Tuesday, December 23, 2008
Wishing you a Merry Christmas!
Far too long since I've posted, but it's really time to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas! I know it's tough times out there, especially in the job market, and I do wish all of my family, friends, colleagues, and former "candidates" the best New Year!
Friday, March 14, 2008
The deadly cost of not training
Mind you, I only had time for a quick skim of this article, but from what I've read, I can't agree more. It's title "IT's top 5 training mistakes" pretty much sums up the focus. What I find most interesting is in my own experience companies roll out software packages and seem to care very little if the actual person sitting in front of the computer has any idea of how to really make it work. The Microsoft Office suite is a classic case in point. It's not that Office doesn't have an amazing breadth of features, it does. It's more that the average user may use only 10% of those features and still consider themselves highly computer literate and a power user. That's why Office is really quite vulnerable in the future. The web 2.0-based, totally online, Office replacements don't have to be feature-rich, they have to do that 10% really, really well.
That's not to say that users shouldn't be trained to use use some of the missing 90% of the features that they ignore or have no idea exists. This is where IT really falls down. I believe that all organizations need a position entitled the "Director of Staff Efficiency." In this role, you would literally watch each team for a week to see what they do. What you'd find would be truly scary. Examples would be 100's of hours wasted on typing and retyping the same emails due to a lack of knowledge of how to use simple templates. Excel users who again, repeat reports over and over in extremely manual ways fraught with the potential of human error that could be, and should be, completely automated. Web users who really have no idea how to efficiently manage their online sourcing or information research. Nothing earth shattering from the technology side, but deadly time-killers and big shots to a corporate bottom line.
Yes, I know that the big buzz word nowadays is business process automation (BPA), but I'm talking about process review on a much, much lower level. It's time to get into the trenches, tackle your training needs, and focus on efficiency. Let's face it, nobody likes repeating manual processes over and over but this is the life of many American workers even if they sit behind spiffy new computer with the latest and greatest software. You'll have happier employees, better quality output, and faster, more efficient project completion.
That's not to say that users shouldn't be trained to use use some of the missing 90% of the features that they ignore or have no idea exists. This is where IT really falls down. I believe that all organizations need a position entitled the "Director of Staff Efficiency." In this role, you would literally watch each team for a week to see what they do. What you'd find would be truly scary. Examples would be 100's of hours wasted on typing and retyping the same emails due to a lack of knowledge of how to use simple templates. Excel users who again, repeat reports over and over in extremely manual ways fraught with the potential of human error that could be, and should be, completely automated. Web users who really have no idea how to efficiently manage their online sourcing or information research. Nothing earth shattering from the technology side, but deadly time-killers and big shots to a corporate bottom line.
Yes, I know that the big buzz word nowadays is business process automation (BPA), but I'm talking about process review on a much, much lower level. It's time to get into the trenches, tackle your training needs, and focus on efficiency. Let's face it, nobody likes repeating manual processes over and over but this is the life of many American workers even if they sit behind spiffy new computer with the latest and greatest software. You'll have happier employees, better quality output, and faster, more efficient project completion.
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Bye Bye Google!
Well, 1 year has come and gone and I find myself with just a few days left here at Google in Santa Monica. As my year contract comes to a close, I wanted to thank everyone at Google for a fantastic experience, great people, and a wonderful learning opportunity. Google is truly a unique environment in general, and this particularly true of their staffing organization. That being said, I'm on the look out for my next opportunity.
It's my hope that I will be able to find a management role in technical recruiting an a progressive organization hopefully a bit closer to home (Burbank, Glendale, Pasadena, or even downtown LA off of a train line are key target area for me). I love working with companies who specialize in open-source development. Why? I'm very interested in education in general and truly believe that the internet, and open-source, provides a parallel learning path for engineers (parallel to more "traditional" educational institutions). I'm not referring to online colleges/universities. I'm referring to the organic, cooperative, collaborative learning that open-source inspires. Working in such an environment where I can play a key role in bringing in exceptional talent from this unique pool of candidates is my ideal. I'd also be very interested in considering roles in staffing programs, corporate evangelism and outreach to technology communities as opposed to traditional recruiting.
Wish me luck!
It's my hope that I will be able to find a management role in technical recruiting an a progressive organization hopefully a bit closer to home (Burbank, Glendale, Pasadena, or even downtown LA off of a train line are key target area for me). I love working with companies who specialize in open-source development. Why? I'm very interested in education in general and truly believe that the internet, and open-source, provides a parallel learning path for engineers (parallel to more "traditional" educational institutions). I'm not referring to online colleges/universities. I'm referring to the organic, cooperative, collaborative learning that open-source inspires. Working in such an environment where I can play a key role in bringing in exceptional talent from this unique pool of candidates is my ideal. I'd also be very interested in considering roles in staffing programs, corporate evangelism and outreach to technology communities as opposed to traditional recruiting.
