If this sort of stuff interests you, pick up The Mythical Man-Month: Essays on Software Engineering, 20th Anniversary Edition, by Frederick P. Brooks. He was actually on the team that built the 360 (IIRC) and it is full of insight not into the hardware or architecture, but on the process of developing such a monster (sizewise) of a release.
Which completely misses the point - it's not the learning, it's the doing that matters.
Yes and no. None of the physical things we actually did in 1964-1970'ish range with respect to Mercury / Gemini / Apollo provided us with a single ounce of reward (except those moon rocks - they fetch a pretty penny on eBay.) It is all the stuff we learned in the process that continues to provide us ROI from that investment.
I would say it is the learning - but learning in an exceptionally high dollar lab with astronomical goals and a stellar budget (heh) provides us with lessons that can't be learned by a single grad student working in the physics lab at Alabama State University (no offense ASU - I'm just saying.)
True scientists would burn every natural resource in Brazil to turn a penny worth of lead into a dime worth of gold. The lessons learned during that process would be incredible but Wall Street won't let regular business perform those sort of money losing experiments - NASA will, and does.
While we are talking about the 'people' that accomplished these things - consider where they came from : millions of American servicemen in their early 20's came back from WWII in the 1945'ish time frame, got uber student loans / grants from the government back when a one bedroom apartment in Boston didn't cost half a million dollars and college for four years didn't cost another quarter million dollars, got good entry level engineering jobs that hadn't been outsourced by short sighted businesses, worked their way into upper level engineering positions in companies that hadn't outsourced those, made long term commitments to companies that didn't RIF entire divisions because quarterly profits were a penny less than Wall Street expected, and did feats of engineering magic that we still talk about today.
Heh. Most of us wear watches with more horsepower than a single System 360 of the time. I would imagine that every computation performed at all of NASA from T minus 10 until splashdown could grind through my desktop in less time than it took me to reply to this message.
The difference wasn't in the hardware. It was in the people, their abilities, and in the working relationship those people had with each other. It was in the management of those people, putting success and excellence above all else. It was in the work - putting men on the moon wasn't just a job, it was an adventure and it was a dream.
Oh man - another Spectrum class admin. I cut my teeth in my first job on a Spectrum class 3000 box, loved it to death. I grew up just assuming that computers stayed up forever, that the only reason you needed to reboot the machine was for hardware upgrades. God I miss my 922/LX.
Your search - "doom ported to the alpha" - did not match any documents. Your search - "doom released for the alpha" - did not match any documents. Your search - "doom running on the alpha" - did not match any documents.
It's too bad HP didn't already have a long term successful 64 bit chip, all the engineers that designed it from the ground up, and 10 years of history with something like the DEC Alpha chip. That was a killer platform and some collaboration between Intel and whatever company held all the people that did the Alpha would have resulted in computer nirvana - unless the company that held all that Alpha history was run by a complete loser of a woman with the sole intent of systematically destroying the company and bringing a few other companies with it.
Actually what he said was 'if we screw it up, we fix it. If we can't fix it we call the admin and ask him to bring the Gold Disk.' When getting an admin involved means getting your system formatted, you tend to keep your computer running nice and TIGHT.
We get admin rights on our boxes at work, but we have to agree to the same sort of deal in the process. Tech support for the group that goes that route consists of one option: Format C: [X]Yes [ ]No
(and we are happy (and productive) as hell with that arrangement.)
If that isn't reducing the workload of an admin, I don't know what would.
The only problem is that for every guy that really knows his shit, there are 5 others that are complete bozos that install spyware and what have you, fucking things up for those of us in the first group (and the hard part is - those 5 think they belong in the other group.)
If you are in a serious bind, need random apps and what have you installed in your environment and getting the 'Lock Down Blues'... get one app approved, buy it yourself if you have to : VMware Workstation 4.5, and tell them once it is installed they can lock your computer down as hard as they want. Needless to say, I work in a locked down environment (tight as a drum) and I'm happy (and productive) as a bumble-bee in springtime.
If you haven't heard of VMware, read my Journal (scroll down a little.)
