What people don't seem to understand is that this medication is basically just a strong cup of coffee with a time release coating. How many of you have philosophical objections to that? There must be a lot of Mormons on this board.

Not to mention missing the opportunity to do things which require concentration, like math.

Its really easy to figure out if your kid was misdiagnosed. People without ADHD who take the medication (e.g. Concerta) have a very different reaction than, say, my kid who barely notices it but is able to concentrate in class.

It seems I'm a bit late to the party.

The only potential's I've seen in linux for this (aside from ZFS fuse already mentioned) is...

OHSM

CacheFS

If you want to do this in hardware, you can use MaxIQ from Adaptec which, IIRC, uses linux drivers to get this function from their storage controllers. There is also a few others, one of which only mirrors the first part of the hard drive.

I'll agree, but ultimately the problems arisen with cache consistency and the latency of the network in inhibiting that consistency makes such caching unfeasible.

And by new paradigm, you mean the emperor's new clothes?

The author clearly offered no new paradigm, only a slap on the back and a hardy "take charge and tell them what you really think". That is not discouraged by the "old" paradigm, nor is it a "new" paradigm.

We might be saying the same things, but the author of the article said little that helps, and nothing that promotes anything but hubris.

So he says, but the parent comment is right, any paradigm could suffer from the same barriers.

Not in my experience, which actually sees IT organizations dramatically misunderstanding the business paradigm they trying to adopt with the customer model. Many of the policies that many IT folks adopt in that paradigm would not make for a successful business or customer service experience.

There have been way to many /.ers who read the article and drank fully the kool-aid of criticism. Beguiled by the promise of being in charge, the consultant who casually alluded to (but never divulged) what he teaches, the ./ers seem to have entrenched even more against their foes rather then torn down barriers.

I'm convinced that the IT-as-a-business paradigm is not bad at all. But that those that adopt it forget the business sense at the center of it. I believe that might be the contradiction the parent comment is alluding to also.

The IT shop you mentioned is likely a very successful IT shop in maximizing the money they get, and minimizing the investment they have to make to get it. In fact it looks more like a way to be successful without really understanding business (which is what most techies want anyway).

But there are better ways of doing things. But it involves better understanding business, and when you better understand business they will in turn understand IT much better (because you are much better at communicating it to them).

I'll agree to the gist. I think the parent poster lightly tiptoed up to the real flaw in the article. As you mentioned it is vague, but why?

When I read it, I was impressed with the incisive commentary against some current IT practices. But, when it came to solutions it seemed very vague and referenced the fact that his consulting company teaches people to be (but not divulging how to be) in charge.

To be honest, putting two and two together here and I see a technical hit piece soft-selling consulting services. Perhaps I'm too churlish.

Without being churlish, he's written a piece where I can only say, I appreciate that he is smart but I didn't learn anything. Perhaps that was the goal, after all if I feel smarter for thinking what I already do, I'm half won.

In truth, being a peer and suggesting the right solution with confidence to sell is what a business really needs to do. The IT as a business paradigm, if it were understood with better business prowess by the IT staff, would lead to better dialog with business.

If he says anything (though he never came out and said it) is that if IT had real business sense to act as a business peer, they wouldn't act like peers -- they would be peers. They would be given more respect, they would be seen as the most integral part of their company, and they would know better what to sell and how to their internal customers.

Thus, the real message is simply to be smarter about business. Short of that, learn better business by acting more like a friend to business.

The author of the article was big on criticism, low on practical advice. For practical advice for what 99% of what techies get wrong in dealing with business, I suggest "The Personal Credibility Factor" by Sandy Allgeier. Read that and you'll understand better the cat that the article's author is keeping in the bag.