... just taken the snow shoveled off the streets in New York City. Ship it over and spread it out. Might have to pick a few homeless people out. And illegally parked cabs.
Ineffective or ignorant managers I can handle. It's when they start working for their own self interests instead of those of the organization, and they aren't stupid, that problems arise.
Balkanized IT arises when the primary providers can't provide adequate service and there are no policies against doing it yourself instead of calling Central Services. The solution is for that central organization to clean up its act. Once done, people will start to opt for their support.
Pressure to standardize everything is usually imposed by outside IT service firms (their consultants), who do not want to inherit heterogeneous environments. Their costs are lower and profits higher if the client organization forces everything into a standard format before outsourcing. And if policies are adopted that prohibit internal groups from opting out of the impending support contract. Even if that standardization harms the client organizations by removing flexibility.
The winners in IT outsourcing are the ex managers of the client IT organization. Often, they get a bonus for the anticipated cost savings. A little gold star for their resume because they 're-engineered' something. An sometimes a financial reward and/or position within the new service provider for bringing in the business.
Is your comment based on an unfortunate personal experience? I have worked as an engineer for two aerospace behemoths,
Interesting. I worked for one as well.
the engineering types didn't have any trouble at all in obtaining, installing, and using whatever specialized tools (including alternative operating systems) they required to do their jobs.
Define 'trouble'. I worked for several bosses. One of them just said, "Screw it. Install whatever you need to get your job done." The other one ran around with a report that listed 'non-conforming systems' (i.e. not Microsoft) and whined like a little puppy about not making managements goal of 100% conformity (get rid of non-Microsoft systems).
IT's part of that was limited to procurement.
So was ours. And if it wasn't on the 'approved' list, it could take months to get. And they'd inspect every incoming package. More than once, media 'disappeared' and all we'd get was an empty box. Imagine their dismay when they discovered that you didn't have to buy individual licenses for Linux.
Balkanization usually doesn't have anything to do with serving the needs of the users. It's mostly about empire building and job security.
You've got that backwards. Centralization is about job security and empire building. When you have the ability to tell IT to 'F* off, we'll build it ourselves', their empire collapses. And we had that ability for some time when the FAA determined the IT-run systems were so corrupted, they couldn't be relied upon to build airplanes. For a few years, engineering had carte blanche to tell IT to F* off for anything related to aircraft configuration control. That lasted until our company was acquired by another one which had an 'outsource everything' policy.
NASA wants to migrate from a balkanized IT structure to an enterprise structure, which is a massive cultural change.
Which is another way of enforcing a "one size fits all" IT support scheme. Everybody gets MS Office on Windows 8. You poor slobs that do embedded software development, highly demanding data analysis or have some peculiar h/w or s/w requirements, tough shit.
When you have a 'balkanized' IT structure, at least you have the opportunity to optimize platforms for their intended use. The problem is that you can't take advantage of a central maintenance and support department. You have little groups of people who specialize on these odd cases. And when things are done in house, its difficult to track these costs.
Now, turn it over to an outside contractor and the present you with an itemized bill for the oddball stuff. A bill for Real Money. And since they are motivated to maximize profits/minimize their costs, they soak you for the non standard configurations. Now, your management comes around with this monthly bill and starts pounding people over the head to explain their specialized needs or conform. Every damned quarter (or month). Pretty soon, you need to dedicate some direct staff to handle the exception documentation. Or spend half your life in meetings yourself.
The idea situation is to keep sufficient staff to handle ongoing tasks and hire contractors for occasional increases in workload. There are downside to this as well. Bringing outsiders in to build stuff that they will be able to walk away from at the end of the contract is a recipe for disaster if their work isn't done to the satisfaction of the customer and in-house IT staff (the people that will get stuck with it afterward).
It all comes down to managing the outsourcing contracts properly. And that's probably the biggest problem in any organization. Requiring management to actually get off the golf course to show up and do some work.
On a serious note: Isn't this supposed to be a part of the NSA's charter? Encryption, information security, etc. What did they do with the last fuckton of money we gave them?
Please enlighten us as to why you believe has to be done!
Because the government has to find a way to keep doddering old farts buying cars. They don't have the political will to take incompetent drivers and pull their licenses (and confiscate the vehicles of scoff-laws who drive without one).
counter every single one of Ham's points specifically.
That assumes that Nye lets Ham define the terms of the debate. Nye's opening argument needs to be about using proper scientific technique. Absent that, Ham's points are meaningless.
But the A vs B philosophical differences can be used to garner support and recruits for the inevitable military conflict. We can't have you intellectuals disturb that with your thinking. Off to the gulag with you!
Slashdot Mirror
In case you didn't recognize the source of the parent post, here it is.
for pete's sake
6. "Pete" is a proper name and should be capitalized.
Clones of Sam Rockwell.
Ineffective or ignorant managers I can handle. It's when they start working for their own self interests instead of those of the organization, and they aren't stupid, that problems arise.
Balkanized IT arises when the primary providers can't provide adequate service and there are no policies against doing it yourself instead of calling Central Services. The solution is for that central organization to clean up its act. Once done, people will start to opt for their support.