In other words, if you want to hook up a computer to the network, it has to be a Windows box provided by the administration, that is locked down so only they can administer it.
Lock down your DHCP server to only give IP addresses to registered MAC addresses. Granted you need to do a little work up front, but a lot less work long term.
Disclaimer - I know how to do this off the top of my head for the wireless router I have a home, not entirely sure this is possible with home-grade commercial wired routers w/ integrated DHCP servers. Then again, wifi connections have gotten fast and cheap, and locking wifi down by MAC address is a no brainer even on the cheapo home hardware.
To expand on this, stop calling user access levels 'rights' or 'privileges' - call them 'responsibilities'.
'Admin rights' sounds cool. 'Admin privileges' sounds like something I am entitled to because I am powerful. 'Admin responsibilities' - screw that, that's what we pay IT to do.
Additionally, when they hose their box, you can look at them and say 'hey - you specifically requested the responsibility to admin that box, so go admin it.'
You can get folks to give up their admin access as soon as it sounds like work.
That said, I would envision the biggest hassle would be getting the look-up table that lists every UPC and what it actually is... I mean just because you know that 20138-13604 is a roasted raspberry / chipolte sauce(*) doesn't mean you can necessarily derive product from UPC number - you have to already have the database that knows.
Footnotes (*) - and a damn nice roasted raspberry / chipolte sauce at that.
The appliance that automagically keeps track of your groceries, makes lists of what's needed from the store, even goes and gets them from the store while you are at work - already exists.
Here's a clue : your kid's phone has a GPS tracker in it, and you haven't disabled it. And yes, if someone (read : government) really wants to they can find out exactly (within a city block or two) where he is (his cell phone, assuming it is on) in pretty much real-time.
Google : Enhanced 911
That's not even the best they have, either. Ask me sometime about the 'anywhere microphone' - a trivial use of the phone system from the central office to disable the ringer on your land line, force it to go off-hook, and mute the speaker... Voila! instant microphone into your house in every room with a regular telephone (doesn't work so well with wireless landline phones.)
A related question about RAID on external media
on
USB Key Multitool?
·
· Score: 1
A while ago I found a site that had a USB 2.0 Thumb Drive set of benchmarks (Here, if interested) and on page 8 he does something VERY interesting - creates a RAID 0 array out of two similar drives and shows us the benchmarks of that array.
Scaled in almost linear fashion - not a surprise but definitely thought provoking. The problem is that he did it under OSX, not Windows. Crap, I was envisioning a six drive stripe under WindowsXP Pro but it doesn't seem to be cooperating and none of the people I have asked have figured out a way to change an external drive into a 'dynamic drive', which of course is the first step towards creating the stripe set / RAID array.
Anyone have any ideas about making this work? I think a 6G RAID 0 array (six one gig USB 2.0 drives in a stripe) with zero latency and 50MB/s throughput would be a very cool toy indeed - if only I could get it to work.
That's $250k out of each officer's personal checking account. The company gets to pony up $160M.
For us, thats like getting hit with a fine of two year's take home salary (like maybe $80k to $100k - I said take home, not gross.) Not something that would destroy us... no, come to think of it that would destroy some of us.
I have learned that until you are the one person keeping someone's computer alive, you never really completely control or own that person.
I would quote Grand Moff Tarkin here for effect, but any self respecting hacker is hearing the words in the back of his head long before he finishes reading what I wrote...
Slashdot Mirror
Maybe that explains my extreme lust for Hillary.
Why else do you think I want her to run for President in 2008? Imagine all the Hillary porn that would surface.
I would give each of you a free iPod for a week with Hillary. (Just to stay on topic.)
If this sort of stuff interests you, pick up The Mythical Man-Month: Essays on Software Engineering, 20th Anniversary Edition, by Frederick P. Brooks. He was actually on the team that built the 360 (IIRC) and it is full of insight not into the hardware or architecture, but on the process of developing such a monster (sizewise) of a release.
Which completely misses the point - it's not the learning, it's the doing that matters.
