We ask supervising managers what files/data are required and ask the users to send us those files. Provided that data is returned and the user left on good terms the drive on their machine/laptop is wiped. We have a lot of users who travel fulltime and to ask or even expect them not to use their laptop for personal reasons while on the road is ridiculous and management thankfully agress with that stance. So, for everyone's privacy... the drive just gets zapped and then reimaged.
It was argued that we may lose valuable information in doing so but I pointed out to our CMMI happy managers that this would indicate a failure in the document creation and control process and not an issue with our IT policy and they conceded the point.
Additionally we work on secure projects for the government and have NDA's in place with corporate clients. I can't allow my IT staff to dig through files that they're not authorized to see and because of that we have to treat the whole drive as if its classified material unless we can get someone who is authorized to see to come in and sort through the whole mess. And we're never going to be able to pull a billable consultant off a project to do that unless something is missing.
I work as a contractor at large federal agency that IBM is fairly involved with (that narrows down the field, doesn't it?;p) The client (agency) complains bitterly and often about the cost of their data center and the IBM sales staff has been suggesting, praying, begging for them to migrate to IBM blade systems running Linux and the agency *won't* do it because Linux "untested", "unproven", "unreliable"... etc... an opinion largely shaped by a report pulled together by another group that just happened to provide the current infrastructure.
IBM has a whole host of applications and environments that run on Linux and that is where the bulk of their sales come from. There is a major release of AIX how often? Where as WebSphere product line seems to be upgraded as often as I change my shorts, and that's where they make their money. There is more opportunity for consulting services with the WebSphere line as well.
So you can't/shouldn't judge IBM's commitment to Linux by the clients adoption rates, the two are not directly correlated.
I, and most of my friends, do not have home telephones and rely completely on our cellphones and this actually becoming the norm in most urban areas. It would be rather nice to be at my apartment or even at my friends' pads and not have to burn valuable minutes and use the Wi-Fi instead. As you pointed out, you can already do that with an iPaq or an Axim but it would be nice to have it built into the phone and be able to carry one less brick on your waist.
It may not wipe billions off anything but if it takes a few ounces off my waist, I'm happy.
I work at a small-sized consulting firm, last year a few of the managers/execs so me with a a Siemens SX-66 Windows Mobile Phone that I bought on my own dime and decided that they wanted one. So, they bought about a dozen and they were universally despised. The software was finicky, they Sprint models they had behaved differently than my Cingular model and they all developed mechnical problems and broke after a while. Mine, well it's still running fine, but I treat it like what it is... a small computer and not a phone.
After much belly-aching and nashing of teeth we got crackberries. They just work. They're not the most technically amazing things, the screens aren't great, etc, etc, etc. But they work, they don't break that easily and they're almost idiot proof... perfect for today's office environment.
I see a lot of knocks against Russian engineering in here from people who obviously don't study history or current events. Russian engineers are some of the most creative and imaginative in the world and some of the things being turned out by their aerospace industry currently is top-notch. Don't forget we're riding their "junk" into space and their new Sukohi fighters are the match of anything we have with the possible exception of the F-22 Raptor... and the Sukohis are cheaper. If you have any doubts about the ultimate capability of vast quantity over quality just ask anyone living in Berlin in 1945.
Regardless... never doubt the capabilities of Russian equipment when they have the resources and the guy turning the wrench actually reads the blue prints.
I am a huge fan of efficent, cheap systems. The bulk of our server load is handled by dual opteron machines with 3ware cards and a 10k rpm system spindles and 7.2k rpm data spindles. However, even the best sata drives choke under file system and database loads and our primary data stores are U320. StorageReview.com has a good review of the new 150gig 10k rpm WD drive that shows it gettting spanked by SCSI drives under non-linear server loads.
Long story short, if you expect a lot of drive activity you might be able to eek by for a while with a well tuned SATA system but you will have to pony up for a SCSI system at some point and you might as well do it now and save yourself the hassle of migrating later.
Hey now... you forgot about the additional hardware costs. Have you seen the amout of silicon GoDaddy is using for their ads? That costs money! (hmmm... would that be considered as dual core?)
I'd say a full half of the gadgets I buy are shiny, new and fun... for the first month. Then they're relegated to "eBay" pile. I'll be more interested in seeing how their sales fare in six months when having the latest teenage singer shaking her bottom in your hand is no longer enough to make you the "cool guy/gal" in school. I tried video on my iPAQ and trust me, there are better, more entertaining ways to go blind. Speaking which, time to go shave my palms.
Wind does not affect satellite signals. It effects the dishes. Rain does attenuate the signal however. Regardless, the storm will have blown over by the time the Red Cross gets the equipment setup.
All and all this was not a well thought out post:
1. Capacity : Yes, the cell companies could build out the capacity to support everyone calling at once but you don't want to foot the bill. Every once in a while you need to speed to pass some one, you don't buy a porsche do you? Why? Because most of us justify it, much less afford it.
2. Robustness : Lets see if you house stands up to 20 feet of water and 145 mph winds. I'm certain it won't... why not... because you don't want to pay for it.
Cell phones are not a public service, they are a commodity and are priced and scaled accordingly. I'm sure the cell phone companies would be more than happy to accomodate you if you'll sign the 10 year $250/month service contract.
