"Are there common data file formats for databases? Yes..csv files. [...] We never bother with database backup utilities since aren't portable at all and often not even between different versions of the db software. Just dump.csv data out, and store that."
That doesn't mean csv is the answer to the question, it just mean your ignorance gets to the point to take spreadsheets for databases.
"I'm just very nervous about entrusting the company meat and potatoes to an external business."
Risk management as always. Higher costs *now* versus "might be" menaces tomorrow. I don't think any manager will have any problem choosing.
"If our stuff goes down because I screwed up - and it has happened - I can try to fix it immediately."
Which amounts to what, exactly. That you will try doesn't mean you'll get it. Amazon will try too, so may be you'll get it sooner or it will be Amazon. And in the meantime you'll cost more and you'll mean a greater risk to your bussiness (not only because the bus can go over you at any moment but because they can get references from Amazon everywhere but they can't test your performance against anyone since you only work for them, so unless they are in the IT bussiness themselves, they'll know you are good at your job basically because so you say).
"If something goes wrong with my Cloud Computing setup, I am at the complete mercy of their technical staff."
Unless you are the bussiness owner, the bussiness owner will see no difference. When shit hits the fan, he will be at his technical staff's mercy on one case and at Amazon's technical staff's mercy on the other, and Amazon won't have a hard day to convince your boss that they can pay more and better technical staff that him... basically because it's true.
"And of course, I'm at the mercy of the vendor. If they decide to shut down, I have to scramble to find replacement as quickly and painlessly as possible. If they decide to raise prices, I'm looking at an instant drop in operating income or else the expense of moving to another vendor."
And if you are hit by the bus or you are offered higher pay anywhere else, your company will have to scramble to find a replacement as quickly and painlessly as possible or looking at an instant drop in operating income or else the expense of hiring and training a new replacement (maybe to find too late that their expenses skyrocket because you were one of those that don't document anything and do things in the more convoluted and unreasonable way). And since they probably have suffered from that in the past Amazon won't find too difficult to convince your boss that with them it will be different -and better, since it seem (at least "seem") more difficult that they will disappear overnight or that they will go crazy and risk losing clients in the thousands to their competitors. Hell, and even then, since that crazyness will hit your boss *and his competitors* at the same time the playground would still be leveled.
Sorrily we, in-house IT people, will have a very hard day to convince the bussiness guys we are a better deal in the bussiness terms they understand.
Still the implicit problem remains: *if* people do indeed value that kind of security. Which they don't.
Just for an example, the other day I read on a mail list about one asking for help because due to a server crash on a remote co-location he lost its configuration as a DNS secondary so he didn't even know which domains the server was secondary for. A short bunch of pure text files which are not only perfectly "back-upable" by, say, scp, but that are in fact better managed locally and then rsync'ed away. On the same mail list another guy was asking for some tool for his Linux-based host so he could edit his statical, HTML-only web pages on-site which, again, are not only easily backuped locally but even easier to be edited locally and then rsync'ed to the server.
If on systems that by their very nature are easy to be untangled from the server people manage to find uncomfortable ways to unprotect and tie their data to the provider, what wouldn't happen when the provider, for its own greed, makes easy for the users to lock their data with them. Well, results shows it: people will *rush* to them.
"So anyone have thoughts on why these transitional states were able to survive long enough for our species to evolve from them but weren't capable of surviving and branching?"
Because given enough time, all species, not only those that paved the way to our origins do become extinct. On the other hand, who says they didn't branch? *You* are the branch *hands you a treat and pats your head*.
How is this? Because the very special nature of the number "zero".
When you have a population of, say 27583 individuals, next you can have maybe 27584, or 27582, or 58397. The same is sayable of almost any other number. But what if per chance the population number becomes zero? Next you will have zero, zero and zero again and so forth for whole eternity. Given this very strong assimetry between zero and all the other numbers is just a matter of time for a population to hit "zero" once and then stay there forever. We know this very stable state as "extinction".