Yes and no. None of the physical things we actually did in 1964-1970'ish range with respect to Mercury / Gemini / Apollo provided us with a single ounce of reward (except those moon rocks - they fetch a pretty penny on eBay.) It is all the stuff we learned in the process that continues to provide us ROI from that investment.
I would say it is the learning - but learning in an exceptionally high dollar lab with astronomical goals and a stellar budget (heh) provides us with lessons that can't be learned by a single grad student working in the physics lab at Alabama State University (no offense ASU - I'm just saying.)
True scientists would burn every natural resource in Brazil to turn a penny worth of lead into a dime worth of gold. The lessons learned during that process would be incredible but Wall Street won't let regular business perform those sort of money losing experiments - NASA will, and does.
While we are talking about the 'people' that accomplished these things - consider where they came from : millions of American servicemen in their early 20's came back from WWII in the 1945'ish time frame, got uber student loans / grants from the government back when a one bedroom apartment in Boston didn't cost half a million dollars and college for four years didn't cost another quarter million dollars, got good entry level engineering jobs that hadn't been outsourced by short sighted businesses, worked their way into upper level engineering positions in companies that hadn't outsourced those, made long term commitments to companies that didn't RIF entire divisions because quarterly profits were a penny less than Wall Street expected, and did feats of engineering magic that we still talk about today.
Heh.
Most of us wear watches with more horsepower than a single System 360 of the time.
I would imagine that every computation performed at all of NASA from T minus 10 until splashdown could grind through my desktop in less time than it took me to reply to this message.
The difference wasn't in the hardware.
It was in the people, their abilities, and in the working relationship those people had with each other.
It was in the management of those people, putting success and excellence above all else.
It was in the work - putting men on the moon wasn't just a job, it was an adventure and it was a dream.
You need to see the movie (in theaters now) : Closer.
Don't ask - just go.
And SCO can bite the big weenie.
Oh man - another Spectrum class admin. I cut my teeth in my first job on a Spectrum class 3000 box, loved it to death. I grew up just assuming that computers stayed up forever, that the only reason you needed to reboot the machine was for hardware upgrades. God I miss my 922/LX.
Why then would Carly merge HP with Compaq at great expense...
Carly did it to cover the fact that she was stealing $100M in the process. Any other questions?
Actually the real reason the Alpha failed :
Your search - "doom ported to the alpha" - did not match any documents.
Your search - "doom released for the alpha" - did not match any documents.
Your search - "doom running on the alpha" - did not match any documents.
Well D'oh - poor fucker didn't have a chance.
It's too bad HP didn't already have a long term successful 64 bit chip, all the engineers that designed it from the ground up, and 10 years of history with something like the DEC Alpha chip. That was a killer platform and some collaboration between Intel and whatever company held all the people that did the Alpha would have resulted in computer nirvana - unless the company that held all that Alpha history was run by a complete loser of a woman with the sole intent of systematically destroying the company and bringing a few other companies with it.
Oh wait - that is exactly what happened.
Actually what he said was 'if we screw it up, we fix it. If we can't fix it we call the admin and ask him to bring the Gold Disk.' When getting an admin involved means getting your system formatted, you tend to keep your computer running nice and TIGHT.
:
We get admin rights on our boxes at work, but we have to agree to the same sort of deal in the process.
Tech support for the group that goes that route consists of one option
Format C: [X]Yes [ ]No
(and we are happy (and productive) as hell with that arrangement.)
If that isn't reducing the workload of an admin, I don't know what would.
The only problem is that for every guy that really knows his shit, there are 5 others that are complete bozos that install spyware and what have you, fucking things up for those of us in the first group (and the hard part is - those 5 think they belong in the other group.)
... get one app approved, buy it yourself if you have to : VMware Workstation 4.5, and tell them once it is installed they can lock your computer down as hard as they want. Needless to say, I work in a locked down environment (tight as a drum) and I'm happy (and productive) as a bumble-bee in springtime.
If you are in a serious bind, need random apps and what have you installed in your environment and getting the 'Lock Down Blues'
If you haven't heard of VMware, read my Journal (scroll down a little.)
