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• My Doors - Why Standards Matter to Business

  - by [email protected]

  By Brian Dayton on April 8, 2010 9:27 PM "Standards save money." "Standards accelerate projects." "Standards make better solutions." What do these statements mean to you? You buy technology solutions like Oracle Applications but you're a business person--trying to close the quarter, get performance reviews processed, negotiate a new sourcing contract, etc. When "standards" come up in presentations and discussions do you: - Nod your head politely - Tune out and check your smart phone - Turn to your IT counterpart and say "Bob's all over this standards thing, right Bob?" Here's why standards matter. My wife wants new external doors downstairs, ones that would get more light into the rooms. Am I OK with that? "Uhh, sure...it's a little dark in the kitchen." - 24 hours ago - wife calls to tell me that she's going to the hardware store and may look at doors - 20 hours ago - wife pulls into driveway, informs me that two doors are in the back of her station wagon, ready for me to carry - 19 hours ago - I re-discovered the fact that it's not fun to carry a solid wood door by myself - 5 hours ago - Local handyman, who was at our house anyway, tells me that the doors we bought will likely cost 2-3x the material cost in installation time and labor...the doors are standard but our doorways aren't We could have done more research. I could be more handy. Sure. But the fact is, my 1951 house wasn't built with me in mind. They built what worked and called it a day. The same holds true with a lot of business applications. They were designed and architected for one-time use with one use-case in mind. Today's business climate is different. If you're going to use your processes and technology to differentiate your business you should have at least a working knowledge of: - How standards can benefit your business - Your IT organization's philosophy around standards - Your vendor's track-record around standards...and watch for those who pay lip-service to standards but don't follow through The rallying cry in most IT organizations today is "learn more about the business, drop the acronyms." I'm not advocating that you go out and learn how to code in Java. But I do believe it will help your business and your decision-making process if you meet IT ½...even ¼ of the way there. Epilogue: The door project has been put on hold and yours truly has to return the doors to the hardware store tomorrow.

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• Lenovo Thinkpad X1 Carbon support

  - by Robottinosino

  I am considering selling my Mac to get money towards a Lenovo Thinkpad X1 because what I really want to do is to be running an Ubuntu system all the time. Is this machine completely supported in Ubuntu, with no tiny little feature missing just because I am "going Linux"? Optional user story section, skip to the question below if you don't have time: I have a friend who bought a "works on Ubuntu" system a year ago and has hated the fact ever since: battery lasts less than if he boots in Windows (which he despises) and he ascribes that to "no good OS/harware integration and support for advanced chipset power management features", odd behaviour on suspend/resume/hibernate (says: "when it works 90% of the time and the other 10% it makes you lose your work is as good as broken - 90% is the same as 0% he says), some occasional graphics card glitches he can perfectly well live with and has almost grown affectionate to, and finally, and that is what would make him undo his choice if he could, bad "input device drivers". He says: trackpoint and trackpad just "feel different", "so much better" on Windows and that was impossible to know from the website brochure. That story makes me very doubtful... but I want to abandon this "walled garden" of prison that is my Mac and go Ubuntu all the way, no doubt about that! My dilemma at this time is just: "I don't want to live with those eternal frustrations for sure"! Here's a directly answerable phrasing of my question: Is the Lenovo Thinkpad X1 supported on Ubuntu? Yes/no, which version? Which hardware features are not supported? Provide a list Optionally: sort the list in descending order of frustration from your experience Optionally: mention if there are acceptable workarounds to the "out-of-the-box" condition described in the earlier points and whether this ameliorates frustration at least to "tolerable" levels Comment: the Ubuntu hardware certification page is so not-for-end-users it's unreal. Whoa. What would make it end-user friendly is: Link to "buy here and you'll be just fine, this is the right configuration for you, it'll work as long as you press BUY on that page and don't browse further" Remove mentions of may and might not work. Just tell it straight: press buy here and you will get a working system with the exception of A, B, C (so that I can decide whether the philosophical "freedom pleasure" I get from escaping an Apple world is enough to off-balance the loss, for instance, of Bluetooth capabilities (something that I of course use on my Mac) but "could" lose to use free (as in freedom) software The certification page fails to dispel doubts in me as an end-user. I don't feel "eased into Ubuntu", I feel "partially informed".

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• How do I maintain a really poorly written code base?