So now, the question is not why a population becomes extinct but more why a population does not become extinct.
"It's really not the ability to be the fittest to survive."
The problem with the "fitness concept" in evolution is that it is a tautology: what's in the end fitness? Whatever makes your genomic pool to perpetuate at a higher rate than the alternates. How do you show that a given genomic pool is better fitted for a given environment? By showing that it in fact perpetuates at a higher rate than the alternates.
"Yes one aspect why many feel that Giant Pandas are doomed in the wild."
In the end all K-strategists are doomed (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R/K_selection_theory). They make the best efficience of a given niche but once the niche changes (and it is not "if" but "when") you are out of the game.
"It's not cooking, but it's a similar issue, and it becomes a rather interesting chicken-and-egg question."
Only because we tend to think about evolution on finalistic terms (such as "this allowed us to go towards this goal").
Darwinian evolution is based on fitness and that means a given genotype is selected by means of its expressed phenotype as a whole. There's no "chicken-and-egg" problem since mutations are not queued waiting to see if they win the prize or not prior to go for the next one. At any given moment random mutations can appear; some of them produce a better fitting to current environment; vast majority are either "bad" or neutral. The "proper" combination of brain size/energy cost plus allowed diet plus difficulty or easiness at childbirth plus... is selected on an "all or nothing" way.
So, in the end, it is not that immatureness at birth allowed to bigger brains or the other way around; it is not that a more energetic diet allowed for less costly digestive apparatus which in turn allowed for a more costly brain or the other way around, etc. it all happened more or less at the same time on a monotonic path (while certainly one given mutation did appeared earlier than any other one; I don't think will ever be able to find what exactly happened, mutation by mutation, nor it's needed go down to such level of detail to understand how happened on a more general but still significant way, except, maybe, for a bunch of big steps if they indeed happended).
"The point of the article is the digestive system for most humans has significant subsystem that's outside the body."
Which I don't know how it comes as "news" to anybody. The metabolic trade between brain and everything else (being the digestive apparatus the second in command) has been accepted now for decades.
"I'm a vegetarian. Let's say my children will be too, and their children as well (and so on, and so forth). Does this mean that eventually their stomach size will increase?"
"Competently designed software allows users to do the tasks they have to do without unnecessarily complicated actions and time wasting steps."
Hmmmmyesss. But *really* competently designed software do the tasks *on behalf* of the user, so he can go for more gratifying things. So the parent poster is right: properly designed software makes user testing moot; there's nothing to test.
"Which leads me to wonder if they wrote crappy code so they can, or could later on, like now; claim there hidden uber closed (therefore more secure) code is better."
You didn't get the point. In their minds it's better *because* is closed source. It can be line by line exactly the same sources as Bind9 (and there's quite a high chance that's exactly the case), still it is better because it is closed source while Bind is not. Obviously, the fact that you would pay them for their product but not for Bind 9 has nothing to do with their assertions.
"The Soviet Union fell because planned economies do not work."
Well, by your own account Soviet Union didn't felt appart *until and because of* Gorbachov "went about liberalizing the economy and political system (perestroika and glasnost)" so there it goes your argument.
"(as Dr Strangelove pointed out) a doomsday machine only makes sense as a deterent if both sides know about it."
But Dr Strangelove was wrrrrongggg!
It is not onlly necesssary but it is esssential that *those* that can be stopped by the knowledge of the existance of the doomsday machine do effectively know about it. One would tend to think that they are the conflatring enemies but... what if that's not the case? What if this doomsday device is meant as a deterrent to those of the very same side, those that claim that USA have the better planes, the better subs and the fastest command chain, so the only chance to strike the hideous enemy is by striking first?
Given Dr Strangelove's plot it could come as a god's joke (and the best testament to Kubrick's genious -understanding "best" in quite a freak way) to learn that the russians built their doomsday device as a result of they learning through that film how stupidly a total nuclear devastation could come from the USA side.
