Category: Technology

ISS goes to IBM – more than a change of TLA?

War Bunker, Pointe de PenhirIBM sucks in ISS for $1.3bn (more here and here) to follow on from the acquisition of FileNet.

What I find most interesting about this deals is that it would appear to be a service purchase rather than a technology purchase. ISS will not go into IBM’s software division, it will go into global services.

Most analysts seem to agree that IBM has little new technology to gain from the purchase. ISS already does managed security services and that is what IBM are purchasing.

There is clearly more consolidation in the security market to come now that the likes of IBM, Microsoft, CA and Sun have their eyes fixed on it. Not sure where that leaves Symantec, McAfee, CheckPoint, etc.

IBM obviously expect the current levels of expenditure on security to carry on growing.

(TLA – Three Letter Acronym)

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One problem uncovers another

Crozon Market - a small biteI would hate to try to estimate how may times I have been in a problem solving situation where the resolution of one problem only lead to the discovery of another.

Today has been one of those days – two problems leading to another two different problems.

This happens so regularly that I wonder why I can’t change my mind to expect multiple problems. Whenever I launch into problem resolution mode I always expect there to be a single thing to change to get me to a resolution.

Does that make me an optimist or just naive?

The way we normally launch into problem resolution is to undertake an audit of everything within the sphere of the problem, trying to find anomalies. I call this the Sherlock Holmes approach:

“Eliminate all other factors, and the one which remains must be the truth.”

“It is an old maxim of mine that when you have excluded the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.”

Holmes was a great one for logic.

The way we normally apply this logic to IT systems is to parallel. We take system that is working fine and parallel it with the one that isn’t. It’s then a game of spot and correct the differences. The challenge here is understanding where a difference is trivial and where it is really contributing to a problem.

The skill in problem solving is knowing which are the important things that need to be changed. There are normally too many differences to change all of them.

I used to work with someone who’s approach to identifying the most important problem was to work on the most difficult to change. If it’s easy it can’t be important was his logic. His theory was, of course, completely illogical but he swore by it.

Back to our friend Sherlock Holmes:

Crime is common. Logic is rare. Therefore it is upon the logic rather than upon the crime that you should dwell.

So how do I decide what difference are important and which are not?

I have a method which I have built up over time. I’d like it to have some fancy name and be able to reference some fancy professor but I can’t. It’s simply the Graham Chastney method:

  1. Identify all of the elements in the system.
  2. More importantly identify all of the connections between the elements in the system.
  3. Do a quick health-check on each of the elements.
  4. Resolve obvious health issues.
  5. Identify the element where the problem is evident in a measurable way.
  6. Identify ‘anomalies’ on elements that are directly connected to the element that is exhibiting the problem.
  7. Resolve these ‘anomalies’ first, testing the impact on the problem measures as you go.
  8. Go next to the second tier of elements.
  9. And so on.

On the way through this process you may resolve many problems but not actually get to the problem which is causing the issue you are trying to resolve.

The true skill is understanding how the element are connected together. Quite often you find the answer to the problem their and then because you discover that two elements that are supposed to be connected aren’t.

Remembers: the connection is more important than the element. To rephrase Holmes:

Problems are common. Logic is rare. Therefore it is upon the logic rather than upon the problem that you should dwell.

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Windows Live Writer – English Dictionary Please

La PaludI’m still using Windows Live Writer. Up until now it has done a number of things better than BlogJet, and the things it does worse are less important. I say up until now because the lack of a proper English dictionary is starting to bug me.

As a slight aside:

Why is is “emphasis” and “emphasize”?

English makes much more sense “emphasis” and “emphasise”.

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Brain Dimensions

Grassy Sun

I was watching Imagining the Tenth Dimension yesterday with intrigue. The intrigue didn’t so much come from the idea or concept, but rather the method of communication. This site tries to convey a very complex scenario by using diagrams, animations and voice.