  - by onlineapplab.com

  Recently I got hired to work on existing web application because of NDA I'm not at liberty to disclose any details but this application is working online in sort of a beta testing stage before official launch. We have a few hundred users right now but this number is supposed to significantly increase after official launch. The application is written in PHP (but it is irrelevant to my question) and is running on a dual xeon processor standalone server with severe performance problems. I have seen a lot of bad PHP code but this really sets new standards, especially knowing how much time and money was invested in developing it. it is as badly coded as possible there is PHP, HTML, SQL mixed together and code is repeated whenever it is necessary (especially SQL queries). there are not any functions used, not mentioning any OOP there are four versions of the app (desktop, iPhone, Android + other mobile) each version has pretty much the same functionality but was created by copying the whole code base, so now there are some differences between each version and it is really hard to maintain the database is really badly designed, which is causing severe performance problems also for fixing some errors in PHP code there is a lot of database triggers used which are updating data on SELECT and on INSERT so any testing is a nightmare Basically, any sin of a bad programming you can imagine is there for example it is not only possible to use SQL injections in literally every place but you can log into app if you use a login which doesn't exist and an empty password. The team which created this app is not working on it any more and there is an outsourced team which suggested that there are some problems but was never willing to deal with the elephant in the room partially because they've got a very comfortable contract and partially due to lack of skills (just my opinion). My job was supposed to be fixing some performance problems and extending existing functionality but first thing I was asked to do was a review of the existing code base. I've made my review and it was quite a shock for the management but my conclusions were after some time finally confirmed by other programmers. Management made it clear that it is not possible to start rewriting this app from scratch (which in my opinion should be done). We have to maintain its operable state and at the same time fix performance errors and extend the functionality. My question is, as I don't want just to patch the existing code, how to transform this into properly written app while keeping the existing code working at the same time? My plan is: Unify four existing versions into common code base (fixing only most obvious errors). Redesign db and use triggers to populate it with data (so data will be maintained in two formats at the same time) All new functionality will be written as separate project. Step by step transfer existing functionality into the new project After some time everything will be in the new project Some explanation about #2, right now it is practically impossible to make any updates in existing db any change requires reviewing whole code and making changes in many places. Is such plan feasible at all? Another solution is to walk away and leave the headache to someone else.

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• Should I continue to pursue programming based on my experience?

  - by El Be

  The reason I ask this question is because I am not sure my troubles come from a lack of confidence, or something much deeper like lack of passion. I'm hoping experienced programmers and developers can help identify the cause of my troubles. To be brief my undergraduate major was in Computer Science, but in a small school and I had the highest gpa in my year in computer science. The first time I ever programmed was once in the 5th grade (using logo) and when I was a freshman in college. I enjoyed programming when I was in school. Then I did an internships where I was expected to produce image processing software and program microchips. I was unsuccessful and produced little results and I hated the job, because I had to figure out everything for myself, did not have any help, and there was a lot of pressure to produce results. Although I tried I could not figure out what to do and was stuck all the time and made me dislike the job. When the internship ended I went to a PhD program for computer science at a prestigious computer science school. I had a very hard time with the course, met people who have been programming since they were 6 and made plenty of applications in their spare time (which I never did, although I tried). I even met many sophomores who understood more than I did. The combination of this and other things have made me feel that programming is not for me, but sometimes I consider a career in programming. I still consider programming as a career because of the career potential (not only just because of money). Based on my experience do you believe my confidence has just been shaken and I should continue to prepare for a programming career, or do you see a lack of passion and it would make it tough to continue programming. thank you for reading and for your advice Thank you for everyone's advice so far! Also: I dropped out of the ph.D program for computer science and switched to a master's in computer graphics. Its more applied, but I still find it hard to be motivated (due to either lack of confidence or passion), but since programming is such a big field I am looking for that niche area that I feel good programming in.

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• You probably have enough

  - by BuckWoody

  This a decidedly non-technical post, and even a little preachy. I post it here because you, the technical professional, are the perfect audience for it. I have enough stuff. I never think so, of course, but I do. I don’t consider myself rich, but if you have a comfortable place to sleep,  enough food to eat and you can plan for your future, you are rich. And when we are rich enough to have “enough” stuff, that usually means we have too much stuff. Stuff costs money that could be put to better use, stuff needs painting, cleaning, fueling, feeding, storage and caring for. Stuff is a burden. So I decided a few years back that I had enough stuff. We gave away a lot of things, and we don’t buy any new (meaning we didn’t have one before)  things – only replacement things. We’d rather “do something” than “have something”. But even so, when birthdays, anniversaries and Christmas rolled around, we got more stuff. So I asked all of my friends and relatives to do something for me.   I ask folks that want to give me a gift (for whatever reason) to donate the price they would have paid for the gift to a charity they care about. This does a few things: They have to find a charity to care about The fact that I made it through a calendar year now actually means something Someone else gets the help they need Everybody feels better No, I’m not saying these things so you’ll think I’m a wonderful person - the reason I’m posting this here is that as a technical professional you probably have enough stuff like I do. So I ask you to try this out. Try it for one birthday, or one Holiday, or even for a year. I can promise this: it will change your life, the life of the person who gives the gift, and the person’s life who receives it. If you do try it, I’d love to have a comment here on your thoughts.

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• An Unstoppable Force!

  - by TammyBednar

  Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0in; mso-para-margin-right:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0in; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} Building a high-availability database platform presents unique challenges. Combining servers, storage, networking, OS, firmware, and database is complicated and raises important concerns: Will coordination between multiple SME’s delay deployment? Will it be reliable? Will it scale? Will routine maintenance consume precious IT-staff time? Ultimately, will it work? Enter the Oracle Database Appliance, a complete package of software, server, storage, and networking that’s engineered for simplicity. It saves time and money by simplifying deployment, maintenance, and support of database workloads. Plus, it’s based on Intel Xeon processors to ensure a high level of performance and scalability. Take a look at this video to compare Heather and Ted’s approach to building a server for their Oracle database! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=os4RDVclWS8 If you missed the “Compare Database Platforms: Build vs. Buy” webcast or want to listen again to find out how Jeff Schulte - Vice President at Yodlee uses Oracle Database Appliance.