Of course there's nothing to worry anyway... *I* qualify for the nucleus of human specimens, ready for you know, the sacrifice required for the future of the human race. I hasten to add that since each man will be required to do prodigious... service along these lines, the women will have to be selected for their sexual characteristics which will have to be of a highly stimulating nature.
"The planet could easily survive removal of all human life within the borders of Russia down to 500 feet below ground."
It migth come as a surprise to you but the planet could easily survice removal of all human life within USSR *and* USA too, so that means that the USSR device isn't a doomsday device either, doesn't it?
"Why that should get you out of reporting data loss is what I don't follow."
Remember yesterday's story about data breach due to an spyware e-mail (http://news.slashdot.org/story/09/09/18/0011218/Spyware-Prank-Exposes-Hospital-Medical-Records)?
I stated there that "the true point is that Hospitals don't want security [...] Pitifully I won't hold my breath waiting for a multimillion exemplary fine against the hospital so others will take the issue more seriously."
Well, there you have it. Not only these kinds of misconducts won't get exemplary fines but they even are preparing the grounds not to disclose the incident at all.
You are implicitly mixing two *very* different things.
On one hand is the "fair use definition" which basically is what you already got and it's terribly easy to transmit even to children: just two or three not too long phrases on plain English.
On the other hand is the "USA legal system" which is the one that doesn't take the time to translate those easy phrases to legal carved stone, that allows entities that start on "R" to litigate against undefined "John Does", that allows for legal doctrine to be "downright laughable", that allows for something to remain "unclear until you've already been sued for doing it", that makes the average citizen to believe that the one with the more expensive lawyer is the one that winds.
Trying to explain to children "fair use" and "USA legal system" I really don't see any problem with the former, but I won't try with the latter. Not it terms I'd want to use speaking to children at least.
"The only true security is a physical disconnect."
Yes. Physical disconnect... from the electric grid. But there's more than "true security", things like "there's job to be done" that are way more important since if the job is not done, the security in uneeded. There's a thing called "proper ballance". Of course, if you end up with a lot of medical records disclosed just because a rejected lover sent an e-mail you are lightyears away from "proper ballance".
"Seriously though, if you think it's that easy, give it a shot."
I not only give it a shot but I already make a living out of it. Not on the medical environment, obviously.
"the constraints are annoyingly largely political and financial."
Surely they are, and much more political than financial. But it is not technology the one that should deal with political issues; that's a mistake on and by itself. And since on a capitalistic society "politics" and "financial" are almost the same I already stated what the proper solution should be: "Something nasty happens, medical data gets disclosed, the hospital gets a billionare fine and the directors get fired on the most publized way. As easy as that."
"Previous posters have suggested that there should be a separate systems for EMR software and everything else. I said that wouldn't work very well"
And I tell you -again, you don't know what are you talking about. I'll try to put it down in your own terms.
There's a basic misunderstand among general population about what a comma is in medical terms. While on medical speech a level one comma*1 may merely mean you are drunk if you tell somebody without medical training about comma they will understand you must be talking about somebody with a foot on the grave -and they might even mock at you: "comma? that doctor didn't recognize his ass from his face, Joe was just death-drunk!". You understand otherwise because you are a trained physician.
Now, you are falling in the same mistake: just because you recognize the words it doesn't mean you know what their technical meaning is. I know what a lancet is and that doesn't make me a surgeon; you know what a PC is and that doesn't make you a systems architect. What a trained IT professional mean for "separate systems" is not what you understand for "separate systems" -it might requiere separate keyboard/screen sets or not; it might requiere physically segregated network connections or not. The interactions, problems, ballances, etc. you see on IT systems you use are not the interactions, problems, ballances, etc. the IT professional is aware and needs to take care of.
It is not that you step on my dog's tail. Surely you have had patients that go to you trying to impose their own diagnostic, prognosis and treatment. Maybe the way you affront them is not exactly the same I take now, maybe because they are both patients and clients, you are face to face with them or you are just more polite than me but surely the end point is the same: "wait a minute sir, who's the doctor here?"
