Category Archives: Problems

Sometimes Local Talent Is Better Talent

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What if the local Talent is really the better talent?

Strategy and the ability to create quality systems and software is not location specific!

Ten years ago, one of my projects that I was working on was to developer a knowledge-base at work.  Now I live in the midwest area of the country, and so the area isn’t exactly know as a technological powerhouse for talent, or so that’s the common believe.

While juggling projects, I came up with the idea at work of developing an online website that would serve as a knowledge-base and command console for the computer applications and the various systems at where I worked.  My passion was to create a documenting and tool site especially for not commonly updated applications that can be hard to remember how to work with, and a reminder piece to keep the documents up to date!  So I started the project, and to my surprise took it to a level that I’ve never seen before.  It was a system that made even the canned software version that were fat client based (installed on your workstation instead of an online website) look lame in comparison.  I’m not going to get to technical here, but it had features that later would be seen in products like Microsoft Sharepoint (but my application was 5 years earlier) and it even had other features that I still haven’t seen on the market.  Needless to say, it was very powerful and all the local users of the knowledge-base loved it.

Huh?

 

Sometimes Corporate Politics Kill a Great Product

The application/website had some internal mechanism like a checking mechanism that would email document owner if the document hasn’t been updated within the past 6 months.  This ensured that the documents in the system were both relevant and up to date.  It had an intuitive and quick interface that was easy to add/edit and delete entries, and it was integrated with the Microsoft Active Directory so no logon page was associated with it.  It would just allow the users to see stuff based on their AD logon and groups that they were in.  It was so easy.  And another nice “advanced” feature of the site was that it was automated or self maintained by the users of the system.  Changes were archived so they could be reviews via a reporting element for managers too. So there wasn’t any operations cost of the product, so it cost less to own since it was automated and end-user maintained.

Then a VP (that didn’t use my knowledge-base website or know of the functional or cost benefits) heard that there was a version in corporate headquarters that existed and axed the knowledge-base that I designed and created, without even reviewing my site or asking others opinions about the move.  This made the users of my site and me disappointed, but we figured as long as a knowledge-base existed it would be good.

That didn’t turn out to be the case!  The “official” knowledge base sucked, it had a separate login, and the functionality and interface was horrible!  Those that used my version found the “official” knowledge base a pain and stopped using the “official corporate” knowledge base site all together.

I recently reviewed the “official” site again, and although it a bit prettier (thanks to CSS), it’s still missing the logic to make it a great product.  Sharepoint has stolen some of its thunder though too, although I find Sharepoint a pain to work with to because of the way it’s structured (at least where I use to work), its much better than the corporate knowledge-base.  I would have brought the site to the market place to sell, but my employer made us all sign a form that states anything that we develop on company time, is the companies.   So even though the product wasn’t use by the company, I couldn’t sell it.  Needless to say, it was a somewhat frustrating experience!

So in conclusion, sometimes your local talent may be as good or perhaps a lot better than the talent located in the big cities or state know for technology.  I think it shows poor leadership skill when a VP doesn’t even review a product or asked the users of the product if it has value.  Hopefully your employer’s VPs are more clever than the VPs of the company that I use to work at.

Thanks for reading my rant,

Don

 

Memorial Day Smoke Fire Scare

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Today I’m going to deviate off of my normal blogging path and tell of an interesting scare my family recently had.

On this past Memorial Day Monday, I woke up at 5:30am and couldn’t get back to sleep.  I found myself continuing to watch the clock in 15 minute intervals as I waited for a respectable hour to get out of bed, and thus, in the process waking my wife.

I believe that I was close to dozing back to sleep when I heard the smoke detector out in the hall going off.  I jump out of bed and rush to the hallway, and started fanning the cacophony sound emitting from our hallway smoke detector.  You see, often in my house when toast or pop-tarts in our toaster start to burn a bit, for some reasons, this particular smoke alarm wails first.  But my frantic waving didn’t remedy the problem, so I gave the unit a twist and unplugged the unit from the ceiling.  Still it wailed, then after about 20 seconds it stopped.  That was when I realized that I also hear the alert from other units in the house!

I looked at the kids rooms but asked my wife to check them out while I sprinted downstairs to see if the potential fire was down there!  Once I was in the kitchen, I didn’t see or smell any smoke, so down I went into the basement.  Nothing there either, I quickly checked the fuse box, but it was okay and no burning smell!  I asked my wife to go outside and walk around the perimeter of the house looking for any smoke or heat distortion to the air while I grabbed a ladder from the garage and went to check in the attic.  On my way up, my wife asked if she should call 911, and I agree it sounded like a good idea!

I quickly check the attic (not really expecting a problem), but there wasn’t any smoke up there either…

So I decided to do a perimeter walk myself.  my wife was busy soothing my daughter who was now downstairs and freaking out.  Surprisingly, my son was nowhere to be seen.