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• Registering domain during Christmas holidays

  - by arkascha

  One of the domain names I tried to register previously has been blocked by a domain grabber two days prior to my own attempt. That was about 1 year ago. The attempt to buy the domain from that person failed due to a totally exaggerated price. So I dropped the issue and watched the domain (offered at sedo.com). As expected there were no more offers, the domain was not sold. Now I learn from the whois database that the registration of that domain name ends on 25 Dec 2012 (Christmas holiday). This raises two questions for me, I fail to find reliable answers on the internet. So maybe someone experienced here can drop a statement or a hint: Is it reasonable that the domain name in question really will be free again when that date mentioned in the whois database up to when the domain is registered has passed? I certainly know that the registration can be prolonged, that is not what I mean. I expect (hope) that that domain grabber does not extend the registration, since it costs money and effort and he failed to sell the domain. Provided this is the case and the domain registration is not prolonged, is that date mentioned reliable? Or might it just be some 'default' date? I would like to try to register that domain name as soon as it is unregistered. Since that domain grabber registered that domain only two days before my own registration attempt I would like to prevent such annoying interference next time. So I ask myself: is it possible to register a domain name on a holiday? I mean not to send an email to my provider to do so on that day or before, but to actually have to process taking place as not to wait for 1-2 days after the unregistration? My own provider which I am very happy with does not offer such service on a holiday (which is perfectly understandable). They are 'still checking' if they can offer something automatic. I researched and did not find an answer to the question if that is possible at all. Is an automatic registration attempt on a holiday possible? Where can I do that? Is that reliable?

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• PASS: FY10 Actuals Posted

  - by Bill Graziano

  Earlier this year we published preliminary fiscal year 2010 financials to the Governance page on the PASS web site.  Please remember that FY10 runs from July 1st, 2009 through June 30th, 2010 and includes the November 2009 Summit.  We do our fiscal year this way so that the Summit falls earlier in the fiscal year.  The financials we had posted were P&L numbers at the portfolio level.  Prior to this we had posted our detailed budget but only posted the auditors report at the end of each year.  Today we updated our published financials to include: Pre-audit actuals from FY10 at the same level as our budget.  The document has both actuals and budget for FY10 side by side.  This is over 20 pages of detailed financial information covering hundreds of line-items. A letter describing key differences between our budget and actuals.  I walked through each line item where the difference was greater than $25,000 and explained what happened and why. We updated the financial graph going back to 2003 to include FY10. This update should “close the loop” on our financials.  You can now start with the published budget and compare it to the finished financials at the same level of detail.  We also plan to publish the auditor’s report when that is completed -- as we do every year. Overall I’m very happy with how FY10 turned out.  Keep in mind that this was the November 2009 Summit so we were still facing economic challenges.  With all that we were roughly break-even showing a $15,000 profit on $3.9 million of revenue.  I didn’t find anything shocking in reviewing our actual vs. budget but there were a few things that needed explanation.  You can see those in the letter on the governance page. Please keep in mind that these are the actuals from our operating financials.  The auditor may have us make adjustments for depreciation or other financial transactions.  We may also account for certain transactions differently for tax purposes than we do for financial reporting purposes.  I feel these financial statements give you the clearest picture of how our organization spends its money. We were late publishing these this year.  We were working through some tax issues and that delayed our ability to file our final tax forms which delayed this process.  In hindsight I should have published these documents as soon as we had them and not waited for the tax issues.  We’ll do this better in the future. And on a final note, you don’t need to login to view these documents.  If you have any questions you can post them here.  If we get more than a few questions we may see about creating some forums for financial issues on the PASS web site.

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• Forced to be trained [closed]

  - by steeb

  is it OK to force employees to take a training in order to make them sign a contract to stay in the job for X years? Here I'm the only developer in the company and before this job I've developed in VB6, VB.Net and others. There are others technicians here but they query the database server to make reports and make little programs but do not spend all day in programming. I was hired here to manage some legacy data to be migrated to a new system and I used my experience to accomplish the task. I also have made some utilities and other developments. Since we went live with the new system I've been developing a lot of side programs, add-ons and changed the source code of it and basically I've been learning from it since then and became some sort of jack of all trades when some feature needs to be changed or corrected. I have one and a half year in this company but during the last 8 months I've been entirely programming in the system. There have been times when even the implementers ask me how I accomplish certain things. The issue here is that the company has come and told me and other co-workers (which do not program in the system but know basic programming and databases) to have a basic training to program for the new system's platform and when we finish it we will sign a contract to stay in the company for an unspecified time. They have offered also an unspecified better salary. I'm feeling very suspicious cause I know the basics of system and I don't understand why I have to take it, being known by everybody all developments I've made. I gathered with my boss and told him that I should not take that course because I feel that I can learn more with all the daily requirements I've been asked and they should save that money. But he responded me that I have to take it and sign after that. I think they want me to be with them for a long time, and I'd like to, but my opinion is that I would like to stay in the company because I feel comfortable in all laboral aspects (including salary) but not because I signed a contract forced to do more tasks and forced to say no if I have others and better job offers. What advice can you give me in this kind of situation?