"I think I am qualified to at least render an opinion on it."
Yes, surely you are. Even more: you should be allowed to express your opinion and to put in the table your needs in order for them to be taken into consideration just as much as your patients are entitled to render their opinion about how they feel and what do they think about the proposed treatment. What you are not entitled to is thinking you know what's good or bad technically-wise just because you happen to sit in front of a computer from time to time and that's something that woefully happens just to frecuently as this very news is a clear example of.
You have a very easy path to understand on which terms your relationship with IT should be for your best benefit since it's basically the same as the one between your patients and you.
*1 I don't know if that's USA medical jargon, it's just a direct translation of how it's known in Spanish.
"b) The woman for opening it and infecting the computer? Yes, for abject stupidity."
Uh... sure?
Was she contracted as an IT expert? Did she lied when hired about her internet acumen?
She *might* be guilty of something if she went over a training or at least a speech or a signed document where she was told what could be done or not (like using corporate assets for personal issues*1) but overall, I find that even if she was "abjectly stupid" is still the hospital at fault, not her, for hiring "abjectly stupid" people where a different profile is needed.
After all, even if I'm "abjectly stupid" I still have to feed myself, so if my employer things I'm fitted for the position why should I tell otherwise?
*1 And even then, if it's the company unwritten policy not to discourage or directly prosecute those attitudes, so much could be said.
Slashdot Mirror
"Are there common data file formats for databases? .csv files. [...] We never bother with database backup utilities since aren't portable at all and often not even between different versions of the db software. Just dump .csv data out, and store that."
Yes.
That doesn't mean csv is the answer to the question, it just mean your ignorance gets to the point to take spreadsheets for databases.
"I'm just very nervous about entrusting the company meat and potatoes to an external business."
Risk management as always. Higher costs *now* versus "might be" menaces tomorrow. I don't think any manager will have any problem choosing.
"If our stuff goes down because I screwed up - and it has happened - I can try to fix it immediately."
Which amounts to what, exactly. That you will try doesn't mean you'll get it. Amazon will try too, so may be you'll get it sooner or it will be Amazon. And in the meantime you'll cost more and you'll mean a greater risk to your bussiness (not only because the bus can go over you at any moment but because they can get references from Amazon everywhere but they can't test your performance against anyone since you only work for them, so unless they are in the IT bussiness themselves, they'll know you are good at your job basically because so you say).
"If something goes wrong with my Cloud Computing setup, I am at the complete mercy of their technical staff."
Unless you are the bussiness owner, the bussiness owner will see no difference. When shit hits the fan, he will be at his technical staff's mercy on one case and at Amazon's technical staff's mercy on the other, and Amazon won't have a hard day to convince your boss that they can pay more and better technical staff that him... basically because it's true.
"And of course, I'm at the mercy of the vendor. If they decide to shut down, I have to scramble to find replacement as quickly and painlessly as possible. If they decide to raise prices, I'm looking at an instant drop in operating income or else the expense of moving to another vendor."
And if you are hit by the bus or you are offered higher pay anywhere else, your company will have to scramble to find a replacement as quickly and painlessly as possible or looking at an instant drop in operating income or else the expense of hiring and training a new replacement (maybe to find too late that their expenses skyrocket because you were one of those that don't document anything and do things in the more convoluted and unreasonable way). And since they probably have suffered from that in the past Amazon won't find too difficult to convince your boss that with them it will be different -and better, since it seem (at least "seem") more difficult that they will disappear overnight or that they will go crazy and risk losing clients in the thousands to their competitors. Hell, and even then, since that crazyness will hit your boss *and his competitors* at the same time the playground would still be leveled.
Sorrily we, in-house IT people, will have a very hard day to convince the bussiness guys we are a better deal in the bussiness terms they understand.
"Beautifully said."
