Daniel

Cloud Computing Thoughts – Part I

The Cloud Computing freight train roars on, if not with a lot of motion, at least with a lot of noise and tumult.

I have been part of a number of panels over the last few months which focused on the subject of Cloud Computing, the current state of the’art’, and as usual what barriers exist that need to be dealt with to make it easier to utilize. There certainly has been much written about it both pro and con and it remains a high-priority focus for the current Administrator and, in particular, Vivek Kundra, the Federal CIO.

For one of the graduate classes I am teaching this semester at the University of Maryland University College, the subject is touched upon as part of a broad look at technology changes and implications. The topic generated much comment by my students.

It seems to me that the subject starts from the wrong side of the discussion, the technology side. When the discussion turns to the impact, it starts at an important but not the most important concern, that of return-on-investment (ROI).

Today and in a number of future blog entries, I will talk about what I think are the current important issues associated with cloud computing. Today I start with what I perceive as a foundational issue, cost, but later in the week will move to what I believe are more important considerations and goals.

Note: I do not plan to rehash what cloud computing is, or is not, there are too many other write-ups that do this. Look at the National Institutes of Standards work on such definitions, I think it is pretty good. Continue reading “Cloud Computing Thoughts – Part I”

Remember to Vote

Two events happened today that are at least in my mind related.

First when I woke up I checked my emails for the two classes I am teaching through distance learning, at the University of Maryland University College, a capstone class for an IT Master’s program, and at Syracuse University, about Cyber-Security Policy.

One of my students at Syracuse University was taking the class for a second time because he was unable to finish it the first time. The reason he could not the first time was because he had been stationed in Afghanistan and he wasn’t able to juggle the time he had to spend out in the field with the time necessary to complete the class assignments. This, coupled, by the intermittent Internet access meant he was unable to finish the work. As a result I arranged with Syracuse University for him to take it again this year without additional cost and with no negative grade consequences (small things for a large sacrifice on his part).

This morning his email confirmed that he will have to redeploy back to Afghanistan this coming week. Since he will be based in Bagram, he is much more confident that he will have sufficient Internet access and thus will be able to finish the final weeks this time. His role is to provide IT support for Forward Operating Bases, which doesn’t sound like something most of us would want to do.

He thanked me for being so flexible. I thanked him for his service, I told him it was a continuing honor to have him in my classes.

After reading his email, I went and voted.

All of us should, people like my student are the reason we can.

So there is an American, a Russian, a Chinese, and an Israeli …

standing on a steet corner, my wife reads to me from a book she is reading, Start-up Nation: The Story of Israel’s Economic Miracle, http://www.amazon.com/Start-up-Nation-Israels-Economic-Miracle/dp/044654146X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1288525742&sr=8-1.

A reporter comes up and asks “Excuse me, what is your opinion about the meat shortage.”

The American asks “What do you mean by ‘shortgage’?”

The Russian asks “What do you mean by ‘meat’?”

The Chinese asks “What do you mean by ‘opinion’?”

The Israeli asks “What do you mean by ‘excuse me’?”

Halloween Versus Campaigns

I rarely talk directly about political issues here, but I was struck by the NBC evening news tonight; normally I don’t see it but my wife often has NBC local or national news on in the evenings.

Early in the broadcast was a story about how much money was being spent on the campaigns this year. The slant of the story was how awfully high the money being spent was. They estimated the total was perhaps $3B which I would agree seems like a large number to me.

Toward the end of the broadcast they had an article on Halloween. They remarked on how much was being spent on Halloween costumes this year. Their estimate was perhaps $2B, again a fairly large number.

On the other hand, it occurred to me that if you added the candy that was also bought I strongly suspect the total was significantly higher than $3B total, when added to the costume cost.

So in other words, they were saying that it is bad if we spend as much on deciding who will serve in the entire House of Representatives, 1/3 of the Senate, and most of the Governors in the United States as we do on Halloween costumes and candy.

Now I am as cynical as the next person about politics these days but I wonder if the NBC news editors didn’t see at least some irony in those two stories. I am sure the way people these days, few others will either.

Ambient Knowledge

I have been giving a lot of thought lately about the impact of technology being integrated into everything.

In a separate post, I will talk more about that, but until I get that written, one of my students in my Syracuse University class on CIO on “CIO’s and the Global Enterprise”, wrote an interesting discussion about Ambient Organizations.