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• How can we unify business goals and technical goals?

  - by BAM

  Some background I work at a small startup: 4 devs, 1 designer, and 2 non-technical co-founders, one who provides funding, and the other who handles day-to-day management and sales. Our company produces mobile apps for target industries, and we've gotten a lot of lucky breaks lately. The outlook is good, and we're confident we can make this thing work. One reason is our product development team. Everyone on the team is passionate, driven, and has a great sense of what makes an awesome product. As a result, we've built some beautiful applications that we're all proud of. The other reason is the co-founders. Both have a brilliant business sense (one actually founded a multi-million dollar company already), and they have close ties in many of the industries we're trying to penetrate. Consequently, they've brought in some great business and continue to keep jobs in the pipeline. The problem The problem we can't seem to shake is how to bring these two awesome advantages together. On the business side, there is a huge pressure to deliver as fast as possible as much as possible, whereas on the development side there is pressure to take your time, come up with the right solution, and pay attention to all the details. Lately these two sides have been butting heads a lot. Developers are demanding quality while managers are demanding quantity. How can we handle this? Both sides are correct. We can't survive as a company if we build terrible applications, but we also can't survive if we don't sell enough. So how should we go about making compromises? Things we've done with little or no success: Work more (well, it did result in better quality and faster delivery, but the dev team has never been more stressed out before) Charge more (as a startup, we don't yet have the credibility to justify higher prices, so no one is willing to pay) Extend deadlines (if we charge the same, but take longer, we'll end up losing money) Things we've done with some success: Sacrifice pay to cut costs (everyone, from devs to management, is paid less than they could be making elsewhere. In return, however, we all have creative input and more flexibility and freedom, a typical startup trade off) Standardize project management (we recently started adhering to agile/scrum principles so we can base deadlines on actual velocity, not just arbitrary guesses) Hire more people (we used to have 2 developers and no designers, which really limited our bandwidth. However, as a startup we can only afford to hire a few extra people.) Is there anything we're missing or doing wrong? How is this handled at successful companies? Thanks in advance for any feedback :)

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• Working for Web using open-source Technologies

  - by anirudha

  As a Web Developer we all have own dream to make a great web application. a great application was built upon high discipline and best practice on the process of development then we can make modification easier in future as if we want. the user feedback also have a matter because they tell us what they want or expected with the application we make day and night. sometime they report a nice story , experience or a problem they got with our application. so that's matter because they telling about our application much more because they use our software and a part of process of future development or next version of application we make. so the Web have a good thing that they updated as soon as possible. in desktop application their is a numbers of trouble client have when they want to use our application. first thing that installation of software never goes right on every system. big company spent a big amount of money to troble these problem the user have with their software.   Web application is nice implementation of application because their is no trouble with installation all have same experience and if something goes wrong patch come soon and no waiting for new version. Chrome even a desktop application [browser] but they automatically update themselves so their is no trouble for user to get next version now hasseles.    Web application development in Microsoft way have their own rule , pattern practice to make better application in less time. the technologies i want to show you here is some great opensource example like MySQL jQuery and ASP.NET MVC a framework based on ASP.NET server side language.   For going to next step we need to show you a list of software you need to have to fully experience this tutorial.   Visual Web Developer 2010 Express Edition  MySQL [open-source RDBMS]   Query [open-source javascript library]   for getting these software you need to pay nothing.   Visual Web Developer can obtained from Microsoft.com/Express or if you are student or Web Developer you are eligible to get the Visual studio professional and many other great software from Microsoft through their Dreamspark or WebsiteSpark programmes.   MySQL is a great Relational Database management software who are freely available from MySQL.com as a database monitorting tool you can use MySQL workbrench who can be freely get from MySQL official website or many other free tool are available for begining development with MySQL   jQuery is a great library for making javascipt development easier and faster.you can obtained jQuery from jQuery.com their official website.

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• Can Anything be Done to Make Improv (a 1993 Win 3.1 App) handle larger Files?

  - by user75185

  My very favorite spradsheet is Improv, a 1993 Windows 3.1 application. It still puts Excel to shame for building spreadsheets and writing formulas. The only problem is because Improv was written when 1 Meg of RAM was state of the art, it becomes unstable when working with larger spreadsheets and often crashes and/or corrupts the data file. I am working on a project that greatly exceeds Improv's limits. Although it will ultimately require more robust databasing capability, I could save a lot of critical time if I could delay that headache and continue working in Improv for now. To that end, I moved to the only product I could find that comes close, Quantrix, which is nothing more than Improv updated to handle large spreadsheets and utilize today's technologies. The problems with Quantrix are its speed (significantly slower than Improv) and its $1000 price (which I cannot afford). I have already had 3 15 day extensions after the initial 30 day trial, so my time to use Quantrix as a bridge is at its end. Searches for Improv over the years have gotten me nowhere and, not surprisingly after reading some posts on this site, I got nothing for the money and time invested to find a programmer to write code to "fix" this problem. Improv is freely available as "abandonware" at http://vetusware.com/download/LotusImprov2.1/?id=5797 , and the best background info can be found on Wikipedia and at "Moose's Greatest Software Products of All Time - Lotus Improv" http://moosevalley.fhost.com.au/mooses_review_page_lotus_improv.html It is critically urgent for me to focus on analyzing the data asap. Working in a stable Improv would, without question, be the fastest route. To that end, I am looking for answers to the following questions and anything else that might be helpful: 1) Is it lawful to hire someone to fix Improv for my own use? If so, 2) About how much should it cost? 3) About how long should it take? 4) What skills should I be looking for &/or how should a post be worded? 5) Is there a niche site where it should it be posted? 6) What questions can I ask to quickly screen candidates? Since I am not a programmer, I need questions the answers to which leave no room to confuse me, whether intentional or not. For example, what tools or players should someone with an acceptable competency level have knowledge of?

