Survivor's Syndrome

We had a big meeting at work, all the IT folks in a room together. Webcasted to those in remote sites. Clearly something big was in the works. Things had been quiet for a long time, and my own pursuit of an opening in the management team terminated with hints that a major reorg was planned.

Sitting in the room, marveling at just how big our IT department had gotten I was joking with a friend that this must be the meeting to announce that we are outsourcing to IBM. 5 minutes later the joke wasn't funny.

Initially I was excited! My wife and I had been planning on trying to move to the Southern US next spring and this might give me either an avenue through employment at IBM, or a kick in the pants through a layoff (and hopefully a nice severance package). I never thought for a second that I would be part of the small (12.5%) group of staff who were wanted long term to manage the outsourcing agreement and relationship. But I was.

In fact, I'm the only one in my department not being laid off. Most of my friends from my old role are being offered positions with IBM, but not all... In fact, I don't know anyone yet who is staying, and that really saddens me because the people have been the only thing to make this place survivable. And those relationships are strained now. There is clear resentment from some of my friends that I am staying while they are not, and I'm feeling really guilty at my initial pleasure at the announcement, more every minute as I see the stress that this is inflicting upon everyone.

I've been reading about "Survivor's Syndrome" on the web and exactly as is described, there is the obvious "why not me" guilt that I feel, but also a thirst for more information. What will the org be like after the transition? What will my job really be? My title looks to be unchanged, but instead of a team of 5 there will just be me? Long term does the outsourced IT function even need me? I assume that in 2-3 years there will be an IBM black box look to the environment... The simple cost of services that IT used to absorb will now be visible to the business, so the rate of change is likely to drop dramatically.

I need to call an acquaintance who's been through the IBM takeover and see if he has any tips...

I also need to be patient and wait for more information. But it is hard.

Cost of storage

I'm trying to put together a roadmap for our Enterprise Storage group, and part of it is trying to show the expected cost of storage over time for different scenarios. Unfortunately I'm having a terrible time trying to gather information on the price of enterprise class storage, and how it has changed over the years. It is obviously getting cheaper as time goes on, but how much? Historically we only buy storage every 3-4 years, so I have a grand total of 2 data points to run with. Not too helpful...

Mayoral Elections in Calgary

I've often thought that I should get involved in politics, as I'm never satisfied with how things are run. Municipal government is especially disappointing for me, likely because the "results" are so pathetically visible. Unfortunately for everyone, I'm far too lazy to commit to the effort and time required for a successful campaign, not to mention the ongoing workload!

Fortunately for me, I think I've found a candidate who has some uncommon sense, good ideas and a firm grasp on reality. Sandy Jenkins has my vote, and I hope that you will read his site if you live in Calgary - and then get out and vote!

Gatorland

I just learned from Fark that Gatorland is rebuilding after a fire. I never heard about the fire when it happened, but I'm pleased to here it is being rebuilt. It was a little cheesy, but I loved going to Gatorland. My son and I got a picture taken with a little caiman and a snake when he was 3, and it is one of my favorites. I'm looking forward to returning someday and getting one with my daughter too.

Server 2008 RC0 - initial impression

I've finally gotten a few minutes to play with Longhorn - I've downloaded all 3 public betas and never installed any of them, and figured that the release of RC0 was an indicator that the time to prep for release was now.

For some reason trying to download anything from Technet causes my IE to flail around trying to do something with my Live passport ID, and it fails, so I had to use Firefox to download it...I thought that was weird.

BUT, I did get it downloaded, and quick. Then I spun up a new VM, mounted the ISO and was off. A Server Core install was done in about 15 minutes! (Maybe less - I went to get a coffee, came back and it was done)

Then I sat down and tried to figure out what do with it. It is in a sandbox, so I'll need a DC, so that was where I started. A quick google later had me directions for the installation, and 20 minutes later I have my brand new longhorn domain up and running.

Important note - server core includes notepad! I was trying to create the unattend.txt file with echo>file and then EDLIN and just found another notice that notepad was added to server core waaaay back in beta 2 days.

Now for the very initial impressions.

Fast.
Surprising - server core actually has a gui! I was expecting the linux command prompt experience, instead there is familiar vista-ish logon screen, then an empty desktop and a familiar CMD window. You can access task manager and open new windows, and gui apps will run - the VMWare tools for example went on flawlessly. This is probably common knowledge, but shocked the hell out of me when I saw it. I love it.

I eagerly await the final release so I can migrate my DCs.

Server depth issues

Brilliant post about the ongoing growth of "compact" servers. Every word is true, and I've found the rail growth to be a challenge with IBM systems in the past too - although they do seem to have gotten better, but we are forced to use the "Enterprise" racks for servers now...

Thanks cgoolsbee!

Jason