While walking outside looking for smoke, I got the idea to check out the electric meter to see I could see any electricity flowing.  The display was not lite!  At that point I realized that the problem was no power was coming to the house.  I went in and flipped the main breaker, but still nothing happened.  As I heard the fire fighters stop by, I realized that the problem must have been with the power from the electric company.  Still the fire fighters walked through the house with me doing exactly what I did and came to the same conclusion that I had come to, especially when I showed them the display that was not showing any numbers.

So since everybody was up, I suggested that we all go our for breakfast and hope that the electricity was back on by the time we got home.

That was our start of memorial day morning.  Oh, and my son slept through the entire ordeal until my wife woke him to go to breakfast!

I’m still trying to figure out why most of the alarms triggered during the power outage.  Neither I nor the fire fighter had any idea what that happened.

Hope you enjoyed  the story of our Memorial Day Fire Scare!

MR

Overreaction to Baby Stuck in Washing Machine

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Why are we such negative people?

The latest buzz on the internet was that a baby boy was put into a washing machine as part of a peek-a-boo game with what looks like a teenager or young man putting the baby in the washing machine as part of the game.  The problem was that the man didn’t realize that once the door was shut, the machine started up.

After the washer started up, both the man and the babysitter of the toddler started freaking out!  It was obvious that the accident wasn’t intentional.  This was a game that went bad because the man and babysitter was young and naive.  I’m sure that the man didn’t intend for the washing machine to start!  So the media is jumping all over this and a blogger (her name escapes me, but she was very white) said that the reason that they (girlfriend and man) weren’t arrested because of racism!   I thought that the statement by the blogger was an incredible stupid statement!  Since the girlfriend and man (who is probably her boyfriend) told the police that it was their child, are the police to arrest every parent that make a dumb mistake?

Now we hear that the real mom of the baby is pressing charges!!!  This is a huge overreaction (along with the blogger’s reaction), there are plenty of criminal acts that deserve the attention of the court system, instead of a man trying to make a small child laugh.

I can honestly say that hearing the doctor female blogger accusing the police of racism, and the reaction of the mom (hasn’t she ever done dumb things in her life?  I know I have when I was younger), make me feel sad for the country.

While as a parent if my child was put in a washing machine, I definitely wouldn’t be happy!  But instead of trying to get the babysitter and man arrested for being dumb, I just wouldn’t use them for babysitting services anymore.

Another thing that I consider very sad is that the employee who saved the baby wasn’t mentioned at all.  I find it odd that the blogger (again the white female with a doctorate degree, I wish I noted her blog) didn’t take into consideration that the employee in the video fix the problem with superhuman speed.  He was the hero in this mishap, and he is totally ignored!!!  I’m pretty sure he saved that baby’s life!  No kudos for him?  What gives…

So my question for readers…  Should people be arrested because they are young and naive (or dumb)?

Thanks,

MR

Update:  Okay, I’ve come to realize that some readers might not understand the way that some Laundromat washing machine work.  Unlike washing machines at home, some of these machines (esp.the older ones) don’t have a start and stop button.  You put the money in, and then when you are ready for the machine to start, you just close the door.  I know this from my days as a college student going to the Laundromat to wash my clothes.  Perhaps this is why many think that this was a malicious act, when in reality, the man that shut the door (perhaps he has a washing machine at home were he lives that has a start button) was just trying to make the child smile and laugh.

 

 

When Water Is Worth More Than Gold

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There are many reasons that the price of gold has gone up so much over the past few years.

One reason is that the developing countries (especially India) is buying more gold as these countries become more wealthy.  Another reason is that it’s a scarce resource so naturally as the population all over the word grows, people will naturally accumulate it whether they know it or not.  By this I mean that there are sometimes trace elements of gold used in electronics (especially older PCs) – a very, very small amount but there nevertheless.

 

Asteroid

 

Another reason that gold is rising so quickly is the believe that in a mass destruction, end-of-the-world scenario, gold will be the only investment that holds value… And to be honest, it will hold value!  The governmental currencies (especially the ones with a fiat currency) will be worth less than the paper that it’s printed on (since the paper no longer makes a good writing surface).  But I have to wonder is the end-of-the-world folks acquiring the most valuable assets?  What about water?

Wouldn’t water and canned goods along with MRE a more valuable asset?  Or even metal like guns and knives?  Not to mention blankets, clothes, shoes, horse (no infrastructure means no gas…) and water… lots and lots of water.

Of course to get the system moving again, practically everybody would either barter, write IOU notes, or use gold.  Gold is the lowest common denominator and practically has a universal value versus fiat currencies, and personally I wouldn’t want an IOU from anyone.

What if water was contaminated or restricted in flow?  In addition to the desert states obviously in trouble, potentially so could all the other states.

I wonder if those houses with solar panels would somehow be a critical part to the recovery of a destroyed society?  After all, if somehow the utilities companies were destroyed, those houses outfitted with solar panels would be able to provide electricity for small-scale manufacturing.  Perhaps even powering the pump for houses still fitted with water wells.

While you never know what will happen in the world, personally I’m not concerned about doomsday scenarios… but perhaps it wouldn’t be a bad idea to get a month’s worth of cans and bottled water (especially if you already buy bottle water for consumption).

Thanks for readying my meandering thoughts today,

MR