As I understand the various phrases that use the word ambient in this context, what is being said is that we come across information all the time; conversations, books we read, news sources, and so on. Over time even when we do not realize it, we tend to process and integrate this information often in unexpected ways. This is becoming even more relevant as the number of information sources and the pervasiveness of them increases.

For a simple example, for those of us who participate in such things as twitter or facebook, it is not infrequent that we when we run into someone for the first time physically that we are connected to on one of these social networks, it is as if we already know them. Even when we didn’t notice it, we pick up on what a person is interested in and what their opinions on a variety of topics are.

Helen Patricia McKenna is one of my students in this semester’s CIO class, the class itself in fact is completely on-line; taught asynchronously – that is, no direct lectures. It is part of the on-line graduate curricula at Syracuse University’s iSchool, http://ischool.syr.edu/. She often posts very interesting comments, this one I thought was of particular interest – I will warn those who go on, that in addition to being interesting it is a bit long.

BTW, in the interests of full-disclosure, I also teach at the University of Maryland University College. I find that the “do not want to appear like an idiot” syndrome forces me to keep relatively up-to-date in the topic areas I teach – which typically range from Cyber-Security Policy to CIO Management to IT Acquisition. Continue reading “Ambient Knowledge”

Philosophy of Life

This morning my wife mentioned that she was going out to Target.

“Did I want anything”, she asked. “What do they sell at Target?”, I wondered aloud.

“Well,” she said, “would you like detergent?”

“What?”, I responded in confusion, “Detergent?”

“Yes”, she said, “Would you like some laundry detergent for your clothes?”

“You know,” I said, “In almost 30 years of marriage, I can honestly say you have never asked me that question before. I have no idea as to if or what detergent I would need. I have never figured out which kind works with what kind of clothes or in what circumstances. I just take the container closest to the washing machine and hope that is the one that would work best.” Continue reading “Philosophy of Life”

Ellen & Dan’s Excellent Adventure in Nova Scotia – Day 7

We started our penultimate day on our Nova Scotia adventure by going to the Cows manufacturing plant where they make cheese, most recently butter, and most important what is considered by a number of sources the best ice cream in the world, www.cows.ca.

We took the tour along with a number of other visitors, including four guys who were members of the Harley Davidson club in Idaho Falls, Idaho. They brought along with them their fake snake Chester. It turns out they hold a 50-50 raffle each meeting. The winner not only gets 50% of the money paid into the pot but they also get Chester who (which?) they are obligated to take around with them until the next meeting where they hopefully will not be a repeat winner. Continue reading “Ellen & Dan’s Excellent Adventure in Nova Scotia – Day 7”

Ellen & Dan’s Excellent Adventure in Nova Scotia – Day 6

Today was Anne of Green Gables all day, all the time.

For those of you who haven’t read the books (I haven’t) nor seen the TV shows/movies (I only vaguely remember them) it might be a wonder that a fictional character has this kind of impact. I think that LM Montgomery, who wrote the books, was so strongly associated with Prince Edwards Island (all but one of the books was located at PEI) and local pride; there is lots of that we have learned helped. Continue reading “Ellen & Dan’s Excellent Adventure in Nova Scotia – Day 6”

Ellen & Dan’s Excellent Adventure in Nova Scotia – Day 5

Today was our transition from the first part of our trip, in Cape Breton Island, to Prince Edwards Island.

Interestingly when we asked people in Cape Breton about PEI, they almost always said that it was pretty nice but they rarely visited there. One person described PEI as a potato field surrounded by water which we thought pretty funny. We found when we landed in PEI, the reverse was equally true. There they all said that Cape Breton was very pretty, but rarely went.

For one thing it is free to drive over the very short causeway to Cape Breton. It costs between $40 and $60 to take the ferry, or drive over the bridge, from PEI back to the mainland one-way. It is free to enter PEI. So once there, the trick is to figure out to sneak out and avoid the toll. Continue reading “Ellen & Dan’s Excellent Adventure in Nova Scotia – Day 5”

Ellen & Dan’s Excellent Adventures in Nova Scotia – Day 4

Tuesday was a leisurely day starting in Ingonish on the East side of Cape Breton about half-way down the coast, completing the loop we started yesterday, swinging back in a circle through Baddeck and ending up in the early afternoon in Mabou, at the bottom of the west side of Cape Breton.

The Lantern Inn & Hollow where we stayed overnight was on the Atlantic Ocean. That morning, we walked on the beach. Continue reading “Ellen & Dan’s Excellent Adventures in Nova Scotia – Day 4”