Wish me luck!
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
OLPC giving up on core principles?
Please tell me it ain't so! In a recent article by Business Week, there are hints that OLPC, the makers of the XO laptop for children (i.e., the $100 laptop) is rolling over and giving up their moral principles by handing over the farm to Microsoft.
From the Business Week article:
"OLPC will hand more of the development and support of its XO laptop and its core software to technology companies, including Red Hat (RHT), the leading distributor of the Linux open-source operating system, and Microsoft (MSFT), which is just now putting the finishing touches on a version of Windows for the XO machine."
Let's put this in perspective...
First, I'm one of the people who jumped at the chance to contribute to the OLPC's "Give One Get One" program where were allowed to purchase two XO units and one would go to you, one to a needy child. All good so far. When I got my machine, I was just thrilled and taken back to my days when I got my hands on my first Mac 128K. Here's a machine that needed refinement but had lots of promise. I could see how this little machine could change the lives of children all over the world. While I was a little surprised at the number of "rough edges" in the OS and software, it's clear that there are a lot of people involved in cleaning things up. I like to think that the XO in the next 6 months will really be quite remarkable, even more than it is already.
Now, I have to say that I think that the OLPC program has some definite, well... biases. First, the whole program is based strongly on a constructivist learning model which, by and large, I think is good although totally strict constructivism causes some problems of it's own. For instance, in strict constructivism children essentially guide their entire education which may have some limitations. Also, more traditional or "classic" education may be ignored or shunned to focus more on activities that are considered to be more applicable to today's world. That leaves out a lot of classic literature and subjects like Latin. Oh well, nothings perfect and there is no reason that a kid couldn't find the classics on Project Gutenberg and read them if they wanted on the XO!
On top of this emphasis on constructivism is a definite bias toward all things open-source. Closed source bad, open-source good. OK, again I can see that the OLPC program is doing all it can to maintain independence in the future direction of the laptop and it's OS and activities. In general, I agree with this approach but there are some limits. For instance, having a browser that does not, out of the box, support the Flash plug-in for video and animation is a big limitation in the real world. The supplied OS replacement for Flash just doesn't cut it since it doesn't work in too many instances. I'm not sure if this decision was based more of a philosophical stance on OS software in general or an inability to make a deal with Adobe which would allow for unfettered distribution of Flash. This does not mean that I don't support OS software and in fact, when at all practical, I strongly support using open-source. Considering that simply having a Flash player proved to be a big problem I'm about to fall off my chair with the notion that Microsoft will play a major role in the XO's future (sorry if I don't buy Microsoft's recent announcement of welcoming the OS world with open arms). That's why I go back to my original thought "Say it isn't so." Only time will tell but this new announcement is, to say the least, bewildering.
From the Business Week article:
"OLPC will hand more of the development and support of its XO laptop and its core software to technology companies, including Red Hat (RHT), the leading distributor of the Linux open-source operating system, and Microsoft (MSFT), which is just now putting the finishing touches on a version of Windows for the XO machine."
Let's put this in perspective...
First, I'm one of the people who jumped at the chance to contribute to the OLPC's "Give One Get One" program where were allowed to purchase two XO units and one would go to you, one to a needy child. All good so far. When I got my machine, I was just thrilled and taken back to my days when I got my hands on my first Mac 128K. Here's a machine that needed refinement but had lots of promise. I could see how this little machine could change the lives of children all over the world. While I was a little surprised at the number of "rough edges" in the OS and software, it's clear that there are a lot of people involved in cleaning things up. I like to think that the XO in the next 6 months will really be quite remarkable, even more than it is already.
Now, I have to say that I think that the OLPC program has some definite, well... biases. First, the whole program is based strongly on a constructivist learning model which, by and large, I think is good although totally strict constructivism causes some problems of it's own. For instance, in strict constructivism children essentially guide their entire education which may have some limitations. Also, more traditional or "classic" education may be ignored or shunned to focus more on activities that are considered to be more applicable to today's world. That leaves out a lot of classic literature and subjects like Latin. Oh well, nothings perfect and there is no reason that a kid couldn't find the classics on Project Gutenberg and read them if they wanted on the XO!
