Oracle related rants (and lots of off-topic stuff)…
Just got this message today…
Hi Timothy,
You can now earn twice as much free space by inviting your friends!
For each friend that installs Dropbox, you’ll both get 500 MB of free space. You can earn up to 16 GB.
Thanks for spreading the Dropbox love,
– The Dropbox TeamP.S. Already invited a bunch of people? Don’t worry! You’ll get credited for all of them.
Do you think Dropbox are getting nervous about Google’s GDrive? 🙂
Cheers
Tim…
I tend to self host as much as possible, so the emphasis is always on me to keep on top of my backups. Like most DBAs, I’m a bit of a control freak, so relying on myself suits me. Having said that, there are some services I delegate to the cloud (mail, contacts, calendar). Yesterday I was thinking about how bummed out I would be if any of these services lost my data and I suddenly got the fear. This morning I’ve had a backup frenzy. The following notes from Google give suggestions for backing up mail, contacts and calendar entries.
I was wondering how many other people bother with this? Do people even consider the impact of a goof-up by their online mail provider?
Many moons ago I used to use Blogger and I used to export my posts on a regular basis. There are some awesome blogs out there and the thought of them being lost is a nightmare. I remember Mark Rittman had a problem with his blog many years ago. Are people who have blogs hosted by Blogger or WordPress bothering with backups?
So now I’m feeling a little more secure as my PC, NAS and Google will need to go bang for me to lose my data on the cloud.
Cheers
Tim…
PS. Notice how I managed to mention cloud a few times. Gosh I’m so relevant! 🙂
Over the last few months my browser usage switched from pure Chrome to a combination of Chrome, Firefox and Opera, all running on Fedora 16 (x86-64). This may sound a little odd, but when you see what I use them for it may not sound so wacky.
So now I’m a triple-browser guy. 🙂
Interested to know:
Cheers
Tim…
Update: Colin ‘t Hart mentioned the Incognito Window in Google Chrome. It does seem to give the correct (non-social) serach results, but it is a separate window, so not sure if it is a better approach than running Opera. Kinda like the complete separate of running Opera, but worth thinking about though.
One of my friends used to own a sandwich bar. He knew the exact profit margin on each product. He knew the impact of a price change from one supplier on each of the products he sold, as well as the overall affect on his profits.
So compare that situation with your average IT department, where to be frank, nobody has a bloody clue about costs. Yes, we all know the headline grabbers like licensing cost for Oracle and you can probably find the bit of paper that tells you the yearly hardware maintenance fee, but I’ve not encountered many companies that have a handle on the real cost of projects. If a company can’t say, “Project X cost £Y to complete and costs £Z a year to maintain and this is the breakdown of costs”, with a reasonable level of accuracy then they’ve failed.
You need this sort of data in order to make a valid judgement about new projects. When someone starts extolling the virtues of the latest and greatest database/language/framework, how can you make a judgement on the relative savings you can make if you don’t know your true costs? Free software is not free if you have to pay people to integrate it into your existing systems and hire/train staff with the relevant skills. Conversely, paying ridiculous licensing costs may not be sensible compared to hiring/training skills to allow you to use cheaper alternatives.
I sometimes feel the IT industry is like some cowboy building firm. When someone asks for a price you scratch your chin, suck in some air then pull a random figure out of the ether. Don’t even get me started on the sales people, with their astronomical list prices that nobody ever pays, just so they can make you feel like you’ve got a “good deal”. It’s an industry in dire need of a change.
[/RANT]
Cheers
Tim…
Followers of this blog, Twitter or Google+ can’t help but have noticed me moaning about my hosting provider (Fasthosts). My site was moved on to a new server (by accident) in December:
Since then I’ve been having assorted rants on G+ and Twitter because the site has been up and down a lot.
I started looking at new (UK-based) hosting providers, but the reviews of all of them are pretty terrible. Part of this is because they are all pretty dodgy, having to cut so many corners to make a profit, and part of it is because people (like me) only tend to review things when they are really bad. So here I was, caught between a rock and a hard place. Stick with Fasthosts (who I’ve been with for 11 years), or make a move?
Whilst looking for a new hosting company, I continued to hassle Fasthosts, opening tickets for every failure and providing all sorts of tracing, screen shots. Eventually, they offered to switch me to another server. On Thursday night (about midnight UK time), the server move was initiated. I spent until 03:45 snagging the move, then went to bed. I woke up to a message from Arjen Visser from Dbvisit.com saying there was an issue with the site. By the time I picked up the message things were working again, so I filed this as a “bedding in” issue. 🙂 Later that day, there was one 15 minute downtime, which I logged and was given a proper explanation for by the support team (the first so far!!). Since then, as far as I know, the site has bee working fine. Fingers crossed.
