httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQjIsaf3S2A
Verizon is now offering FiOS customers a 150 Mbit down and 35 Mbit up connection. Honestly, I’d be happy with just more uplink on my broadband, but this will work.
Becoming (or staying) an organized sysadmin (contest with free stuff)
Most system administrators can tell you about the importance of being organized but few can pull it off very well. We’re always being pulled in different directions, by different people. There are always those fires that need to be put out ASAP, sometimes at the least opportune times. So it’s hard to always make the most efficient use of your time and keep things organized.
We’d like to see what are some of the ways our visitors try and stay organized. What are the tools and methods you use to keep track of projects, your personal calendar, tasks, your files, your notes, etc. We welcome our visitors to post a comment in this thread and let us know what are the ways you keep yourself on track. We’ll gather up the best ones and share them in another post, and for a couple of the best ones we have something special to give away to you. (It’s a secret)
To get you started I’ll give you an example of my personal tools:
There is one program I use on every system and mobile device that helps me keep track of things. The main one is Evernote. It’s a great piece of software that runs on all my Windows boxes, as well as my iPhone and Blackberry. It can keep track of screenshots and sync them into the cloud and to all my other devices. I also have the Chrome plugin installed so when I find something I need to remember (for instance, steps to fix a problem) I can highlight it and with a couple clicks instantly import it into Evernote. Since there are clients on both my iPhone and Blackberry when I’m on the go and need to make a note of something I can write it down or snap a picture and sync it up into the system for later use. Evernote also gives you an email address that you can add to your contacts to forward important emails into the system with. I have that setup with both my personal email and business email, so important emails get dumped into Evernote for quick retrieval. Evernote helps keep my thoughts, findings and important documentation easily accessible.
There you go, it’s that easy. So lets hear how you keep yourself organized!
Microsoft revives Mac vs PC, but in a friendly way
httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_YbmK3Zu0Os
Note to Apple: This is how you can do a Mac vs PC ad, but in a less aggressive way. You can be cute, funny, point out the deficiencies in the other product (like the fact Steve Jobs hates Blu-Ray) but still all be friends in the end.
Storage Tiering vs Caching
During the first day of Tech Field Day #4 in San Jose we heard from two storage vendors who had two different thoughts on how storage should be configured. We started out the day with NetApp who went over everything from their new OnTap 8.0.1 software, to the joint venture with Cisco and VMware called FlexPod as well as a presentation from Greg Kleimanon, Director of Marketing, on how NetApp uses caching in their arrays.
NetApp believes their Intelligent caching using Flash Cache is the best way to handle some of the hurdles that customers are facing today. Kleimanon stated that Tiering is expensive and complicated to manage. He did comment that there are companies (Like F5, another vendor from a previous Tech Field Day) that have created algorithms to dynamically manage tiering but he echoed that these algorithms are not proven.
The last presentation of the day was from Avere Co-founder/CEO Ronald Bianchini, Jr. He was very passionate about his product and it showed through the presentation. Avere uses your current “slow” storage for archive and uses a hybrid of RAM and SAS/SSD drives for faster reads/writes. This solves the problem of speed in space by using a non traditional process of putting their box with the fast stuff (RAM & SAS/SSD) in front of your traditional SATA slow array. It uses a algorithm to decide which items should be written/read from the RAM, the SAS/SSD drives or the SATA drives depending on the most efficient way to handle the data.
So what are your thoughts? Caching or Tiering?
After seeing both presentations I think Tiering as implemented by Avere is the right way to implement the solution. The way Avere breaks down the data and gives it the most efficient access path to the storage just makes sense. Look for big things coming from Avere, especially in their FXT Series.
Update: Here are the videos of the two presentations. Watch and share your thoughts!
Disclaimer: Tech Field Day is organized by the great folks at Gestalt IT and paid for by the presenters of the event. Even though my travel, meals and hotel accommodations were paid for my opinions are my own and it will not affect my posts.
