Posts by Stewart McKenna

BOFH: The Great Backup BACKDOWN

Re: responsibility

I once lost some personal data despite having 3 different backup tools.

1) the Corporate desktop backup didn't backup my local Exchange folder because it in a different directory to the corporate standard due to an OS upgrade.

2) the TSM backup to the mainframe apparently stopped working because whomever was paying

the IBM license fee decided to stop and the admin cancelled all the backups without notifying me.

3) My Linux network backup failed because the building maintenance guys did a power/generator test and the Linux backup server did not boot

Moral: You can't have too many backups.

Larry Ellison: Technology has 'negatively impacted' children

Human Capital Management

For Heavens sake, let's stop using this term... too close to 'Human Cattle Management"

and that's generally how the PHBs consider us

Meg Whitman asks HPers to drag their asses into the office

Re: All full at the inn

There's a slight problem. When HP bought EDS, they sent almost everyone home

and shutdown the offices.

Microsoft: We're nearly OUT OF STOCK of Surface 2 and Pro 2

"Microsoft may also be distorting presale estimates for Surface 2 by making early volume sales to business customers"

Technically known as 'stuffing the channel'...

Oracle halves cost of ExaLogic middleware platform

Cut prices on their database

now if they would only cut prices per CPU on their database software,

or at least even the playing field

Sysadmins: Everything they told you about backup WAS A LIE

It's very simple

you have user data backups

you have OS backups

OS backups require

1) Mirror OS to prevent issues with h/w failures

2) Alternate boot disks - copy of OS disk that is not online except when you make the backups

3) Bootable tapes/DVD if possible - off site

No, you cannot restore the OS from kickstart/PXE/Puppet etc unless you are constantly refreshing

that data.

STEVE BALLMER KILLS WINDOWS

Wonder how the OEM/VAR hardware

'partners' are going to take this.. Unless M$ builds lots and lots of plants

who is going to make the 'devices'?

Microsoft CFO quits as quarterly results fail to sparkle

"Goldman Sachs downgraded Microsoft's stock to a "sell" rating,"

Well that's what they say... what are they DOING? Does anyone believe GS cares

about anyone other than GS?

Also, I believe Win8 is officially less popular than Vista, as least in terms of sales so far..

US House of Representatives passes CISPA by 288-127

Re: What I don't understand...

Turn it around. A Congress that won't make any sensible restrictions on gun purchases does not

care on iota about your rights of privacy..

I am NOT a PC repair man. I will NOT get your iPad working

Re: This is all too familiar.

yep and as I tell my wife. Change your password - DO NOT tell your password to the KIDS!

argh....

Feeling poor? WHO took all your money? NOT capitalist bastards?

Re: Starting figures are well out

The real irony is that States in the US where unionizing is basically undermined and the laws that

enforce it are called 'Right to Work' States and 'Right to Work; laws....

OS/2 a quarter century on: Why IBM lost out and how Microsoft won

I used OS2 v1. My FIL purchased one of those S/Z? 80s for $8,000 (amazingly expensive at that time).

I could not run anything except dBASE on it and I had to develop an app for him.

It was horrible.

My next experience was using OS2 v 2.1 to port development of a PL/1, IMS, DB2 application from

and IBM mainframe to the cheaper PC platform. Once I got through all kinds of issues getting

compatible software etc. to work - it was awesome,

What was most impressive was the system recovery. If the system crashed, or even if you

just hit the power button, it would come right back up with the same screen open and the cursor

sitting on the same line that it was on before the crash/power... impressive...

Peak Apple: Forstall was 'closest thing to Jobs they had left'

Successful? what about Apple Maps?

HP to take one more stab at consumer tablets

Re: Try to find a niche, why not a "workstation tablet"?

Should be possible. I installed Ubuntu 12.04 on an old Dell 620 and my 20 year old daughter is happily

using it to access Facebook and whatever she does via a browser. She does it all as 'guest' too...

I'm thinking of replacing my wife's laptop OS with Ubuntu too

Woz: Cloud computing trend is 'horrendous'

Re: it begins with 'C' and ends in 'sucker'...

Not true. Back when there was a Word 2.0, you got 'whores' if you mis-spelt 'whereas'...

Also, I used to get 'God Damn' for Goodman....