On top of this emphasis on constructivism is a definite bias toward all things open-source. Closed source bad, open-source good. OK, again I can see that the OLPC program is doing all it can to maintain independence in the future direction of the laptop and it's OS and activities. In general, I agree with this approach but there are some limits. For instance, having a browser that does not, out of the box, support the Flash plug-in for video and animation is a big limitation in the real world. The supplied OS replacement for Flash just doesn't cut it since it doesn't work in too many instances. I'm not sure if this decision was based more of a philosophical stance on OS software in general or an inability to make a deal with Adobe which would allow for unfettered distribution of Flash. This does not mean that I don't support OS software and in fact, when at all practical, I strongly support using open-source. Considering that simply having a Flash player proved to be a big problem I'm about to fall off my chair with the notion that Microsoft will play a major role in the XO's future (sorry if I don't buy Microsoft's recent announcement of welcoming the OS world with open arms). That's why I go back to my original thought "Say it isn't so." Only time will tell but this new announcement is, to say the least, bewildering.
Wednesday, March 05, 2008
Scarcity of OS engineers --> Higher Salaries for 08
Interesting blog by Lora Bentley pointing out that with the release of the newly announced Adobe Air and MySQL's acquisition by Sun Micrososystems, the drive for hiring open-source engineers is on. With this renewed vigor in hiring in the OS sector is a commensurate jump in salaries amounting to a 7.6% boost anticipated in this year. Not bad given that people are predicting a recession. Perhaps as dollars compress, corporations are finally getting the kick in the pants needed to take OS technology seriously which, in turn, drives the market for those with expertise in this sector.
One point, at first I was a little confused by the addition of Adobe's Air in the original post, but on investigation, it does appear that Adobe has been releasing more of their code to OS and has built Air very much to meet the needs of OS engineers (see Kevin Lynch interview in Wired).
One point, at first I was a little confused by the addition of Adobe's Air in the original post, but on investigation, it does appear that Adobe has been releasing more of their code to OS and has built Air very much to meet the needs of OS engineers (see Kevin Lynch interview in Wired).
Sunday, February 03, 2008
Drain King is No King
OK, I should preface this rant against a product by pointing out that the Drain King pipe clearing system may be just great under the right conditions. Unfortunately, this nifty tool for unplugging or unclogging a pipe had well... serious problems when I put it to use.
Let me set the stage. My kitchen sink began to fill up with water after the faucet would run for 2-3 minutes. The stoppage wasn't 100% and the water would drain very, very slowly once backed up. Since it took so long to back up, I figured that the clog must be pretty far down the line. The big problem came if someone tried to run the dishwasher since the washer drained into the same line which would lead to water backing up to the sink pretty fast. While I know next to nothing about plumbing, I did know that I needed to get in there somehow and get the line open.
My first approach was to hit my local Albertson's supermarket and pick up a bottle of that super gooey thick acid gel to pour down the pipes. I tried that for two days figuring that the pipe might clear but... nope nothing. OK, now I had a pipe with gel which still drained like a snail.
Next, I tried to go to the traps outside the house. See, I told you I know nothing about plumbing and should have figured out that this would take me to the bigger sewer lines rather than unplug the pipes from a sink. Well, snaking the traps didn't work but it didn't hurt either (other than the smell!).
I then decided to hit the local hardware. There I had a choice between a traditional 25 foot 1/4 inch snake or something new... the Drain King. Well, I like things that are innovative so I was naturally attracted to the Drain King. This device connects to the end of a garden hose. You stuff it into a pipe and when the water is turned on, it inflates like a balloon to fill the pipe. Once the pipe is sealed, the Drain King pulses jets of high-pressure water down the pipe to blow out the clog. It claims to be able to blow out a clog up to 1000 feet away! That was perfect for me since I had no idea just how far down the clog was.
I got home and excited pulled out the pipes under the sink. I then inserted the Drain King and told my son to turn on the hose and wait by the spigot in case something went wrong. I was totally impressed. The Drain King inflated, filled the pipe and then the whole hose started to pulse. In my mind, I could see that clog being blasted away by the awesome power of the Drain King! The next thing I know, my son is yelling that there is water shooting off the roof like a geiser! I look out the window and tons of water spilling off the roof. It took a second but it hit me. The clog was way down the pipe past the point where the vent pipe was coming off of the drain pipe. The powerful water blast of the Drain King was shooting down line, hitting the clog, backing up and forcing the water to the path of least resistance... my vent pipe leading to the roof.