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We ask supervising managers what files/data are required and ask the users to send us those files. Provided that data is returned and the user left on good terms the drive on their machine/laptop is wiped. We have a lot of users who travel fulltime and to ask or even expect them not to use their laptop for personal reasons while on the road is ridiculous and management thankfully agress with that stance. So, for everyone's privacy... the drive just gets zapped and then reimaged.
It was argued that we may lose valuable information in doing so but I pointed out to our CMMI happy managers that this would indicate a failure in the document creation and control process and not an issue with our IT policy and they conceded the point.
Additionally we work on secure projects for the government and have NDA's in place with corporate clients. I can't allow my IT staff to dig through files that they're not authorized to see and because of that we have to treat the whole drive as if its classified material unless we can get someone who is authorized to see to come in and sort through the whole mess. And we're never going to be able to pull a billable consultant off a project to do that unless something is missing.
Long story short... *ZAP*
I work as a contractor at large federal agency that IBM is fairly involved with (that narrows down the field, doesn't it? ;p) The client (agency) complains bitterly and often about the cost of their data center and the IBM sales staff has been suggesting, praying, begging for them to migrate to IBM blade systems running Linux and the agency *won't* do it because Linux "untested", "unproven", "unreliable"... etc... an opinion largely shaped by a report pulled together by another group that just happened to provide the current infrastructure.
IBM has a whole host of applications and environments that run on Linux and that is where the bulk of their sales come from. There is a major release of AIX how often? Where as WebSphere product line seems to be upgraded as often as I change my shorts, and that's where they make their money. There is more opportunity for consulting services with the WebSphere line as well.
So you can't/shouldn't judge IBM's commitment to Linux by the clients adoption rates, the two are not directly correlated.
Ahhh... Flikr on my mobile... I wonder if Tim Berners-Lee still weeps from time to time or he has just become so jaded he doesn't care.
/no pictures of wenk because this ain't fark.
//hey... no slashies either!!!
///darnit, where'd I put my owl?
I, and most of my friends, do not have home telephones and rely completely on our cellphones and this actually becoming the norm in most urban areas. It would be rather nice to be at my apartment or even at my friends' pads and not have to burn valuable minutes and use the Wi-Fi instead. As you pointed out, you can already do that with an iPaq or an Axim but it would be nice to have it built into the phone and be able to carry one less brick on your waist.
It may not wipe billions off anything but if it takes a few ounces off my waist, I'm happy.
I work at a small-sized consulting firm, last year a few of the managers/execs so me with a a Siemens SX-66 Windows Mobile Phone that I bought on my own dime and decided that they wanted one. So, they bought about a dozen and they were universally despised. The software was finicky, they Sprint models they had behaved differently than my Cingular model and they all developed mechnical problems and broke after a while. Mine, well it's still running fine, but I treat it like what it is... a small computer and not a phone. After much belly-aching and nashing of teeth we got crackberries. They just work. They're not the most technically amazing things, the screens aren't great, etc, etc, etc. But they work, they don't break that easily and they're almost idiot proof... perfect for today's office environment.
I see a lot of knocks against Russian engineering in here from people who obviously don't study history or current events. Russian engineers are some of the most creative and imaginative in the world and some of the things being turned out by their aerospace industry currently is top-notch. Don't forget we're riding their "junk" into space and their new Sukohi fighters are the match of anything we have with the possible exception of the F-22 Raptor... and the Sukohis are cheaper. If you have any doubts about the ultimate capability of vast quantity over quality just ask anyone living in Berlin in 1945.
Regardless... never doubt the capabilities of Russian equipment when they have the resources and the guy turning the wrench actually reads the blue prints.
I am a huge fan of efficent, cheap systems. The bulk of our server load is handled by dual opteron machines with 3ware cards and a 10k rpm system spindles and 7.2k rpm data spindles. However, even the best sata drives choke under file system and database loads and our primary data stores are U320. StorageReview.com has a good review of the new 150gig 10k rpm WD drive that shows it gettting spanked by SCSI drives under non-linear server loads. Long story short, if you expect a lot of drive activity you might be able to eek by for a while with a well tuned SATA system but you will have to pony up for a SCSI system at some point and you might as well do it now and save yourself the hassle of migrating later.
Hey now... you forgot about the additional hardware costs. Have you seen the amout of silicon GoDaddy is using for their ads? That costs money! (hmmm... would that be considered as dual core?)
I'd say a full half of the gadgets I buy are shiny, new and fun... for the first month. Then they're relegated to "eBay" pile. I'll be more interested in seeing how their sales fare in six months when having the latest teenage singer shaking her bottom in your hand is no longer enough to make you the "cool guy/gal" in school. I tried video on my iPAQ and trust me, there are better, more entertaining ways to go blind. Speaking which, time to go shave my palms.
Wind does not affect satellite signals. It effects the dishes. Rain does attenuate the signal however. Regardless, the storm will have blown over by the time the Red Cross gets the equipment setup. All and all this was not a well thought out post: 1. Capacity : Yes, the cell companies could build out the capacity to support everyone calling at once but you don't want to foot the bill. Every once in a while you need to speed to pass some one, you don't buy a porsche do you? Why? Because most of us justify it, much less afford it. 2. Robustness : Lets see if you house stands up to 20 feet of water and 145 mph winds. I'm certain it won't... why not... because you don't want to pay for it. Cell phones are not a public service, they are a commodity and are priced and scaled accordingly. I'm sure the cell phone companies would be more than happy to accomodate you if you'll sign the 10 year $250/month service contract.