I pay yearly, so I’m paid up until December, but I’m going to continue to investigate other hosting options, just in case this all kicks off again. If anyone has any long-term experience of a UK-based hosting provider I am interested to know. One of my friends recently moved to 1and1.co.uk, who have pretty terrible reviews, but so far he’s having a good experience. I’ve done a bit of system admin for him and so far there has been no drama.
Cheers
Tim…
One of the comments on my rant about Windows 8 suggested this might be a good thing for desktop Linux. I just don’t see it myself. The only people I know who run desktop Linux are techies or immediate family members of techies. I don’t see this changing any time soon. Why? The same reasons that have been used for years…
I know there are counter arguments to all these points (many involving The Cloud no doubt) and in making them you will be preaching to the converted. I’m writing this on a PC running Fedora 16. 🙂 The point is, as much as I hate Windows 8 and it’s bipolar interface, I don’t see it having any affect on the desktop landscape.
The biggest threat to Microsoft in recent years has been iOS and Android on mobile devices. MS has failed in the phone and tablet market. If Windows 8 starts getting a reasonable market share on mobile devices, Microsoft may reign supreme again. If not, they will be consigned to the desktop, which is not a terrible fate. People keep predicting the death of the desktop and laptop, but I don’t know anyone who has completely binned their desktop/laptop in favor of a fondle-slab or phone… Yet… 🙂
So we are left in this depressing position where Windows 8 sucks and we are all going to use it (directly or indirectly). My alter-ego, Captain Support, will be called upon to rescue friends and family using Windows 8, so I’m going to have to use it, even though I don’t use Windows myself.
Cheers
Tim…
Update: Just read this. Seems I’m just afraid of change. 🙂 Funny. I didn’t feel afraid of change when I moved from GNOME2 to GNOME3. In fact, I seem to remember writing that I liked the change. I think people are afraid of changing to something crap. 🙂
I wrote some time ago about the Windows 8 Developer Preview, which I didn’t like at all from a desktop perspective.
Today I installed the Windows 8 Consumer Preview. What a complete abortion of an operating system! I thought the developer preview was bad, but it’s like they’ve taken all the comments people made about that steaming pile of crap, given everyone the bird, then made it even worse just to spite them.
Now let’s get this straight. I’ve never used Windows 8 on a phone or on a fondle-slab. It may be awesome on those, but I’ll probably never find out. I’m talking here about a desktop machine with a keyboard and mouse.
Metro: Fail. This is not a fondle-slab, it’s a desktop. Fail. The screen looks crap. Fail. I have to sideways scroll to get to anything, or use extra mouse clicks. Fail. Have you MS guys never used a desktop? Fail. Running IE on Metro is vile. Fail. There is a big chunky address bar that animates on and off at the bottom of the screen. Fail. I despise it! Fail.
Desktop: The crippled Start menu from the Developer Preview has now completely gone. Fail. All you get is the option to switch back to the Metro screen. Fail. Looks like the hacks I used previously to resurrect the Windows 7 style menu don’t work now either. Fail. I read somewhere you can buy some 3rd party software to make it work like Windows 7. Fail.
Desktop art: I hope that crappy fish graphic is just for the Consumer Preview because it is a total fail!
Speed: Fail. This is not the finished product, so maybe there is still a bunch of tracing on, but if this is to show the consumer what they will get, then fail!
There are some WindowsKey+(letter) short cut keys to navigate a bit quicker, like:
Nothing new here, but my Mom will never find this stuff. If it’s not on a basic menu it doesn’t exist! Fail.
As with the previous incarnations of Windows 8, this is a complete fail of an OS. I can see corporate users going spastic over this. There is no way I would want to support users on this OS. The interface changes between Windows XP, Vista and 7 were quite gradual. This is a complete interface overhaul for all the wrong reasons. The really depressing thing about it is it will be forced on the world because it will get bundled on every new PC. Microsoft will claim record uptake, as they always do, and everyone who isn’t a geek will have no choice but to bend over, lube up and get royally shafted by Microsoft.
I’m sure in a few years we will look back and laugh at how moronic the current OS interface designers are. Repeat after me, “this is a desktop, not a bloody iPad!”
Cheers
Tim…
PS. Looking forward to Windows 9.
Saturday: This was my day off before OOW11 started. I spent the morning following Chris Muir round toy shops, trying to find something cool to take home for his kids. Then we went and registered for the conference. After that it was back to the hotel to chill out a bit before the OakTable Network party in the evening.