Having started to research our leaning styles a little in order to understand a little more about brain polarization I was intrigued by how others would interact with this site. I (as a right-brained person) found myself primarily following the diagrams and animation. Do left-brained people focus more of the voice? Is the concept easier to understand in words than in diagrams?

As an IT Architect I regularly come across issues which have multiple dimensions, because they have multiple variables. I have often tried to portray these problems as diagrams and often struggled, the diagrams becoming too complex for many people to understand Trying to explain the multi-dimensional problem in words is also problematic. This issue is often made worse by different people wanting to understand their dimension, and not being too bothered about the other dimensions. I have often found myself writing documents which repeatedly say and illustrate the same thing, but in different dimensions representing different members of the audience of the document. I’ve also used PowerPoint as a mechanism to constrain myself to a single slide for each dimension and hence each audience. This constraint actually helps to remove the desire to explain every other dimension.

If we want people to engage with something we need to show a dimension that’s relevant to them and not to confuse them with the totality of all of the dimensions. Showing all of the dimensions might not be enough though, we might need to show all of the dimensions in a way that is relevant to people with different learning styles.

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Even more , on More on Windows Live Writer

Sweet Peas

My last post made Steve think I wasn’t impressed with Windows Live Writer.

I wasn’t wowed, but I am still impressed.

The first things I tend to see in any new product are the things that it doesn’t do compared to my current capability, that is what my last post was reflecting.

I am impressed with the cleanness of the WLW interface.

I am impressed with the way it deals with posts and drafts, retaining a local copy.

I am impressed by the way it properly formats my posts. It’s nice to be writing in the same colours and fonts as will appear on the blog. It’s even nicer to be writing in a screen that is the same width as the blog without having to guess where things would actually appear. For those of you looking on the web you will notice that the paragraph spacing is much batter than in my previous posts.

I am impressed that they have written a product that covers ore than just Spaces.

I am impressed that they have created a plug-in capability and SDK.

The thing that concerns me about the things I think are missing is whether I believe Microsoft have a motivation to put them in, or whether a plug-in movement will be built which will add them in. Microsoft has little motivation to put Technorati tag support in, or Flickr support, or a broad Ping Server list.

But I am still impressed.

Trying Windows Live Writer

Lilacland: There must be something in here to sort Jimmy's hair

Thought I would give Windows Live Writer a go.

First impressions – it’s BlogJet with bits missing. Some of the screen are even in the same order, it’s a bit too close a likeness sometimes. The similarity to BlogJet is be interesting in itself though – I like to use BlogJet. BlogJet costs a small amount of money, so a free alternative is interesting.

I’ve already found a few places where BlogJet is definitely better. I add Flickr pictures into my posts which is best done using some code cut from Flickr. Switching to the code page is easier in BlogJet because it’s just a tab at the bottom of the screen, it’s a bit more complicated in WLW. You can use F12, but as I’m not likely to live most of my life in the tool I suspect I won’t remember that.

When working with code BlogJet highlights incomplete code, no such joy in WLW.

I was living in hope that Windows Live Writer would have the Microsoft Office wiggly line for spelling mistakes, but unfortunately not. You need to do the spell check. As others have mentioned Spell Check is Shift+F7, I have no idea why, F7 doesn’t do anything? Once is Spell Check there is no “Ignore All” option either. The Office Grammar checker would be even nicer, but I suspect I’m pushing for too much there.

BlogJet doesn’t do a good job of dealing with Tags, but at least I can create an “Auto Replace” which replaces a keyword with a set of code. Using this code it’s then really easy to create tags. There is no such option in WLW.

WLW allows you to add ping servers, but doesn’t have any in the default.

Given all of the effort Microsoft has put into smilies in other products I’m also a bit surprised that they haven’t put smilies into WLW. BlogJet smilies are great.