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• Response: Agile's Second Chasm

  - by Malcolm Anderson

  William Pietri over at Agile Focus has written an interesting article entitled, "Agile’s Second Chasm (and how we fell in)" in which he talks about how agile development has fallen into a common trap where large companies are now spending a lot of money hiring agile (Scrum) consultants just so that they can say they are agile, but all the while avoiding any change that is required by Scrum.   It echoes the questions that I've been asking for a while, "Can a fortune 500 company actually do agile development?"  I'm starting to think that the answer is "usually not"   William ask 3 questions at the end of his article that I will answer here.   1) Have I seen agile development brought in and then preemptively customized (read: made into ScrummerFall)?   Yes, Scrum is hard and disruptive.  It's a spotlight on company dysfunction.  In a low trust environment like most fortune 500 companies Scrum will be subverted by anyone who has ever seen "transparency" translate into someone being laid off.   2) If I had to do it all over again, would I change anything?  No, this is a natural progression, but the agile principles are powerful enough, that the companies that don't adopt them will no longer be competitive and will start to fail.   3) Is this situation solvable?  I think it is.  I think that one of the issues is that you often see companies implementing Scrum, but avoiding the agile engineering practices.  I believe that you cannot do one without the other.  Scrum keeps the ship sailing in smooth deep waters.  The agile engineering practices keep the engine running smoothly and cleanly.  If you implement agile engineering practices without Scrum, you run the risk of ending up with a great running piece of software that is useful to no one.  On the other hand, implementing cargo-cult Scrum without the agile engineering practices and you end up (especially in a fortune 500 company) being steered in the right direction, but with your development practices coming to a dead halt because you have code that can not keep up with the changes in requirements.   If you are trying to do Scrum, make sure that you hire some agile engineering coaches, or else you may find your deveolpment engines grinding to a dead halt in the middle of the open ocean.

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• Cloud Computing Business Benefits

  - by workflowman

  If you have been living under a rock for the past year, you wouldn't have heard about cloud computing. Cloud computing is a loose term that describes anything that is hosted in data centers and accessed via the internet. It is normally associated with developers who draw clouds in diagrams indicating where services or how systems communicate with each other. Cloud computing also incorporates such well-known trends as Web 2.0 and Software as a Service (SaaS) and more recently Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and Platform as a Service (PaaS). Its aim is to change the way we compute, moving from traditional desktop and on-premises servers to services and resources that are hosted in the cloud.  Benefits of Cloud Computing  There are clearly benefits in building applications using cloud computing, some of which are listed here:  Zero up- front investment:  Delivering a large-scale system costs a fortune in both time and money. Often IT departments are split into hardware/network and software services. The hardware team provisions servers and so forth under the requirements of the software team. Often the hardware team has a different budget that requires approval. Although hardware and software management are two separate disciplines, sometimes what happens is developers are given the task to estimate CPU cycles, disk space, and so forth, which ends up in underutilized servers.  Usage-based costing:  You pay for what you use, no more, no less, because you never actually own the server. This is similar to car leasing, where in the long run you get a new car every three years and maintenance is never a worry.  Potential for shrinking the processing time:  If processes are split over multiple machines, parallel processing is performed, which decreases processing time.  More office space:  Walk into most offices, and guaranteed you will find a medium- sized room dedicated to servers.  Efficient resource utilization:  The resource utilization is handed by a centralized cloud administrator who is in charge of deciding exactly the right amount of resources for a system. This takes the task away from local administrators, who have to regularly monitor these servers.  Just-in-time infrastructure:  If your system is a success and needs to scale to meet demand, this can cause further time delays or a slow- performing service. Cloud computing solves this because you can add more resources at any time.  Lower environmental impact:  If servers are centralized, potentially an environment initiative is more likely to succeed. As an example, if servers are placed in sunny or windy parts of the world, then why not use these resources to power those servers?  Lower costs:  Unfortunately, this is one point that administrators will not like. If you have people administrating your e-mail server and network along with support staff doing other cloud-based tasks, this workforce can be reduced. This saves costs, though it also reduces jobs.

