ALU is doing a lot of things right, from the customer standpoint. they have the usual and expected number of "butches" here and there, as all tech equipment that does anything more complicated than put "hello, world" up on the screen does.
the trick is, how to get rid of dead weight that costs a ton and does nothing.
way I see it, there are a lot of extra VPs, senior directors, and district/area/product/country presidents that should be holding "slow" signs at a road project, for the pay they are more worthy of earning.
somehow, the C-levels don't buy the notion that when you need a tech on site at 3 in the morning, that's more precious. I guess it's because they can't reserve the whole deck of the cruise ship or the whole wing of the island resort for offsites if they don't have enough reservations.
that's how it works. much of the time, the service contracts are lagniappe for the manufacturers in every field. there are also a tangle of legal service requirements that mean long after a provider wants to dump a bunch of power-sucking light-blinking money hogs, they have to maintain it because it is tariffed and posted for resale.
wireline companies would probably like to blow the central offices out and go VoIP all the way, and the technology is now mature for everything except 911 location information at the caller's phone. but tangles of law and regulator FUD get in the way.
so failing to support the old gear in this field dooms your chance to sell new gear. and ALU has some nicely featured stuff recently out that fills a lot of holes better than Cisco.
they're in the business of walking a fine line. ITT couldn't, so they sold their telco stuff to France Telecom's Alcatel decades ago. Newbridge couldn't or wouldn't certify for Y2K, so they got dumped into the whirlwind, and Alcatel bought 'em for a song. Lucent lost the knack, so we have Alcatel-Lucent. Nortel just plain couldn't get up after falling off the wire any number of times, so they got chapter-7 firesaled in pieces.
that's the business. every 2 or 3 years, the "new stuff" is supposed to blow out the old stuff. except the old stuff is basically the foundation of civilization's communication, and it gets riveted into regulations. until it's all IP or whatever next-gen becomes with the world's consensus, that won't change.
the requirements of the FCC for durability and failover practically keep equipment operable for longer than 15 to 20 years in the backbone. all you need to do is replace the failures, periodically upgrade the software to clear bugs and enable new services, and for that you need infrastructure partners in it for the long haul. they get paid millions of bucks a year for service contracts.
a company that does not play by those rules gets crossed off the bid list. a customer that does not renew the service contracts sees the product line discontinued. that is the bargain the players make to keep things going. kind of like the mutual squeeze in large-scale computing.
stop whining and build something. if you really want better training and are even willing to sponsor it, then hire the people when they come out. don't go running to East Sub-Nirvana for code at pennies per day and then whine there are no programmers in the shadow of the CEO's mansions.
it will all suck. total reorg with the same CEO who fostered the cluster? -- yah, sure, ya betcha then. Sven. so put some gas on the wood chipper and let's get it ready.
things are always unstable during test periods. once a device this complicated, like a space booster or a 787 for instance, gets certified and enters serial production, that is the part where inspections and workers empowered to shut down the line becomes the paramount safety mechanism.
is toss one site back to another, so they are tossing ads back and forth, making it look like all the hits are coming from other advertisers. I would suspect eventually the hosting sites will end up blocking themselves, and all will be well in the Twitterverse.
just what the world needs, another old grey fat billionnaire trying to figure out how to blast the monsters in front of a crowd, and lasting 10 seconds.
or not at all. if "big time Hollywood" won't come to the market, the market will go to the folks who want to serve it.
maybe it's time to tell them to go to freakin' hell in a flamebucket and let somebody else start producing and distributing content. we need a new model anyway, Steven Spielberg this month told a big ol' Hollywood gathering that their business is kaput anyway... you can't grind out a potboiler for under $100 million, and increasingly films are not making their production money back. of course, Hollywood accounting has always read that tale to the artists who had profit participation.
screw DRM, in all its forms, over Da ISH, and let's see what we get for production values. you can do a passable edit job with the free software on any new computer in the past 5 years. what you don't get for free are "10 passes through the optical printer" effects.
there is no RFC allowing for a change in the plate while in operation, as there is for an IP address. the soft IP was very useful in the life of things like VAXes because of all the licenses tied to the MAC address. so when our net card died at the school, DEC just added a line to the startup script with comments to soft-IP the machine to the old hard address.
used to be in the old days, the cops could spot a fake plate from ten lengths away. now that almost all stamped plates have been replaced with printed plates only, "a hacker" could spoof the plate with some Scotchlite film and black paint.
which is to say, the compression algorithms for the various packet formats are open to all. some packet generators are proprietary. some are free or low cost things whipped up on computer by hams.
there is an argument going on at eHam these days about whether your (open) transmissions are being copied by the spooks.
duh. they listen to everything.
encryption is a path to banning amateur radio communications altogether, as various pig-headed dictatorships try to lock down discussion and turn everybody's eyes back to Fearless Leader on the big screen. the IATU should be protesting this, hard. -- KD0REQ
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ALU is doing a lot of things right, from the customer standpoint. they have the usual and expected number of "butches" here and there, as all tech equipment that does anything more complicated than put "hello, world" up on the screen does.
the trick is, how to get rid of dead weight that costs a ton and does nothing.
way I see it, there are a lot of extra VPs, senior directors, and district/area/product/country presidents that should be holding "slow" signs at a road project, for the pay they are more worthy of earning.
somehow, the C-levels don't buy the notion that when you need a tech on site at 3 in the morning, that's more precious. I guess it's because they can't reserve the whole deck of the cruise ship or the whole wing of the island resort for offsites if they don't have enough reservations.