I have to admit to feeling a little daunted about the OakTable Network party. I wasn’t able to go last year because it clashed with the Oracle ACE party, so this was my first time. I’ve met many of the members before, but standing in Graham Wood’s house surrounded by a bunch of people with brains the size of planets tends to make a grunt DBA/developer like me feel a little paranoid. Luckily, everyone is really low temperature, so I quickly felt at home. Graham and Joan certainly know how to throw a party. Vast quantities of food and drinks along with great conversation. I’m already looking forward to the next one, but I must eat less next time. 🙂
Sunday: I started the day of with Marcelle Kratochvil‘s session about unstructured data and multimedia. If you know Marcelle, you’ll know that she is passionate (a massive understatement) about multimedia and is now starting up a multimedia and unstructured data user group called OMMUDS. It’s early days at the moment, but I hope things go well because it is a fascinating subject and one that will do nothing but grow in importance in the coming years.
After that I went to see Scott Spendolini do a brief history of APEX, which is a pretty cool intro session for the APEX symposium. I was planning to watch some more of the APEX symposium, but I got pleasantly side-tracked and ended up going to get some food with Frits Hoogland. That developed into a couple of hours of geeking-out about Exadata. I know very little about Exadata, but Frits knows loads, so I guess I got a lot more out of it than him. 🙂 During that time he showed me some of the stuff he’s presenting at UKOUG this year. If you have the opportunity you should definitely go to his sessions. He has some really neat stuff to show you.
In the evening it was the ACE party. Once again, a cracking event, but once again I ate far too much. Victoria also forced me into taking a doggy-bag home with me, which I really didn’t need, but emptied anyway. 🙂 I spent a lot of time talking with Oded Raz and Liron Amitzi. With a bit of luck I might get to present in Israel in the future. Just as it was closing time I bumped into Steven Feuerstein and we had a little chat. Don’t forget to try my questions on the PL/SQL Challenge in October. 🙂
I’ve continued to get to the gym a couple of times each day, but considering the amount of food I’ve eaten, I’m not sure it will do me much good. This morning both Lillian and Victoria were at the gym, but there was no sign of Justin. Come one dude, you are letting the side ACE Program down. 🙂
Cheers
Tim…
If you’ve followed Twitter over the last couple of days you’ll have seen cryptic posts about the content of the ACED briefing. We all had to sign non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) to make sure we didn’t tweet or blog about the Oracle Games Console (OGC) before Larry announces it next week. Day 2 is done and we have a day off before OOW11 starts for everyone else. I’m already totally knackered. 🙂
It’s quite freaky to think the ACE program has got so many of us together in one spot and essentially provided a 2 day conference just for us. It’s even more amazing to think that they were able to get so many important people to take time out during the busiest time of their year to come and speak to us. I don’t think many people can pin down Thomas Kurian for an hour this close to Open World. It says a lot about the amount of work Justin, Victoria and Lillian have put in over the last few years, that they can get this level of buy-in for the program. Despite being a tired and grumpy old man, I am extremely grateful to be part of the program.
If you are coming to OOW, you are going to hear a lot of interesting announcements this week. If you can’t make it, you might want to keep an eye on the Oracle YouTube channel. It will have live content streaming, which should help keep you up to speed with what’s going on over here.
I mentioned in a previous post Jeremy Schneider invited me to help out at RAC Attack at OOW 2011. I’ll be doing a couple of shifts on Tuesday. Come along and have go. It should be fun.
I’ve managed to drag myself into the gym quite a bit. I did the evening of my arrival and morning and evening on both days since. Once the mayhem surrounding OOW kicks in I don’t know how easy it will be to keep it going. Time will tell.
Cheers
Tim…
I’ve done quite a few certification exams, so I’ve seen a lot of OCP questions in my time. In the past I’ve been openly critical of some of the OCP questions, but always said that it must be a really tough job to create the exams. With that in mind, when Steven Feuerstein asked me if I would be interested in providing the October questions for the SQL quizzes on the PL/SQL Challenge, my first reaction was OMG!
After the initial panic/fear/denial had subsided I decided to bite the bullet and get a feel for how hard a job it really was. I would love to say it was really simple, but that would be a complete lie. 🙂 The initial questions themselves were pretty easy to write, but the fine tuning to make sure they were properly focussed and reduce the chances of accidentally misleading people was quite a big job. The team of question reviewers deserve medals for helping me knock the questions into shape. Big thanks to all those involved.
During October, you will be able to judge for yourself how well I got on by trying the SQL Quizzes. In addition to the normal feedback channels, feel free to contact me directly and let me know. Please be gentle. 🙂
Cheers
Tim…