For some reason it can’t delete a post it creates in order to understand the make-up of the blog – that’s what this post is about. I thought I would leave it there as a reminder. This is a niggle really, I was just pleasantly surprised that WLW even considered blogging tools other than Spaces.

One thing I have notices, and it’s only a small thing, WLW does a proper selection when you double-click, BlogJet always selected the space following the word.

It’s still a Beta so hopefully we’ll see some changes.

I forgot Flickrmap

It’s one thing being in flick and being able to see where a picture was taken – but what about the other way around – that’s where flickrmap comes in.

http://map.flickrmap.com/v2/map.swf

Get your own Flickrmap!

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Announcing, announcing, announcing

How big is that cake

Microsoft’s press team have had a busy couple of days.

The first two announcements that caught my eye were virtualisation announcements:

The softricity one is old news, coming as it does on the same day as the XenSource one though it shows a definite shift in the market. While many people are focusing on virtualisation at the server as a way of reducing server footprint and cost, many people are missing the ability of virtualisation to all IT organisation to loosen control without loosing control. This loosening effect will be especially true for the softricity technologies.

Then there were a couple of hosting announcements:

From the first one:

Intergenia, a leading Web hosting company based in Germany, has deployed a wide array of Microsoft hosting solutions to deliver applications and services to its broad customer base. With more than 2.2 million active sites hosted and more than 20,000 dedicated servers in data centers in and the U.S., the company has recently been declared the second-largest Web hosting provider in the world by the British market research firm Netcraft Ltd. More than 95 percent of Intergenia’s active sites are hosted on the Microsoft Solution for Windows-based Hosting 3.5. In 2005 Intergenia was one of the first German hosting providers to launch Hosted Exchange and has since deployed the solution to a growing number of customers.

“We are seeing a significant upswing in the software-as-a-service market in Germany, and Microsoft solutions for Windows-based Hosting and Hosted Messaging and Collaboration are helping us to capitalize on this opportunity,” said Thomas Strohe, founder, Intergenia AG. “Our customers expect a high level of security and service availability, and because of the ease of deployment and the tools and management capabilities in Microsoft’s solutions, we are able to provide both. As companies become more familiar with the software-as-a-service model, we expect to see demand grow even stronger for more sophisticated services and applications.”

I never really saw hosting and SaaS as the same thing, or perhaps I’m wrong and hosting is a form of SaaS. Michael Platt’s been trying to get his head around the different definitions too. Scoble wrote a number of times about how Microsoft should purchase Web 2.0 companies, perhaps they have a more subtle plan which we are seeing working itself out – perhaps the plan is not to own the applications, but to own the delivery of the applications.

Another interesting announcement was the purchase of wininternals. A very interesting move, particularly the thought of Microsoft trying to integrate another set of talented individuals.

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One of my Flickr Pictures Passed 1000 views (with style)

GrafitiOne of my flickr pictures has passed 1000 views (1128 to be precise for the moment). I noticed that it was popular near the end of last week and then it only had 990 (ish) view. That’s right, nearly 150 view since over the weekend.

This is a complete mystery to me. I have absolutely no idea why this picture get so many views. It’s not a bad picture, but it isn’t that interesting either. There are lots of pictures which I personally prefer.

Ever since I took it, it has gained lots of views. It’s sister picture has nearly 1000 (901 actually). In Flickr pictures tend to get noticed because they are members of all sorts of groups, but that’s not true for this picture either, it’s not been posted into any groups. GrafitiIt’s not like it has any comments associated with it either. There’s only one comment and that’s mine, asking if anyone knows why it’s popular .

The most popular Jimmy and Grandad picture has only gained 172 views by comparison .

I suppose it could be related to the blog that it’s posted on. I’d like to think that this was the reason and that lots of people where reading this particular post because I regard it as one of my best. I have done some tests, and I don’t think that these remote loads actually count, the statistics on the blog don’t add credence to this thesis either .

Boggle? Sounds fitting for such a mystery .