In other words, if you want to hook up a computer to the network, it has to be a Windows box provided by the administration, that is locked down so only they can administer it.
Lock down your DHCP server to only give IP addresses to registered MAC addresses. Granted you need to do a little work up front, but a lot less work long term.
Disclaimer - I know how to do this off the top of my head for the wireless router I have a home, not entirely sure this is possible with home-grade commercial wired routers w/ integrated DHCP servers. Then again, wifi connections have gotten fast and cheap, and locking wifi down by MAC address is a no brainer even on the cheapo home hardware.
To expand on this, stop calling user access levels 'rights' or 'privileges' - call them 'responsibilities'.
'Admin rights' sounds cool.
'Admin privileges' sounds like something I am entitled to because I am powerful.
'Admin responsibilities' - screw that, that's what we pay IT to do.
Additionally, when they hose their box, you can look at them and say 'hey - you specifically requested the responsibility to admin that box, so go admin it.'
You can get folks to give up their admin access as soon as it sounds like work.
You are my hero! ...
Now where did I put those mod points
That said, I would envision the biggest hassle would be getting the look-up table that lists every UPC and what it actually is ... I mean just because you know that 20138-13604 is a roasted raspberry / chipolte sauce(*) doesn't mean you can necessarily derive product from UPC number - you have to already have the database that knows.
Footnotes
(*) - and a damn nice roasted raspberry / chipolte sauce at that.
The appliance that automagically keeps track of your groceries, makes lists of what's needed from the store, even goes and gets them from the store while you are at work - already exists.
It's called a wife.
Here's a clue : your kid's phone has a GPS tracker in it, and you haven't disabled it. And yes, if someone (read : government) really wants to they can find out exactly (within a city block or two) where he is (his cell phone, assuming it is on) in pretty much real-time.
... Voila! instant microphone into your house in every room with a regular telephone (doesn't work so well with wireless landline phones.)
Google : Enhanced 911
That's not even the best they have, either. Ask me sometime about the 'anywhere microphone' - a trivial use of the phone system from the central office to disable the ringer on your land line, force it to go off-hook, and mute the speaker
A while ago I found a site that had a USB 2.0 Thumb Drive set of benchmarks (Here, if interested) and on page 8 he does something VERY interesting - creates a RAID 0 array out of two similar drives and shows us the benchmarks of that array.
Scaled in almost linear fashion - not a surprise but definitely thought provoking. The problem is that he did it under OSX, not Windows. Crap, I was envisioning a six drive stripe under WindowsXP Pro but it doesn't seem to be cooperating and none of the people I have asked have figured out a way to change an external drive into a 'dynamic drive', which of course is the first step towards creating the stripe set / RAID array.
Anyone have any ideas about making this work?
I think a 6G RAID 0 array (six one gig USB 2.0 drives in a stripe) with zero latency and 50MB/s throughput would be a very cool toy indeed - if only I could get it to work.
That's $250k out of each officer's personal checking account. The company gets to pony up $160M.
... no, come to think of it that would destroy some of us.
For us, thats like getting hit with a fine of two year's take home salary (like maybe $80k to $100k - I said take home, not gross.) Not something that would destroy us
From Hitachi :
Operating Environmental characteristics
Ambient temperature 5 to 55 C
Relative humidity (non-condensing) 8% to 90%
Thus freezing would be a little too cold for current production drives.
I have learned that until you are the one person keeping someone's computer alive, you never really completely control or own that person.
...
I would quote Grand Moff Tarkin here for effect, but any self respecting hacker is hearing the words in the back of his head long before he finishes reading what I wrote
Fear
'How your face could open doors.'
Hah - that's nothing. At work there is a woman with a face that can stop a train.
I have been asking that question for a while (check my sig.)
When all you have is a hammer, all the world looks like a nail.
Don't try this on Hotmail.
... but it still sucked.
Those fuckers will destroy your entire inbox faster than you can say 'a 32 day vacation touring Eastern Europe.'
Not that I actually lost anything important, mind you