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• Windows Phone 7, taking the mobile out of mobile

  - by markritchie

  I’ll start off this blog entry with a little background which is necessary for you to understand my situation. I moved from to the UK to Germany about three years ago and while I can converse in German, English is still very much my first language and the language I want my content delivered in. I happily purchased a HTC HD7 when WP7 was released here in Germany thinking foolishly that Microsoft really would get internationalization and localization as it’s at the heart of their business and developer products. Overall I’m very happy with my WP7, the camera sucks but that’s more HTC’s fault that Microsoft, but other than that it’s a very promising platform. My problems started when I purchased my first app. Initially everything appeared to be fine and things were as smooth as things had been with my previous free applications, however about a month after I received an email from Zune informing me that the credit card that they had registered against my account had expired. No problem I foolishly thought; I’ll simply add a new one. I don’t want to bore you with the details of what I’ve been through other than to take the low-lights: trying numerous websites, posts on Microsoft Answers and a tweet to Microsoft Support all to no avail. Today somebody suggested that I call the Xbox support line in the UK as they had solved their billing problems this way. So I called up the Xbox support line since I hadn’t resolved the problem using the Zune portal to resolve my problem with my WP7 (anybody else thinks Microsoft might need some consolidation here). After being on the phone with a very friendly representative in Ireland I was informed that because my British credit card has a billing address in Germany they are unable to accept it as a credit card. Because my Live ID and Zune Tag are registered in the UK they cannot take my card. Their solution is that I have to create a new Zune Tag that has its locale in Germany and then associate it with my phone. Now, first thing I go to register for a Zune Tag with a German locale it very kindly switches into German for me, nothing quite like reading a EULA in a language you’re not fluent in. I’ve no idea how this will affect the apps that are available to me in the app store, and I’m pretty sure it means that all my Xbox live achievements will become history. And what if I was to move to say France at some point do I have to go through all this again? At the end of the day I’m trying to set something up so I can give them my money and they’re making it VERY difficult for me. Could you imagine walking into a book store when you were on holiday and being told by the clerk that they couldn’t take your credit card because you came from another country?

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• Usage of Pirated software at a company

  - by hakesh

  Hi, I am redirected from stack over flow since the topic is ethics rather than about programming. Thank you for letting me know that. and please give me advices. So, I started to work at a company as an engineer a couple of months ago. It's a small company and what they basically do is answering service on phones. Now they are switching from normal phones to IP phones so that computers take more important place in the work. However, all the computers used by workers are equipped with pirated software ,even their operating systems are. Moreover, they don't even buy one license to make copies for other computers. In other words, they do not spend any money for the software in office. I am not saying copying a licensed one is legit, but the situation is too much. There is one guy who did installing those pirated soft. He does not feel any sense of guilt and even justified when I asked about it. and he is not even a specialist. He just searched on the internet to install pirated software. Our boss does not have any knowledge of computers, so he took cheaper way. How do you guys think about this? Since I am still new to the company, I am not doing maintenance or managing on those cracked computers. But I have to use those software daily. And later on I will be doing support, help desk kind of staff. I really don't want to take responsibility for operating pirated software. and from an aspect of developer and engineer, pirated software are not able to get legal support and it may work unexpectedly. So, I am thinking about changing job. Am I thinking too much? should I wait until I have more credit from the boss and try to change his policy? So far, the boss does not take any words from me. Any opinions are welcome. Thank you

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• What's a good way to get an IT internship? [closed]

  - by user1419715

  I'm a second year CS student who's worked really hard to build and expand my skills. I've spent the past week now trying to find a place to volunteer (i.e. work for FREE) so I can get a little bit of in-the-door experience with web development. I have a portfolio with several decent projects, a handful of languages and other hard/soft skills that employers constantly say they're clamoring for. I can't even get people to take my calls. This is me offering to work for them for FREE, remember. I'm in a reputable program at a respected school, get decent grades and...yeah, I've worked really hard to be presentable. On the rare occassions I actually get to speak to somebody at a design firm they hedge and do everything they can to get me off the phone. Nobody's ever expressed even the slightest interest in taking me on. The answer to the experience problem is supposed to be "you need to spend a year or two building up a big portfolio of projects on your own" so that employers will be impressed. I've done that. Websites, standalone apps, etc.. Nobody will even look at my resume, though. Question: Why does there seem to be so little interest in taking on upaid interns in the world of IT? Update: Sorry you all think I'm too aggressive or angry. It wasn't my intent to be a jerk to people while asking them for their opinions. That said, how would you feel if employer after employer turned you down cold when you offered yourself to them without asking for remuneration? One can't even get an unpaid job in this economy now, it seems. How am I going about my search? I find web firms in my area and contact them via email with a brief sales pitch of myself and a resume attached. Then a couple of days later I follow up with a phone contact. Nobody--anywhere--is advertising for interns of any kind. If there were I'm sure there'd be about 500 resumes per position, even unpaid. I've had good experiences in the past with cold-calling firms for actual paid jobs in other industries (hiring is a pain in the ass process and a call like this can show initiative while reducing a busy employer's need to do all the hiring overhead work), so I thought volunteering would work at least as well. My skills are pretty good for a CS student and include the usual suspects: HTML/CSS/Javascript, Python, Java, C, C#/.Net etc etc. I made a point on my resume to tie each ability claim to a project as well. Oh, and regarding the "working for free still costs the employer money" argument: that's an excellent point I hadn't though of. But it means...what? I have to pay the employer for the privilege of working there now?

