been about impression, war, power, etc. Also about taking our first baby-steps too remember. We still don't understand gravity, only it's symptoms. We have a long way to go.
So, most of us dreamers started dreaming other dreams. More shall we say romantic ones. If we are relegated to the fantastical, lets pick something more umm, human and less harsh and far away, something more fun perhaps even. Anyways, it's all conjecture.
Perhaps someone will discover or invent something truely revolutonary and perhaps things will change.
Thanks for the input!
L8er
Richard Rebel
I think our focus should not be on what SCO is up to, they are on their last legs anyways. We just end up increasing the hype and prolonging their slow and just death as a viable business.
Instead we should be focusing on a method to prevent additional occurences of others IP ending up in Linux or other OSS projects.
I take a different opinion.
Space travel as discussed in science fiction has become something that we no longer hope for in our lifetimes. This was not the case 50 years ago, we thought we would be traveling the stars! Now we know better.
Perhaps this is people reaction to that. Perhaps if people are to be relegated to remote dreams they like the more romantic notions of elves and wizards.
2c.
Where exactly does that quote come from? I have seen it in wolfenstein a few times.
Not any more you don't. We don't permit moonlighting.
No, I didn't have to look it up.
It certainly isn't hard to get a small mind into unsult hurling mode.
That's what politicians do to some extent. No one ever gets elected who doesn't tell people what they want to hear. Why would anyone vote for someone that tells them things that they don't want to hear or don't believe in? Talk about nonsensical.
Does the comment you mentioned regarding the local's here include you?
I'll refrain from entertaining your attempt to incite a flame war.
I beleive sir you miss my point and are spewing nonsensical and off topic remarks about things most poeple in the civilized world have never seen. Wherever you live must be an interesting place, espcially if you are so familiar with the acumen of donkeys sipping yogurt out of farmers nipples.
Oh, and Mr. Smarty Pants, you spelled acumen as accumen.
Why does the use of 'local' vernacular (eg. $$$ or
Why do you also assume that points made were stolen, misinformed, or parroting, the latter is much more accurate of your post btw.
Where do you find fault with Georgy's platform that does not relate to grammar?
rr
Language is polymorphic and changes all the time. It's a shame that some people are so stodgy about the use of it.
If $$$ makes a more clearer point, adds intended emphasis, shortens the time taken to digest/read/transmit the information, why should you not use it?
Did you ever study communication theory?
What's the difference? She obviously is well spoken and written.
Regardless, Georgy *is* working the geek beat, but honestly is that a problem? Good for her, maybe some Californian geeks will drag their fingers away from their keyboards and go vote. Her platform is refreshing, real, and definately thought out.
I think i'd fall out of my chair faint if she won tho. I am a pessimist after all.
Good luck Georgy and ignore the chum replied to.
rr
Dear Sadsack,
Aside from the typical cracks about immaturity, towing the line, yadda yadda, there are lots of things I can reccomend. Here are a few.
1: You are young, it is not uncommon to feel this way. Buck up, it does get better. Self mastery in times like these is a character trait that you will need to really succeed in life.
2: Try specializing. Take a few extra courses allowing you to go into hot fields like BIOINFORMATICS or controls systems. The areas of I.T./C.S. that seem to still be doing well are these specialized support areas.
3: The internet bubble is broke and lots of people now have a bad taste in their mouth. Don't get hooked on a dead dream, it was doomed from the start. If you are serious about Internet technology, make sure you get lots of experience and be prepared for atleast 5 years of hard work for low pay to gain experience. Also be prepared to face a telco and more of a corporate environment.
4: Diverisify your skill set. Be sure you are not the typical grad whom can only write crappy little utilities in c and java apps and thus thinks they are hot shit. Know how to be an SA, know the hardware, know how to develop in the top languages (C/C++, Java, Perl etc.) Study software archetecture and gain exposure to multiple platforms. This makes you much more likely to get a job, especially getting an interesting one.
5: Work. Get a job, get experience. Even if you have to work for a pittance, gain experience. It takes a few years, but it is unreasonable for people to assume you walk out of college and get a slammin high paying interesting job right away. It doesn't work that way, not for doctors, lawyers, no one. It takes about 5 years after school to really get going in any field.
6: Get a mentor. This is very important. Meet whith him/her once a month over lunch/dinner and discuss what you have done that month to progress your carreer. Discuss your hurdles, what you fail at, what you succeed at. Get more than one mentor if you can.
rr.
Being one of these somewhat quirky, highly individual, 11 year *.com techies, I have some insight on this issue.