Facebook is building a massive datacenter in North Carolina too
Facebook announced today they are breaking ground on a half a billion dollar datacenter in the hills of North Carolina. Sound familiar? Apple has one billion dollar facility nearby with construction started on another next door, with space for another across the street. What is it about North Carolina that makes it so attractive to hosting server farms?
According to North Carolina Governor Bev Perdue, the construction is expected to generate 250 jobs during the 18-month building phase. Once that is complete, Facebook expects to have 35-45 employees and contractors working at the site.
“We are proud that Facebook chose to make North Carolina a ‘friend.’ The feeling is certainly mutual,” said Gov. Perdue.
The new building will be built to LEED Gold standards, and is expected to be one of the most energy efficient datacenters in the United States. Facebook is currently constructing a similar facility in Oregon that will feature environmentally friendly features like evaporative cooling systems and power distribution systems.
Why you shouldn’t leak the CONFIDENTIAL memos your CEO sends out
So you’ve got a really great job as an engineer for Google, and it just got better because the CEO sent the entire company an email letting everyone know how much he appreciated them and that they’d be getting a 10% raise and a $1,000 cash bonus. Sounds like a pretty sweet deal.
You decide to let the rest of the world know how great your job is, and how great your CEO is for giving you a raise by sending the email to the press. The press, jumps on it, talking up how great Google is for giving their all their employees an across the board raise in such harsh economic time, etc, etc.
One small problem. That email you forwarded to the press. Yeah, that was confidential.
More specifically:
CONFIDENTIAL: INTERNAL ONLY
GOOGLERS ONLY (FULL TIME AND PART TIME EMPLOYEES)
Eric tracked you down, and guess what. You’re fired.
I’m not sure what Google’s reasoning for doing so was, but it happened. And it should prove as a lesson not to be so direct about forwarding company communications to the press. The funny thing though, is that the news about the leaker being fired, probably came from a leak within Google.
Firefox 4 beta 7 released, crushes previous versions in benchmarks
Mozilla has released the latest beta of Firefox 4, and it crushes the previous versions in terms of performance.
This release boosts performance in some important ways: it adds the JägerMonkey just-in-time (JIT) JavaScript compiler; adds more support for hardware-accelerated graphics, as well as hardware acceleration for Windows XP and Mac OS X; and enables 3D capabilities, without the need for plug-ins, with WebGL.
It remains to be seen how this release stands up to current reigning speed champion, Google Chrome.
via The Mozilla Blog
Welcome to Tech Field Day 2010
TechVirtuoso’s very own Frank Owen is in San Jose, California this week participating in Gestalt IT Tech Field Day. Those of you sitting at home can watch the whole event live via the Gestalt IT website. But the group posted a welcome video (above) with a few of the bloggers, including Frank.
Over the two days Frank will be hearing from 7 sponsors, from storage providers to chipset giants and enterprise monitoring leaders. Check back later today and tomorrow for more updates from Frank.
Disclaimer: Tech Field Day is organized by the great folks at Gestalt IT and paid for by the presenters of the event. Even though my travel, meals and hotel accommodations were paid for my opinions are my own and it will not affect my posts.
Apache gears up for battle against Oracle
The Apache Software Foundation, masters of the code that is responsible for serving up more than half of the worlds web pages, including this one, has announced that it’s taking on software giant Oracle and it’s ever more restrictive Java licensing. Indicating that if Oracle doesn’t play nice, they’re going to leave the Java Community Process.
Apache is particularly upset because they feel Oracle doesn’t play by the same rules they’re expecting other companies to follow when using Java technology in their products. Their complaints about the license process date back to before Oracle purchased Java when they’re acquired Sun Microsystems at the start of the year. Arguably, it was THE reason Oracle bought Sun, as Oracle has been one of the biggest Java users in their products.
via ITWorld
When old media embraces new media, The Washington Post iPad app
httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KCUFxFoaloE
When one of the most respect names in journalism gets into the iPad game, it seems they go all in. Bringing out big guns like Bob Woodward to pimp their latest adventures in new media.
From the look of the previews and reviews thus far, the app seems to be top notch. It’ll be interesting to see how other papers embrace new media into the workflow as their traditional distribution methods begin to dry up.