Now the real fun begins. With dirty water shooting from my roof like a jet from Moby Dick I had no choice but to scream "Turn it off!" Well, think this through and imagine things from my point of view. I'm looking into a pipe that is sealed by the inflated balloon of the Drain King. The hose is turned off, the balloon deflates. I have a pipe leading all the way to my roof filled with dirty, acid-gel-filled water and gravity does its stuff. The water comes rushing back down the vent pipe past the deflated Drain King and blasts me with a rush of nastiness. My floor is a river of muck. I'm saturated and my drain is as plugged as ever.
After a bit of much needed clean up, I went back to the hardware store and bought that old-fashioned snake. After about 25 minutes of snaking, I put the pipes back on and "Viola!" no more clog.
The moral of the story is that sometimes the old fashioned approach just works. Would I use a Drain King again? Yeah, but only if that drain clogs up almost immediately after putting water in the sink. Then at least there's a good chance that the clog is before the vent pipe. If that were the case, then there might have been enough pressure built up in the line to blast out that clog and the Drain King would have worked like advertised. If you get a clogged drain, give it a shot and let me know how it works. Be ready to change your clothes and mop the floor though!
Let me set the stage. My kitchen sink began to fill up with water after the faucet would run for 2-3 minutes. The stoppage wasn't 100% and the water would drain very, very slowly once backed up. Since it took so long to back up, I figured that the clog must be pretty far down the line. The big problem came if someone tried to run the dishwasher since the washer drained into the same line which would lead to water backing up to the sink pretty fast. While I know next to nothing about plumbing, I did know that I needed to get in there somehow and get the line open.
My first approach was to hit my local Albertson's supermarket and pick up a bottle of that super gooey thick acid gel to pour down the pipes. I tried that for two days figuring that the pipe might clear but... nope nothing. OK, now I had a pipe with gel which still drained like a snail.
Next, I tried to go to the traps outside the house. See, I told you I know nothing about plumbing and should have figured out that this would take me to the bigger sewer lines rather than unplug the pipes from a sink. Well, snaking the traps didn't work but it didn't hurt either (other than the smell!).
I then decided to hit the local hardware. There I had a choice between a traditional 25 foot 1/4 inch snake or something new... the Drain King. Well, I like things that are innovative so I was naturally attracted to the Drain King. This device connects to the end of a garden hose. You stuff it into a pipe and when the water is turned on, it inflates like a balloon to fill the pipe. Once the pipe is sealed, the Drain King pulses jets of high-pressure water down the pipe to blow out the clog. It claims to be able to blow out a clog up to 1000 feet away! That was perfect for me since I had no idea just how far down the clog was.
I got home and excited pulled out the pipes under the sink. I then inserted the Drain King and told my son to turn on the hose and wait by the spigot in case something went wrong. I was totally impressed. The Drain King inflated, filled the pipe and then the whole hose started to pulse. In my mind, I could see that clog being blasted away by the awesome power of the Drain King! The next thing I know, my son is yelling that there is water shooting off the roof like a geiser! I look out the window and tons of water spilling off the roof. It took a second but it hit me. The clog was way down the pipe past the point where the vent pipe was coming off of the drain pipe. The powerful water blast of the Drain King was shooting down line, hitting the clog, backing up and forcing the water to the path of least resistance... my vent pipe leading to the roof.
Now the real fun begins. With dirty water shooting from my roof like a jet from Moby Dick I had no choice but to scream "Turn it off!" Well, think this through and imagine things from my point of view. I'm looking into a pipe that is sealed by the inflated balloon of the Drain King. The hose is turned off, the balloon deflates. I have a pipe leading all the way to my roof filled with dirty, acid-gel-filled water and gravity does its stuff. The water comes rushing back down the vent pipe past the deflated Drain King and blasts me with a rush of nastiness. My floor is a river of muck. I'm saturated and my drain is as plugged as ever.
After a bit of much needed clean up, I went back to the hardware store and bought that old-fashioned snake. After about 25 minutes of snaking, I put the pipes back on and "Viola!" no more clog.
The moral of the story is that sometimes the old fashioned approach just works. Would I use a Drain King again? Yeah, but only if that drain clogs up almost immediately after putting water in the sink. Then at least there's a good chance that the clog is before the vent pipe. If that were the case, then there might have been enough pressure built up in the line to blast out that clog and the Drain King would have worked like advertised. If you get a clogged drain, give it a shot and let me know how it works. Be ready to change your clothes and mop the floor though!