First, the type of person mentioned in this article is more like a corporate myth in the sense of an urban myth. I have rarely come across such useless people and have never tolerated them in my environments. If the author of this article had spent the time it took to type it on interviewing the candidate I am sure he could have avoided the whole situation.
Frankly there is some merit to what the point the author is trying to make, altho not perhaps the exact point.
There is little tolerance in the corporate market right now for individual thinkers, loners if you will, and especially to guru's seeking lots of perks even if it is for lots of good work. This is somewhat understandable, I mean, how many of you have had engineers over-use the flexible schedule you allow them? How many of you have had to insist that your employees wear their shoes when running around the office, not sleep under their desk, or to get some dandruff shampoo? I am sure there are plenty of these cases.
Unfortunately, the cattle of corporate culture have had a bit of a knee jerk reaction to the whole 'crash' and the climate is rediculously herd-like. This is not the answer, and frankly this type of extremism won't last just as the type of free-wheeling internet company culture didn't.
To give you an example: The vendor of our new billing, provisioning, and CRM system had informed one of our developers that they had completed his assigned project for him: integrating a web based filemanager into their system. Of course QA signed off on it but it was never really tested. Four days before the launch, it was noticed by a support person and brought to general attention that the program authenticated but didn't work at all. Basically, the vendor did a small portion of the work.
Being the most Sr. technical person and the most proficient developer in house (I run R&D and Eng.), I end up being the 'buck-stops-here' guy. So, I spent that Thursday, Friday, and Saturday working from home 18 hours per day to complete the integration work, full regression testing, and documentation.
On monday, the CEO calls me and his other direct reports into a meeting at 9:00am. I was expecting significant praise for getting a tough project done in time to save the launch date of a 7 month project. What I got instead was a general message to send to my staff and the rest of the company that we must be at the office working from 9:00am till 6:00pm mon-fri regardless.
When I asked him how he would address the issue of me working from home (we have a very interruptive workplace) in order to complete the a key task on time and extensive use of my personal time, he basically responded that he wanted me to do the work at the office (including the Saturday work) and made some comment about being paid the big-bucks... This discussion degraded into him sharing his perception that all of the technology group was over-paid and under-performing. He made some exeption for me, saying I worked hard just was over-paid. He also has the impression that job market is so bad that we must accept his perceptions. All of us made cases in return and he waved them off without further discussion (he is a pretty bad manager when it comes to conflict).
Of course I will do what is asked. I am quirky, individual, driven, but am a team player. I also know how to make a point. The next time this sort of thing happens (which is often), I'll insist on being paid the OT in my contract. I'll also go back to making him personally call me when he needs help from me on my time when the operations team is unable to fix a problem.
Altho this sounds like so much bitching, my friends in similar situations all tell similar stories. Even tho they are successfull, productive, typically over-worked, gurus, they are treated like they resemble the man mentioned in the article above. It's unfortunate, but this is reality for many. Far more real and far more common than type type of situation portrayed in the article on embedded.com.
How do I handle it? Patience. For now, I just wait. The *.com boom had an end, the *.com crash will too. I try to show good work, productivity, and I try to be more agreeable. I keep my more innovative ideas to myself, saved for a time when they are more acceptable to the herd.
rr.
Wait, so you suggest that it's just so simple to change e-mail addy's? MAPS/RBL ORBs have become over-zealous, so now I have to tell hundreds of people and move my addy?
Come on, sometimes that's just unfeasable. Most users also are not aware of the blockages.
What do you do about the BGP4 subscriptions, altho it does not work well and useage is not terribly wide spread, it causes an even worse problem.
All and all, it is my experience that there are other ways to fight spam, especially for ISP's.
Packet filter your users when they connect/dialin so as to only permit relay via your own servers (log for legal action)
Put chokes on floods of incoming mail, track most recent mails and do simple comparisons in order to identify potential spam. (Sound's hard but not really).
Only permit users to relay X amount of mail in a given time b4 disallowing further relay's for a 'timeout'.
Work closely with other ISP's and lots of other things.
Again, considering MAPS/RBL/ORBs over-zealous behavior I just dont see a need for them and think it is a terrible abuse of power when they do such broad scale black-listing.
BTW, black-listing is illegal in MOST industries.
rr.
Many networks/isp's etc. use these black-hole lists to create null/black-hole routes!
This keeps you from being able to reach web sites as well!
SPAM sucks, but censorship is worse.
I haven't talked to Paul Vixie in a few years, but I always thought he had more moxy than to bounce the author to an unresponsive PR dept.
I'd like to see Paul make some comments on this stuff himself.
Anyone think this is a good