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• Is it smart to take a year off from school to get experience?

  - by user134147

  firstly I apologize if this question is not appropriate for the site, but I've seen other similar (though slightly deviant) questions on this sight before and I know the people here are the most qualified to answer my question. Anyways, I'm currently between my sophomore and junior years at a 4 year university, and after a bit of deliberation I've decided on computer science as a major (BA, by the way, as a BS would require me to stay at least an extra year the way our program is set up). I've been interested now in programming for a few months and I've developed a passion for it in a very short time. I began learning C++, migrating to Java recently when I learned my school focuses on this language. Now, I should mention that the concept of higher education has never sat well with me, so part of my motivation for wanting to take time off is to truly challenge myself and see what I can accomplish when I actually try at something. The autodidact in me finds it difficult to focus on my passions while trying to keep a high GPA in unrelated classes. However, I understand the times we live in and therefore would plan to complete my degree after this year. So my question is whether or not the skills I learn in a year off from college could justify the time off from school. Unfortunately, I don't believe I know enough yet to gain any professional experience (internship, etc.) so I would mostly focus my time on learning Java and another language, possibly Wordpress (to gain an understanding of web programming concepts as I have not yet decided what field I want to get into, and to make some money to fund my off-year), and to delve into security concepts, which also interest me. I'm hoping I could work on projects, such as simple applications or contributions to open source software during this time to enhance my resume once I do finish school, so I can find a job out of college easier. I do not want to be the new hire who knows nothing beyond the concepts of his Java textbooks. Does anyone have any input about these thoughts of mine, or any ideas for where I should focus my studies or how high I might set the bar for my work? Thanks a lot everyone!

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• Developing a cloud based app

  - by user134897

  I am a company owner that has developed a cloud based app. My code writer has told me how good he is more than once, well, better stated, he did a good job telling me he was better than everyone else in my rather small community. In the last 18 months I have spent nearly 160,000.00 dollars trying to get this company to the "making money" stage. I am now nearly broke, sitting on the edge of a brilliant marketing plan to launch a much needed cloud based app. We did launch our app last year (late 2013), and the feedback was amazing from the users. One user that signed up to use the free app stated that we needed to call him the moment our company goes public because he wants to be the first to buy stock. Now, here's my problem. We did not originally set out to develop a freemium app, we just sort of ended up there by the natural progression of the app. So, now I have an app that really needs to be scrapped and re-built. Although I do feel my code writer has displayed some brilliance in what he has done, he was extremely weak on graphics and every time we speak he tells me there is a newer better way to code that he is trying to learn. So, here's the million dollar question. Ho do I find code writers that already know the newest, best ways to write code? Or maybe better asked, what is the newest best code writing technique? Second, is it even possible to find code writers that are good at graphics? In short, I am nearly broke and need to start over, but I do not know where to find people qualified to write it good the first time around and display good graphic skills. I am trying to build a team of writers instead of just one person. Maybe 3 good at code and two good at graphics, but I am clueless as to what criteria I should use to determine if I am building the right team members. Please help, I am sure you can tell I am fairly lost by my continued rambling.

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• Router for creating site to site VPN to server provider using Cisco ASA 5540

  - by fondie

  We have dedicated servers hosted for us by a third party, we connect to these over a VPN. My server provider uses Cisco ASA 5540 as VPN devices. Currently we're using software clients on individual machines to connect to this VPN, either: Cisco VPN Client Shrew Soft VPN Connect However, I'm looking to purchase a new load balancing router for our office and thought this could be an opportunity to get VPN client duties taken over by hardware. We could then create a permanent VPN tunnel that could be used by anyone on the network with no software client necessary. Sadly I'm not the most knowledgeable on this kind of stuff so is: 1) This a realizable goal? Next I need to know what kind of hardware I will need. I'm not looking to spend lots of money on this (~$500), so doubtful I can afford any Cisco kit. Therefore, this is the most promising candidate I've seen (as far as my limited knowledge goes): Draytek Vigor 2955 - http://www.draytek.co.uk/products/vigor2955.html 2) Would this be compatible with the Cisco kit my server provider uses? 3) If not, are there any alternatives I should consider? Many thanks in advance.

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• pfSense Firewall or Linsys/Cisco router for small offices

  - by Tim Meers

  I'm about to start switching some networks around for multiple small offices. Each office has about 10 to 15 users and 10 to 15 computers. Each office has a spread of generic routers and access points. The routers vary from being used as routers, to just being an access point for wireless. Nothing formal has really ever beem implemented for each of the 10 offices. What I'm wanting is to set up a pfSense box for each office to configure things like: traffic shaping (for VoIP QOS) URL Filtering DHCP static routing multiple VLANs I'll then use some of the existing hardware for wireless. Maybe even integrate the wireless right into the firewall depending on the office layout. So my question, would this be better to do a full blown firewall box, or but a new business class or high end consumer class Linksys router to do the URL filtering, QOS and DHPC? Each option could allow for remote access and VPN for remote maintnance and each would only cost a nominal about of money for something decent, i.e. under $250.