Apple CEO: Frothing fanboi iPhone 5 hype screwed our sales

A better writer could have re-phrased this

"Cook and chief bean counter Peter Oppenheimer..."

as

"Chief Cook and bottle washer...."

badda boom

Apple wins US ban on Samsung's Galaxy Tab 10.1

Re: "Stealing Ideas"?

Yes, I liked the Sony Slate. I advised it for my wife.

Haven't seen it or played with it. my son got hold of it.

didn't know there were 'robustness' issues. he's hard on thing.

It's probably in pieces.

Anxiety grips HP as new EMEA chief comes aboard from Nokia

Cut some of these execs, vps, evps and save some dough

Really, what do all these VPs, EVPs, execs DO?

It was once reported that the Hurd had 2,000 VP 'direct reports'... I'm sure the number has not gone

down.

BYOD will cost a packet, warn experts

Re: Oh god

So how does the Desktop Support guy in BRIC do that for the US Executive's new toy?

(There won't be any US Grunts left).

This is just an underhand way to dip into the employees wallett.

First they came for the pens and paper, then they came for the internet access, then the phone....

We're all salve workers for the Corporate Nazis....

HP-Oracle Itanium smackdown starts

Re: HP killed HP/UX itself....

Which HP-UX are you talking about. ? Clearly not 11.x, and not even 9.04..

This is just plain wrong. HP always had 'SAM'. while not a spiffy as SMIT, if was quite

adequate for dumb monkeys to manage HP-UX systems.

Re: So what?

"unparalleled uptime"

I wouldn't say that about equipment that has to be rebooted twice a year for DST...

Vote now for the WORST movie EVER

Wot not George Clooney

Two of my faves (not!)

are GC's 'Solaris', and 'The American'....worst movie ever

Boffins make graphene micro-distillery

Sewage treatment also comes to mind.

When they say 'water' does it mean pure H2O or what?

Colossal dead black neo-sphere approaching Earth

Maybe I'm being a bit dense here, but isn't this the perfect opportunity to land a

'probe' in this thing and have it collect and transmit data as it circles the Universe?

Don't bother with that degree, say IT pros

Close

your're close. Having a Degree tells the prospective employer that you are capable

of learing on your own . And it doesn't matter what subject.

Carly Fiorina of late memory had a degree in Medieval History for gawds sake

(but she sure new how to destroy HP and the shareholders).

Anyway, I used to work for a compnay called EDS who was vry successful in hiring

'liberal arts' graduates and teaching them Cobol/PL-1/IMS/DB2 etc and did very well.

Not so well in the new reality of Java/C++ etc...

The post below reminds my of myself.

I was a Mathematics graduate and really, really thick. for a long time before

started to understand DP....

First Cobol program I tried to use a tape drive for an indexed file.....

I taught computing too (O.K. it was one of those store front Ponzi schemes you see advertised during the day "training to become a medical receptionist, cosmetician, Security professional, computer programmer..')

I did teach my students the basics (3 operations, sequence, iteration, decision)

file systems (flat, indexed, random) etc. etc

There were a couple of students who were really serious and I gve them the best advice

I could. work on typing/data entry, RPM and try to get a data entry/operator position at a small company with S/36/S38 and work your way up cos you know RPM. IBM had just come out with OS400 and there was lost of opportunities

Oracle buys Ksplice

including Oracle RAC

Including Oracle RAC. Even the DBAs don't have a clue when it comes to setting up

redundancy and the apps developers insist on hard coding hosts/IP addresses (not VIPs!)

everywhere.

Our Oracle RAC cluster is harder to maintain than 10 stand alone servers...

London Olympics shop in Union Jack outrage

Poorly made in China

You're kidding, right? No one noticed the colours are wrong?

The only Blue should be the background of white diagonal St. Andrews Cross (Saltire)

It's an abomination, up there with the Kate and Harry wedding plate.

Really go read a book called "Poorly Made in China" if you want to know why

Curl goes outside browser for Silverlight fight

Curl

The fact that curl supports FTP, Telnet and has an option to us .netrc files for user accounts

and passwords speaks volumes about their commitment to 'security'

Rackable serves up $13.4m in losses

Rackable

Tey could get a 'Year of Mark Hurd' for $42.5 Million dollars.