Posts by Don Jefe

Bring Your Own Work Ethic

I'd rather have employees with a solid work ethic that busy their asses all day than saddle my systems guys with bullshit that at the end of the day is just an excuse for (most) office types to waste time during the work day.

Increase Explicitly

Does this mean there will be more porn or that they will become sexually aroused by DDoS?

Google News

This story appeared on the Google News page before it showed up in the Reg app. Weird.

Help

OMG Big wave cmng 2 beach. I can haz PFD ASAP PLZ?

Automobile Analogy

All 'foundation' businesses operate this way. My family made its money selling and installing hundreds of thousands of CD players for car dealers when the transition from cassettes to CD was underway. People were migrating to CD but most new car inventory couldn't use them. Web found a need and we filled it. Made scads of money for about a decade.

Then most new cars started coming with CD players so our business was made irrelevant. There was no longer a need for our service/product.

It is only logical that this happen if you are building on top if someone else's product. The car manufacturers decided it was insane to offer what is positioned as a quality product (new car) then have the owner or the dealer upgrade it the second it was purchased. So they started putting in their own CD players. (The same argument can be made for Keyless entry systems or shiny wheels, etc...)

Point being that if you are building on top of someone's product and you have a quality offering it is inevitable that the foundation product manufacturer will emulate your product/service. You'd do the same if everybody upgraded your product as soon as it was sold...

Government Project

It was obviously a government program meant to stimulate the economy but it went off the rails & was never completed.

All the signs are there:

-Too large in scope

-Poor materials sourcing

-Unreliable temporary workforce

-Long commute times for full time staff

-disconnect between management and operations

Bigger Countries

The easiest solution is just to get bigger countries over there. We don't have much trouble with this sort of thing along the Canadian or Mexican borders.

Surprise?

No. The ability to block VPN connections is certainly nothing new. It's a wonder it took this long.

I think it is sad funny when people rail about censorship in the West but they are doing all their bitching online & that's 100% controllable if 'The Man' saw fit. The fact they can even whine should be looked at as an extremely positive thing.

Car Chair?

Is it called a car chair in the UK? Huh. In the States we only call a thing a chair if it can be moved to a different location.

What do you call the thing a baby human sits in at a the table?

Scoured the Earth

I said a week or so on here but I'll say it again: "Dead" languages are a great way to make scads of money & keep work for many, many years. We just completed a hiring search for two COBOL developers. One was retired but the money involved changed his mind and the other came from Japan of all places & it cost a fortune to relocate him.

Some of the banks we've worked with aren't remotely interested in "upgrading" to a newer language as what they've got is extremely stable and reliable. Unlike so much of the sloppy "high availability" stuff slopped out now a days.

Old languages aren't for everyone but some if them will keep you in high payed jobs for a very long time.

Misread

I read "Hilary Reynolds will be moved sideways and her role filled by David Pitchford" as

"Hilary Reynolds will be moved sideways and her hole filled by David Pitchford".

Merger

Why doesn't Google just buy Facebook? It would save everyone a lot of trouble.

Ready!

I've got my carton of smokes, frying some bacon, and drinking my bourbon getting ready to fire up some porn on my giant TV.

Positive Impact

My nieces are from Uruguay where the OLPC computer is highly utilized in the educational system. It has enabled them to become familiar with computers in a functional way and has been very good for them. Granted they have good parental oversight and are greatly encouraged to use it to learn with.

I guess that last sentence says it all. If kids are encouraged to use a computer in a useful way they will. If parents just want it to be a babysitter then I guess that mind numbing "entertainment" IS all it is good for. Like all computer/kid issues, it boils down to the parents.

Sounds Like Fun

But what does it do? It doesn't seem that the sales team is quite sure either.

Fishes & Barrels

I don't see killing work from home as a bad thing when your organization is bleeding red ink. Get everyone in the office and see who really performs: Then terminate the underperformers.

Secondly I really don't buy into the "work more hours from home" argument. You may sit in front of the computer longer, but in many cases it is mostly due to having to regain your concentration after answering the phone, nursing a child, walking the dog, etc... If people were in an environment that promoted focused work they wouldn't have to put in so many "extra" hours.

Finally, the office politics argument: if you are embroiled in office politics you either don't have enough to do and your manager needs correction, or you are in too high of a position to be working from home anyway. So no wins there either.

None of my staff work from home unless there is a serious, temporary, situation that merits it. Telecommuting is not an option. However, everyone goes home everyday and is able to leave work at work as they are all very happy. Only two quitters and two terminated in nine years.

Grandfather

My Grandfather died (of heart failure) at the age of 88. He was drinking his fifth or sixth (daily) "after work" bourbon and had just opened his third pack of smokes for the day. This was in his library after finishing his dinner of mashed taters, bacon and beef stew.

I only hope I can do something similar.

If you comply

All is fine. Regardless of what the law says, you never want to hear that from a government.

Who?

Who thinks this shit up? Will all the educational material deny evolution too? Maybe it'll have a little stock ticker as well.

Yes

Two of the senior developers at my company have advanced degrees in accounting and one is a CPA as well. Over the years I've found them to be invaluable assets as they have skills that can be applied both to the IT group and to the business as a whole. Since they're involved in nearly every aspect of the company through various systems it only makes good sense that they understand that the business (thus their salaries) are sales and revenue driven.