YMMV
that's how it works. much of the time, the service contracts are lagniappe for the manufacturers in every field. there are also a tangle of legal service requirements that mean long after a provider wants to dump a bunch of power-sucking light-blinking money hogs, they have to maintain it because it is tariffed and posted for resale.
wireline companies would probably like to blow the central offices out and go VoIP all the way, and the technology is now mature for everything except 911 location information at the caller's phone. but tangles of law and regulator FUD get in the way.
so failing to support the old gear in this field dooms your chance to sell new gear. and ALU has some nicely featured stuff recently out that fills a lot of holes better than Cisco.
they're in the business of walking a fine line. ITT couldn't, so they sold their telco stuff to France Telecom's Alcatel decades ago. Newbridge couldn't or wouldn't certify for Y2K, so they got dumped into the whirlwind, and Alcatel bought 'em for a song. Lucent lost the knack, so we have Alcatel-Lucent. Nortel just plain couldn't get up after falling off the wire any number of times, so they got chapter-7 firesaled in pieces.
that's the business. every 2 or 3 years, the "new stuff" is supposed to blow out the old stuff. except the old stuff is basically the foundation of civilization's communication, and it gets riveted into regulations. until it's all IP or whatever next-gen becomes with the world's consensus, that won't change.
the requirements of the FCC for durability and failover practically keep equipment operable for longer than 15 to 20 years in the backbone. all you need to do is replace the failures, periodically upgrade the software to clear bugs and enable new services, and for that you need infrastructure partners in it for the long haul. they get paid millions of bucks a year for service contracts.
a company that does not play by those rules gets crossed off the bid list. a customer that does not renew the service contracts sees the product line discontinued. that is the bargain the players make to keep things going. kind of like the mutual squeeze in large-scale computing.
if ALU backs out, expect another Nortel.
Wei = "way" and Wie = "wee", if you're going to make race-baiting jokes, at least get the pronunciation right.
"Go ahead, piss on your Samsung Galaxy. They want you to. And we'll be open at 9 tomorrow morning for you."
stop whining and build something. if you really want better training and are even willing to sponsor it, then hire the people when they come out. don't go running to East Sub-Nirvana for code at pennies per day and then whine there are no programmers in the shadow of the CEO's mansions.
is if it was badly done porn.
you want to appeal, turn your head upward... but The Big Guy doesn't buy blaming others.
We are complying with GFR privacy rules and more, by directly spying on your citizens and ours, so you don't have to do it for us.
Sincerely, Redacted.
magic, we can install that Web thing in Linux now! I can dig this! does it allow me to use two modems to get 96K speed?
when in operation, that is hardly possible. that's why everybody gets so twitchy over these things, regulators most of all.
best in-flight BBQ
and don't try to hide it by doing a doodle of flowers growing.
it will all suck. total reorg with the same CEO who fostered the cluster? -- yah, sure, ya betcha then. Sven. so put some gas on the wood chipper and let's get it ready.
things are always unstable during test periods. once a device this complicated, like a space booster or a 787 for instance, gets certified and enters serial production, that is the part where inspections and workers empowered to shut down the line becomes the paramount safety mechanism.
economic development spurred by almost two and a half million dollars, and a few hammers... we'll have the complete story live at 10.
weld one end to your desk, and the other end to... oh... a wimpy little Kensington clip. hmm. just like software tools. looks tough, acts muff.
to make sure I get my snark tuned exactly right.
is toss one site back to another, so they are tossing ads back and forth, making it look like all the hits are coming from other advertisers. I would suspect eventually the hosting sites will end up blocking themselves, and all will be well in the Twitterverse.
just what the world needs, another old grey fat billionnaire trying to figure out how to blast the monsters in front of a crowd, and lasting 10 seconds.
God has spoken through Moryath, and we must break the rules.
or not at all. if "big time Hollywood" won't come to the market, the market will go to the folks who want to serve it.
maybe it's time to tell them to go to freakin' hell in a flamebucket and let somebody else start producing and distributing content. we need a new model anyway, Steven Spielberg this month told a big ol' Hollywood gathering that their business is kaput anyway... you can't grind out a potboiler for under $100 million, and increasingly films are not making their production money back. of course, Hollywood accounting has always read that tale to the artists who had profit participation.
screw DRM, in all its forms, over Da ISH, and let's see what we get for production values. you can do a passable edit job with the free software on any new computer in the past 5 years. what you don't get for free are "10 passes through the optical printer" effects.
there is no RFC allowing for a change in the plate while in operation, as there is for an IP address. the soft IP was very useful in the life of things like VAXes because of all the licenses tied to the MAC address. so when our net card died at the school, DEC just added a line to the startup script with comments to soft-IP the machine to the old hard address.
used to be in the old days, the cops could spot a fake plate from ten lengths away. now that almost all stamped plates have been replaced with printed plates only, "a hacker" could spoof the plate with some Scotchlite film and black paint.
I had a set of backups like that once. that's why I dumped NT 3.5
using 2 inch copper bars, connect to a bridge with stainless steel bolts and lockwashers. use anti-oxide paste....
which is to say, the compression algorithms for the various packet formats are open to all. some packet generators are proprietary. some are free or low cost things whipped up on computer by hams.
there is an argument going on at eHam these days about whether your (open) transmissions are being copied by the spooks.
duh. they listen to everything.
encryption is a path to banning amateur radio communications altogether, as various pig-headed dictatorships try to lock down discussion and turn everybody's eyes back to Fearless Leader on the big screen. the IATU should be protesting this, hard. -- KD0REQ