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• Is there a way to tell what the download speed is from a site/server

  - by Memor-X

  i'm looking into which ISP i should go with at the place i'm moving into, one ISP which i have been told good things about has data limits (which when breached will drop your speed to dial-up speed) but multiple memberships which, apart from the cheapest membership, have the same data limits (the cheapest has a 10GB data limit) in their fine print, they say that each different membership has different port speeds, one particular part jumps out at me These speeds are the NBN (National Broadband Network) port speed and not the actual Internet data speed which will vary based on numerous factors including destination you are reaching, your network equipment, network congestion etc. i plan to use the net to download DLC and patch updates for games (particular the insanely large update for the Wii U) and games from Steam (if i find any good one other than this one JRPG) and downloading development resources from free sites like Deposit Files and Mediafire since one membership with a 1000GB data limit is $145 with the port speed being 12Mbps/1Mbps (cheapest) while another with the same limit is $190 with the port speed of 100Mbps/40Mbps (expensive) i am wondering how i can tell what the speed coming from site is since i don't want to be wasting money on speed that makes no difference (unlike memory which i rather have to spare) NOTE: the speeds are for a fiber optic network which where my new place is can only connect via fixed wireless which i may not be able to get with this ISP but if i can get this network then good NOTE 2: most of the resources i get from Deposit Files are always about 200 MB or less, if a resource pack is greater then it's split into multiple archives (like .7z.part) while Mediafire i have to see one bigger than 150MB NOTE 3: one update patch for a PS3 game is close to 4 GB (Disgaea 4) which i need to get access to the DLC and on the weekend i downloaded 5 GB for the Final Fantasy XIV Open Beta for the PS3 which took almost 5 hours

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• Install Linux Mint on PC without bootable CD

  - by crosenblum

  Unfortunately my PC's CD drive is not bootable; I have such a mixture of SATA and IDE drives, so until I have more money to redo my controller setup, I can't boot from any cd. Currently, I have a DVD burned with latest version of Linux Mint, and I have an USB drive with an old version of Mint. I have a partition ready to install Linx Mint into, but no idea how to install it, since I can only boot to my hard drive. I am totally unable to boot to CD, so that is definitely out. My main partition is WinXP Pro SP3. Is there software I can use to format my Linux partition, so that I can then just copy Mint over to that partition? Or is there a better way to install linux mint? I have to do it within Windows XP, since that's all that I can boot right now. I have considered Mint4Win, but that doesn't allow a full installation of Linux Mint. Any ideas?

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• Htpc aka "Media Center": cheap and *silent*?

  - by Unknown

  It may be me, or the place I live (Italy), but it seems pretty hard to get a build or a prebuilt nettop or a laptop that fits the need. I need something silent able to playback all h.264 fullhd content without stuttering, and well (and not loosing the hw acceleration because of softsubs...) silent not ugly silent and (possibly) cheap. I'm going the linux route, therefore i'm moving towards a cpu-based or nvida-integrated solution (i don't think ati hw accelerated playback - or the intel "hd" acceleration - is useable yet). Ion nettop; it's either the Acer Revo (but here it's incredibly pricey and it's hard to find the dualcore version) or the Asrock Ion 330, that in the current version is rated "silent" at 26Db. 26. Sounds pretty noisy to me!!! the previous version was even worse. was this product really aimed at htpc market?? the Dell Zino - i think it's ATI based unfortunately. Laptop: correct me if I'm wrong: sub 600€/$ units are quite loud under full load (because of the tiny fans). ULW laptops are indeed quite similar: tiniest fans = high pitched noise and the cpu still lacks power for non hd-accelerated video decoding Handmade build: little money can be saved with underpowered cpus, a low-midrange cpu would help in the case of non-hw-accelerated content the cases are quite pricey the PSU one has to get ranges between 100/150 €/$ minimum to keep the noise down a low-mid build, all included, sums up to over 650 €/$ for a still-looking-ugly-unit, without the blu-ray drive. Please help. What do you advise on this? ;) Am I ignoring laptops too much, maybe? Are low-priced Acers that noisy/high pitched under full load?

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• I cannot format my PC

  - by Jesus Buelna

  I have a Toshiba Satellite(1) l505 6gb RAM, 6.00GB hard disk.Initially I have problem with another satellite(2) I had (mother board problem). I took my Laptop to a technician and cost a lot of money (almost as much as buying new one). So, since I have HDD problems with the first one(1) I decided to use the hard disk of the other one(2). I formatted the HDD and erased the partitions it had into 1 partition (or no partition). The problem is that when I try to format with the SO CD, in the screen, where I have to decide in which partition I want to install the SO, the only one option I have says "unallocated partition and I receive this message "Windows cannot install the SO in this partition, run files do not existed or maybe corrupted" When I erased the disk with Parted Magic, Did I erased any files needed for running the installing disk? I don't know. Is it possible to fixed or reinstate the disk to install the OS? By the way, I checked the disk physical health with Parted Magic, and it is OK. One more thing when I erased the disc to 0, I used the safety option offered by the Parted Magic.Need help please.

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