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Windows Vista System Restore

Mum's turn on the raft

I did something a little scary today – I used System Restore on my Vista Tablet.

Del.icio.us have created proper button for IE (rather than using favourites) so I thought I’d try it out.

Click on download, click on install, click on ‘I accept’ (or something like that) and the install starts, the progress bar moves across the screen and then it stalls, and stalls, and stalls.

After a good long while I check the processes in the Task Manager and IE is no longer responding, but nicely using up 100% of the CPU. I realise that this is never going to finish so I kill the install, but IE is still not responding and is still running at 100%, so I kill IE too .

Unfortunately when I restart IE it hangs, I’m now getting a bit annoyed with myself for having to try something new all the time .

Restart Vista – no effect .

Remove the del.icio.us application via the control panel – no effect .

Restarting Vista again – still had no effect .

My options are no looking very limited. So it’s off to try out the scary option to resolve the problem – System Restore.

I’ve used System Restore a few times on XP devices and had mixed results. In one instance the device had to be rebuilt because it way just not the same again. So I was a bit wary of using System Restore on Beta software.

Undertaking a System Restore on Vista is very similar to the way it’s done on XP. You select your restore point based on date, Vista restores the data and then reboots.

Well it’s come back and everything seems to be fine, and IE is now working again .

(The picture isn’t meant to imply that I felt like I was going down a stream without a paddle, but I suppose it’s appropriate )

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Microsoft Changes to Provide Support for ODF: Big Deal?

Grandad goes white water

Microsoft has today announced (information here, here) that it will indeed support the Open Document Format (ODF).

Will it be a big deal, or just another feature that will have very little impact on most users?

What seems to be clear from the information currently available is that users of Microsoft Office will need to think about using ODF, rather than using ODF as the standard format. For starters they will need to download an additional component, and even then it’s not clear that they can make ODF the default format.

Even if users could make ODF the default format what would make them choose it as the day-to-day format that they use?

People tend not to make decisions of principle if it adds to their workload, or the workload of others. In the short term ODF capabilities will not be ubiquitous so sending an ODF file to anyone will be to take a risk that you are adding to your workload because you’ll need to re-send the file if the person at the other end can’t read it. If you do need to re-send the file you obviously gives the person receiving the file a problem.

Large organisations can make a principle decision and then enforce that on the people who need to collaborate with them, but they need to be large enough to be dominant. If large organisations do make a principle decision they just give the little guy (who is collaborating) the problem of working in two worlds; the current file format world and the new ODF file format world. Both worlds will exist for some time because I don’t see any sign that all of the large organisations making a principle decision all at the same time, all in the same direction.

What I do see happening is an ODF based ecosystem being built and potential growing in parallel to the current Microsoft Office file format ecosystem. Building an ecosystem doesn’t happen in weeks or months, building an ecosystem takes years.

I’m not convinced that the ODF ecosystem will succeed though, decision based on principle rarely win when it comes to IT. The simplest and easiest things tends to win.

Is this a big deal? It might be, but it isn’t going to be a big deal for a long time.

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It's the little things that annoy

Often it’s the little things in life that annoy. My Tablet currently has one very annoying defect. If it was software I’m sure I could work with it, but it’s not. It’s a small piece of rubberised plastic on the pen.

This rubberised material makes it feel nice and squishy in my hand, but the problem comes when I try to put the pen back into it’s nice little hole at the top of my TC1100.

Because there is a little cut in the material it bows out and won’t go in unless I perform some fancy wiggle manoeuvre to make the cut fit in. If I don’t do the special wiggle the cut just gets bigger, and over time that is exactly what it is doing.

I can’t decide how to fix it.

I considered buying a new pen but they are a silly price because they aren’t just a simple bit of plastic, there’s electronics in their too.

I am currently trying to work a cunning DIY plan for sticking the material back onto the pen in such a way as it will no longer protrude from the edge of the pen.

I know it’s only a little thing, but it’s still really annoying .

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