Still the implicit problem remains: *if* people do indeed value that kind of security. Which they don't.
Just for an example, the other day I read on a mail list about one asking for help because due to a server crash on a remote co-location he lost its configuration as a DNS secondary so he didn't even know which domains the server was secondary for. A short bunch of pure text files which are not only perfectly "back-upable" by, say, scp, but that are in fact better managed locally and then rsync'ed away. On the same mail list another guy was asking for some tool for his Linux-based host so he could edit his statical, HTML-only web pages on-site which, again, are not only easily backuped locally but even easier to be edited locally and then rsync'ed to the server.
If on systems that by their very nature are easy to be untangled from the server people manage to find uncomfortable ways to unprotect and tie their data to the provider, what wouldn't happen when the provider, for its own greed, makes easy for the users to lock their data with them. Well, results shows it: people will *rush* to them.
"So anyone have thoughts on why these transitional states were able to survive long enough for our species to evolve from them but weren't capable of surviving and branching?"
Because given enough time, all species, not only those that paved the way to our origins do become extinct. On the other hand, who says they didn't branch? *You* are the branch *hands you a treat and pats your head*.
How is this? Because the very special nature of the number "zero".
When you have a population of, say 27583 individuals, next you can have maybe 27584, or 27582, or 58397. The same is sayable of almost any other number. But what if per chance the population number becomes zero? Next you will have zero, zero and zero again and so forth for whole eternity. Given this very strong assimetry between zero and all the other numbers is just a matter of time for a population to hit "zero" once and then stay there forever. We know this very stable state as "extinction".
So now, the question is not why a population becomes extinct but more why a population does not become extinct.
"how then do we explain that none of these numerous intermediate species survive today"
They don't survive today because the became extint.
Next?
"It's really not the ability to be the fittest to survive."
The problem with the "fitness concept" in evolution is that it is a tautology: what's in the end fitness? Whatever makes your genomic pool to perpetuate at a higher rate than the alternates. How do you show that a given genomic pool is better fitted for a given environment? By showing that it in fact perpetuates at a higher rate than the alternates.
"Yes one aspect why many feel that Giant Pandas are doomed in the wild."
In the end all K-strategists are doomed (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R/K_selection_theory). They make the best efficience of a given niche but once the niche changes (and it is not "if" but "when") you are out of the game.
"It's not cooking, but it's a similar issue, and it becomes a rather interesting chicken-and-egg question."
Only because we tend to think about evolution on finalistic terms (such as "this allowed us to go towards this goal").
Darwinian evolution is based on fitness and that means a given genotype is selected by means of its expressed phenotype as a whole. There's no "chicken-and-egg" problem since mutations are not queued waiting to see if they win the prize or not prior to go for the next one. At any given moment random mutations can appear; some of them produce a better fitting to current environment; vast majority are either "bad" or neutral. The "proper" combination of brain size/energy cost plus allowed diet plus difficulty or easiness at childbirth plus... is selected on an "all or nothing" way.
So, in the end, it is not that immatureness at birth allowed to bigger brains or the other way around; it is not that a more energetic diet allowed for less costly digestive apparatus which in turn allowed for a more costly brain or the other way around, etc. it all happened more or less at the same time on a monotonic path (while certainly one given mutation did appeared earlier than any other one; I don't think will ever be able to find what exactly happened, mutation by mutation, nor it's needed go down to such level of detail to understand how happened on a more general but still significant way, except, maybe, for a bunch of big steps if they indeed happended).
"The point of the article is the digestive system for most humans has significant subsystem that's outside the body."
Which I don't know how it comes as "news" to anybody. The metabolic trade between brain and everything else (being the digestive apparatus the second in command) has been accepted now for decades.
"I'm a vegetarian. Let's say my children will be too, and their children as well (and so on, and so forth). Does this mean that eventually their stomach size will increase?"
Only if Lamarck were right, which is not.
"Intelligence created our digestive track, not the other way around."