Monday, January 28, 2008
Sunbeam CoffeeMaster
OK, I know that this is a bit out of my normal topic areas, but I have had a few people very interested in learning more about vacuum coffee makers. This is a photo of my Sunbeam "Double Bubble" CoffeeMaster. While you don't get to see the coffee brewing, the sleek lines of this unit are exceptional (c. 1930's).
My XO first impressions
OK, I'm addicted to my XO laptop. I participated the OLPC "Give 1 Get 1" program and received my XO just before Christmas. I'm very glad that I did since as an advocate for open-source software, I definitely love this move toward OS software AND hardware to address the unique problems of educating children across the world. That being said, I was also very excited to get my hands on one of the little green devices to put it through it's paces.
What do I think? Well, the XO as a box is just plain fun! There are a few rough spots in both hardware and software. First, I agree with most people that although the keyboard is quite water resistant, it is also very difficult to type on. I'm going to point out that I'm a fat-fingered 40+ year old so this criticism may have no application to a bunch of 6 year olds pounding on the little keyboard. For an adult though, it's just plain tough to get words into the box. The rest of the system is just great. The display is beautiful and crisp. I love being able to turn the back lighting off and still have a totally readable display. The wi-fi reception on my box has been great assuming that WPA encryption is off on the router. No complaints.
Now, on to the software and OS itself. Well... let's just say that the XO is currently a work in progress. There are quite a number of features that simply do not work at present. Some examples are:
What I find most exciting about the laptop is not its current state but its potential. I feel like I did when I sat down in front of my first Macintosh 128K (yes, I do remember that and was alive back then in 1984). The potential of that little box was palpable and I get the same feeling with the XO. When I'm asked what I think about the laptop, I summarize it as "It has some problems right now, but basically it's very usable and I can see such enormous promise that I'm a huge fan." If viewed in that light, I think most would agree that the OLPC achieved a great success. Unfortunately, I'm concerned that there will be those out there who look at the XO and instead focus on its current limitations. This should not be a treated as a totally "ready for primetime" system but instead a system that is, and probably will remain, a work in progress which is the way all good open-source projects should be.
For those of you interested, please also note that there is a vast new growth in XO support being driven by those in the development community and supported further by tinkering new owners. Support will continue to be a big concern for the main organization since they can't possibly support each and every box, but the community is jumping in and I'm finding support to be excellent. If you need help consider posting to the newly unified OLPC Support Forum (I say newly unified since two separate efforts were combined to provide a central resource). Their are also numerous mailing lists and IRC available. The main OLPC wiki remains an essential source of current information.
What do I think? Well, the XO as a box is just plain fun! There are a few rough spots in both hardware and software. First, I agree with most people that although the keyboard is quite water resistant, it is also very difficult to type on. I'm going to point out that I'm a fat-fingered 40+ year old so this criticism may have no application to a bunch of 6 year olds pounding on the little keyboard. For an adult though, it's just plain tough to get words into the box. The rest of the system is just great. The display is beautiful and crisp. I love being able to turn the back lighting off and still have a totally readable display. The wi-fi reception on my box has been great assuming that WPA encryption is off on the router. No complaints.
Now, on to the software and OS itself. Well... let's just say that the XO is currently a work in progress. There are quite a number of features that simply do not work at present. Some examples are:
- the brush size keys on the keyboard are inactive
- the touch sensitive pad does not work (although the main conductive pad in the middle for mouse movement is just fine)
- The various buttons to the left and right of the screen have limited use in the current version of the eBook reading program
- The famous "code" peeking key on the keyboard is not activated
What I find most exciting about the laptop is not its current state but its potential. I feel like I did when I sat down in front of my first Macintosh 128K (yes, I do remember that and was alive back then in 1984). The potential of that little box was palpable and I get the same feeling with the XO. When I'm asked what I think about the laptop, I summarize it as "It has some problems right now, but basically it's very usable and I can see such enormous promise that I'm a huge fan." If viewed in that light, I think most would agree that the OLPC achieved a great success. Unfortunately, I'm concerned that there will be those out there who look at the XO and instead focus on its current limitations. This should not be a treated as a totally "ready for primetime" system but instead a system that is, and probably will remain, a work in progress which is the way all good open-source projects should be.
For those of you interested, please also note that there is a vast new growth in XO support being driven by those in the development community and supported further by tinkering new owners. Support will continue to be a big concern for the main organization since they can't possibly support each and every box, but the community is jumping in and I'm finding support to be excellent. If you need help consider posting to the newly unified OLPC Support Forum (I say newly unified since two separate efforts were combined to provide a central resource). Their are also numerous mailing lists and IRC available. The main OLPC wiki remains an essential source of current information.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