Pressure to standardize everything is usually imposed by outside IT service firms (their consultants), who do not want to inherit heterogeneous environments. Their costs are lower and profits higher if the client organization forces everything into a standard format before outsourcing. And if policies are adopted that prohibit internal groups from opting out of the impending support contract. Even if that standardization harms the client organizations by removing flexibility.
The winners in IT outsourcing are the ex managers of the client IT organization. Often, they get a bonus for the anticipated cost savings. A little gold star for their resume because they 're-engineered' something. An sometimes a financial reward and/or position within the new service provider for bringing in the business.
That was the site of Mars' Slashdot beta.
Is your comment based on an unfortunate personal experience? I have worked as an engineer for two aerospace behemoths,
Interesting. I worked for one as well.
the engineering types didn't have any trouble at all in obtaining, installing, and using whatever specialized tools (including alternative operating systems) they required to do their jobs.
Define 'trouble'. I worked for several bosses. One of them just said, "Screw it. Install whatever you need to get your job done." The other one ran around with a report that listed 'non-conforming systems' (i.e. not Microsoft) and whined like a little puppy about not making managements goal of 100% conformity (get rid of non-Microsoft systems).
IT's part of that was limited to procurement.
So was ours. And if it wasn't on the 'approved' list, it could take months to get. And they'd inspect every incoming package. More than once, media 'disappeared' and all we'd get was an empty box. Imagine their dismay when they discovered that you didn't have to buy individual licenses for Linux.
Balkanization usually doesn't have anything to do with serving the needs of the users. It's mostly about empire building and job security.
You've got that backwards. Centralization is about job security and empire building. When you have the ability to tell IT to 'F* off, we'll build it ourselves', their empire collapses. And we had that ability for some time when the FAA determined the IT-run systems were so corrupted, they couldn't be relied upon to build airplanes. For a few years, engineering had carte blanche to tell IT to F* off for anything related to aircraft configuration control. That lasted until our company was acquired by another one which had an 'outsource everything' policy.
I Am Not A Finnish Lawyer, but doesn't some court have to produce a warrant to collect such information? What's a 'police board'?
NASA wants to migrate from a balkanized IT structure to an enterprise structure, which is a massive cultural change.
Which is another way of enforcing a "one size fits all" IT support scheme. Everybody gets MS Office on Windows 8. You poor slobs that do embedded software development, highly demanding data analysis or have some peculiar h/w or s/w requirements, tough shit.
When you have a 'balkanized' IT structure, at least you have the opportunity to optimize platforms for their intended use. The problem is that you can't take advantage of a central maintenance and support department. You have little groups of people who specialize on these odd cases. And when things are done in house, its difficult to track these costs.
Now, turn it over to an outside contractor and the present you with an itemized bill for the oddball stuff. A bill for Real Money. And since they are motivated to maximize profits/minimize their costs, they soak you for the non standard configurations. Now, your management comes around with this monthly bill and starts pounding people over the head to explain their specialized needs or conform. Every damned quarter (or month). Pretty soon, you need to dedicate some direct staff to handle the exception documentation. Or spend half your life in meetings yourself.
The idea situation is to keep sufficient staff to handle ongoing tasks and hire contractors for occasional increases in workload. There are downside to this as well. Bringing outsiders in to build stuff that they will be able to walk away from at the end of the contract is a recipe for disaster if their work isn't done to the satisfaction of the customer and in-house IT staff (the people that will get stuck with it afterward).
It all comes down to managing the outsourcing contracts properly. And that's probably the biggest problem in any organization. Requiring management to actually get off the golf course to show up and do some work.
Looks like altslashdot.org has been ... Slashdotted.
Actually, that could be a good sign.
On a serious note: Isn't this supposed to be a part of the NSA's charter? Encryption, information security, etc. What did they do with the last fuckton of money we gave them?
the motto "To serve and protect"
Sign painters messed up the logo. Should read "To serve and collect."
spider web that got caught in a hurricane.
No kidding.
Build the array up off the ground and they'll have a head start on roofs for new slums.
Horses were arguably safer. Try driving a horse into the side of a building or t-bone another horse at an intersection. I say we go back to horses.
Please enlighten us as to why you believe has to be done!
Because the government has to find a way to keep doddering old farts buying cars. They don't have the political will to take incompetent drivers and pull their licenses (and confiscate the vehicles of scoff-laws who drive without one).
"So this is why the Arabs sided with the British."
You can have your own opinions but not your own facts. If the Arabs were on any side, they allied with the Nazis.
Nazis? In World War 1? Against the Ottomans?
counter every single one of Ham's points specifically.
That assumes that Nye lets Ham define the terms of the debate. Nye's opening argument needs to be about using proper scientific technique. Absent that, Ham's points are meaningless.
My Tesla just received another HCF command.
Nye can win if he picks apart Ham's logic and erroneous 'scientific' methods.
But the A vs B philosophical differences can be used to garner support and recruits for the inevitable military conflict. We can't have you intellectuals disturb that with your thinking. Off to the gulag with you!