Hi, Mr. gurps_npc:
1912 is calling and asks its Piltdown Man hoax back.
"Push the ideal - forget what the user wants."
Some users want to be able to develop their own drivers for their printers (http://oreilly.com/openbook/freedom/ch01.html).
"Opposition to ATI and nVidia distributing binary drivers for Linux is just the most obvious ideological move that seriously hurt it on the desktop."
Or is it ATI and nVidia still going with binary-only drivers what hurts Linux' on the desktop?
"Competently designed software allows users to do the tasks they have to do without unnecessarily complicated actions and time wasting steps."
Hmmmmyesss. But *really* competently designed software do the tasks *on behalf* of the user, so he can go for more gratifying things. So the parent poster is right: properly designed software makes user testing moot; there's nothing to test.
"Which leads me to wonder if they wrote crappy code so they can, or could later on, like now; claim there hidden uber closed (therefore more secure) code is better."
You didn't get the point. In their minds it's better *because* is closed source. It can be line by line exactly the same sources as Bind9 (and there's quite a high chance that's exactly the case), still it is better because it is closed source while Bind is not. Obviously, the fact that you would pay them for their product but not for Bind 9 has nothing to do with their assertions.
"The Soviet Union fell because planned economies do not work."
Well, by your own account Soviet Union didn't felt appart *until and because of* Gorbachov "went about liberalizing the economy and political system (perestroika and glasnost)" so there it goes your argument.
"First, you're a sexist pig."
Uh... you really think so? Then I think you don't qualify for the specimens pool. Sorry, maybe next time.
"(as Dr Strangelove pointed out) a doomsday machine only makes sense as a deterent if both sides know about it."
But Dr Strangelove was wrrrrongggg!
It is not onlly necesssary but it is esssential that *those* that can be stopped by the knowledge of the existance of the doomsday machine do effectively know about it. One would tend to think that they are the conflatring enemies but... what if that's not the case? What if this doomsday device is meant as a deterrent to those of the very same side, those that claim that USA have the better planes, the better subs and the fastest command chain, so the only chance to strike the hideous enemy is by striking first?
Given Dr Strangelove's plot it could come as a god's joke (and the best testament to Kubrick's genious -understanding "best" in quite a freak way) to learn that the russians built their doomsday device as a result of they learning through that film how stupidly a total nuclear devastation could come from the USA side.
Of course there's nothing to worry anyway... *I* qualify for the nucleus of human specimens, ready for you know, the sacrifice required for the future of the human race. I hasten to add that since each man will be required to do prodigious... service along these lines, the women will have to be selected for their sexual characteristics which will have to be of a highly stimulating nature.
"500 feet underground * total area of Rusia it's a good bite to the earth's mass"
No, it isn't. Please recheck your numbers.
"The planet could easily survive removal of all human life within the borders of Russia down to 500 feet below ground."
It migth come as a surprise to you but the planet could easily survice removal of all human life within USSR *and* USA too, so that means that the USSR device isn't a doomsday device either, doesn't it?
"Why that should get you out of reporting data loss is what I don't follow."
Remember yesterday's story about data breach due to an spyware e-mail (http://news.slashdot.org/story/09/09/18/0011218/Spyware-Prank-Exposes-Hospital-Medical-Records)?
I stated there that "the true point is that Hospitals don't want security [...] Pitifully I won't hold my breath waiting for a multimillion exemplary fine against the hospital so others will take the issue more seriously."
Well, there you have it. Not only these kinds of misconducts won't get exemplary fines but they even are preparing the grounds not to disclose the incident at all.
"Go ahead and tell us what fair use is"
You are implicitly mixing two *very* different things.
On one hand is the "fair use definition" which basically is what you already got and it's terribly easy to transmit even to children: just two or three not too long phrases on plain English.
On the other hand is the "USA legal system" which is the one that doesn't take the time to translate those easy phrases to legal carved stone, that allows entities that start on "R" to litigate against undefined "John Does", that allows for legal doctrine to be "downright laughable", that allows for something to remain "unclear until you've already been sued for doing it", that makes the average citizen to believe that the one with the more expensive lawyer is the one that winds.
Trying to explain to children "fair use" and "USA legal system" I really don't see any problem with the former, but I won't try with the latter. Not it terms I'd want to use speaking to children at least.
"The only true security is a physical disconnect."
Yes. Physical disconnect... from the electric grid. But there's more than "true security", things like "there's job to be done" that are way more important since if the job is not done, the security in uneeded. There's a thing called "proper ballance". Of course, if you end up with a lot of medical records disclosed just because a rejected lover sent an e-mail you are lightyears away from "proper ballance".
"Seriously though, if you think it's that easy, give it a shot."
I not only give it a shot but I already make a living out of it. Not on the medical environment, obviously.
"the constraints are annoyingly largely political and financial."
Surely they are, and much more political than financial. But it is not technology the one that should deal with political issues; that's a mistake on and by itself. And since on a capitalistic society "politics" and "financial" are almost the same I already stated what the proper solution should be: "Something nasty happens, medical data gets disclosed, the hospital gets a billionare fine and the directors get fired on the most publized way. As easy as that."
"Previous posters have suggested that there should be a separate systems for EMR software and everything else. I said that wouldn't work very well"
And I tell you -again, you don't know what are you talking about. I'll try to put it down in your own terms.
There's a basic misunderstand among general population about what a comma is in medical terms. While on medical speech a level one comma*1 may merely mean you are drunk if you tell somebody without medical training about comma they will understand you must be talking about somebody with a foot on the grave -and they might even mock at you: "comma? that doctor didn't recognize his ass from his face, Joe was just death-drunk!". You understand otherwise because you are a trained physician.
Now, you are falling in the same mistake: just because you recognize the words it doesn't mean you know what their technical meaning is. I know what a lancet is and that doesn't make me a surgeon; you know what a PC is and that doesn't make you a systems architect. What a trained IT professional mean for "separate systems" is not what you understand for "separate systems" -it might requiere separate keyboard/screen sets or not; it might requiere physically segregated network connections or not. The interactions, problems, ballances, etc. you see on IT systems you use are not the interactions, problems, ballances, etc. the IT professional is aware and needs to take care of.
It is not that you step on my dog's tail. Surely you have had patients that go to you trying to impose their own diagnostic, prognosis and treatment. Maybe the way you affront them is not exactly the same I take now, maybe because they are both patients and clients, you are face to face with them or you are just more polite than me but surely the end point is the same: "wait a minute sir, who's the doctor here?"
"I think I am qualified to at least render an opinion on it."
Yes, surely you are. Even more: you should be allowed to express your opinion and to put in the table your needs in order for them to be taken into consideration just as much as your patients are entitled to render their opinion about how they feel and what do they think about the proposed treatment. What you are not entitled to is thinking you know what's good or bad technically-wise just because you happen to sit in front of a computer from time to time and that's something that woefully happens just to frecuently as this very news is a clear example of.
You have a very easy path to understand on which terms your relationship with IT should be for your best benefit since it's basically the same as the one between your patients and you.
*1 I don't know if that's USA medical jargon, it's just a direct translation of how it's known in Spanish.
"b) The woman for opening it and infecting the computer?
Yes, for abject stupidity."
Uh... sure?
Was she contracted as an IT expert? Did she lied when hired about her internet acumen?
She *might* be guilty of something if she went over a training or at least a speech or a signed document where she was told what could be done or not (like using corporate assets for personal issues*1) but overall, I find that even if she was "abjectly stupid" is still the hospital at fault, not her, for hiring "abjectly stupid" people where a different profile is needed.
After all, even if I'm "abjectly stupid" I still have to feed myself, so if my employer things I'm fitted for the position why should I tell otherwise?
*1 And even then, if it's the company unwritten policy not to discourage or directly prosecute those attitudes, so much could be said.