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Submission + - Designing a Telecom Configuration Center

Submitted by Big Jim Taters
Big Jim Taters writes: I have been tasked with helping move our config center from one location to our Headquarters. I have a small budget and no choice in location. I do, however, have an opportunity to design the space fresh (well, kinda.) What we will be configuring is routers, switches, firewalls, and other telecom related devices. What I cannot find is any "Best Practices" or "Lessons Learned" out there. So I ask you fine folks: What are some of the best and worst designs, practices, procedures, and work flows that you have encountered in sitting down to stage anywhere from 2 to 200 devices at once to get configured?

Submission + - Real Reason Behind Windows 10 Name: Compatibility (independent.co.uk)

Submitted by ndykman
ndykman writes: The Independent reports that a MS developer has suggested a real reason behind the new name for the Windows 10 name. Old code. More specifically code that looks for "Windows 9" to determine the windows version. Fine for Windows 95 or Windows 98, but not so great for a new operating system. The article includes a link that shows that yes, this would be a problem.

Submission + - Mystery of Gravity powered aircraft 4

Submitted by rjstegbauer
rjstegbauer writes: GizMag published an article about a plane that doesn't need fuel to fly, but sounds too good to be true. The airplane design claims to use buoyancy to go up, then gravity to gain speed for horizontal flight. I'm thinking that it's violating the Second Law of Thermodynamics, but I'm not an aeronautical engineer.

Or was I fooled by a spoof?

Submission + - Fired NY Fed Regulator's Secret Audio Recordings Inside Goldman Sachs 2

Submitted by maynard
maynard writes: Carmen Segarra used to work as a regulator for the New York Federal Reserve Bank, one of twelve regional banks that make up the US central banking system. In her capacity as regulator, Ms. Segarra was assigned to a team overseeing investment banking giant Goldman Sachs. There, while investigating a case of Goldman having advisied a client about a buyout offer by another company in which the firm held significant investment holdings, she determined that Goldman didn't even have a conflict of interest policy. Her supervisor initially backed the investigation, until it became clear she meant to file a written report detailing her findings of fact. Then they abruptly fired her.

And all this would have been another unfortunate case of 'she-said / institution-said' ineffective whistleblowing were it not for the fact that Ms. Segarra saw what was coming and had bought a keychain audio recorder. With it, she collected 46 hours of internal discussion and meetings, including statements by Goldman Sachs principles admitting the firm didn't have a conflict of interest policy and that the deal under investigation had been "shady." Additionally, she collected reams of documents and testimony. She thought her case iron clad.

However, when it came time to reveal her findings in full to superiors, though initially supportive of the investigation, her boss quickly shifted gears and worked to squelch the report. This culminated in a recorded meeting where her boss made clear his supervisors at the Fed insisted she downplay those findings. Then, a week later, before she could formally file the report, they fired her.

While bits of the story have been out in print for about a year, the radio show This American Life just published actual excerpts from those audio recordings. They make for harrowing listening. As the producer says in the introduction, her recordings show: "Repeated examples of pervasive regulatory capture by the industry regulators are meant to oversee."

In other words, whereas before we could all surmise just how bad banking regulation must be, what with the Financial Crisis having nearly tanked the world economy and all, with this audio we can hear first hand and in minute detail what it's like for an honest regulator to try to do the job properly: You get fired. Quickly. Then your embarrassing work is buried and reputation smeared. And if she'd just kept her mouth shut, she coulda gotten rich! This, at the very heart of the global financial system.

Is it any wonder why the public has lost faith in our political and economic institutions?

Submission + - Yahoo Shutters Its Yahoo Directory 1

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Not many readers may know or remember this, but before the advent of reliable search engines (Google) web listings used to be a popular way to organize the web, and Yahoo had one of the more popular heirarchical website directories around. On Friday, as part of its on-going streamlining process, Yahoo announced that their 20 year old directory will be no more: "While we are still committed to connecting users with the information they’re passionate about, our business has evolved and at the end of 2014 (December 31), we will retire the Yahoo Directory."

Comment D'oh! (Score 1) 250

by Gazzonyx (#47991673) Attached to: GNOME 3.14 Released
Actually, you're very probably correct. I'm honestly too tired to check (I lost a DB cluster last night/this morning and have been dealing with that since yesterday), but you're very probably correct. My head isn't in the game like it usually is. Please excuse the noise. As AC said, The Windows key is "Super", not "Meta".

Comment Re:Commands lines (Score 1) 250

by Gazzonyx (#47990939) Attached to: GNOME 3.14 Released

[...]

You can even skip 1 and 2 by pushing your windows (or whatever you want to call it) button, which acts like the upper corner thingy.

The "Windows" key is called the "meta key" on all platforms that I'm aware of.

"Now you know, and knowing is half the battle." -- Sgt. Slaughter (Sorry, but that GI Joe quote was too tempting)

Submission + - How to Hire a Great Engineering Manager (venturebeat.com)

Submitted by hype7
hype7 writes: The great engineering manager — one of the hardest candidates to find. It's easier to tell the great engineers — you can just look at their code. But how do you tell if someone is as skilled in solving the softer, human problems? This post over at VentureBeat grapples with exactly this question, suggesting a very cool test to tell if someone has the chops to lead a team of engineers. The spoiler? It involves asking an engineering manager candidate to role play out a presentation of what they'd succeeded and failed at the conclusion of their first year.

Submission + - Nvidia sinks moon landing hoax using virtual light (cnet.com)

Submitted by schwit1
schwit1 writes: Using its new top-shelf graphics processing unit, Nvidia tackles one of the most persistent conspiracy theories in American history: the veracity of the 1969 to 1972 Apollo moon landings.

Submission + - Mark Zuckerberg Ousts His Pal, FWD.us's Apparently Just-Sort-of-OK President

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes: Two weeks after arguing that Executive Action by President Obama on tech immigration was needed lest Mark Zuckerberg and his FWD.us PAC pals have to deal with 'just sort of OK' U.S. workers, it appears Joe Green's words have come back to bite him. Re/Code's Kara Swisher reports that Green has been pushed out of his role as President of FWD.us. "Today, we wanted to share an important change with you," begins 'Leadership Change', the announcement from the FWD.us Board that Green is out and Todd Schulte is in. So what convinced FWD.us that Schulte merited the job more than Zuck's apparently just-sort-of-OK close friend and college roommate? "His [Schulte's] prior experience as Chief of Staff at Priorities USA, the Super PAC supporting President Obama's re-election," explains Zuckerberg & Co., "will ensure FWD.us continues its momentum for reform."

Submission + - Netflix admits in to slowing their traffic in battle with ISP's (cbit.org)

Submitted by alen
alen writes: The Center for Boundless Innovation in Technology is linking to Netflix's FCC filing where they admit to leaving Akamai for their content distribution and signing up with Level 3 and Cogent. It goes on to say that right after the agreement was finalized, Level 3 and Cogent routed Netflix traffic over their settlement free links with ISP's in order to gain a favorable policy decision by the FCC

Comment Re:Why Do You Accept This? (Score 1) 232

by Gazzonyx (#47941831) Attached to: Ask Slashdot: Have You Experienced Fear Driven Development?
At some point you just say, "let's discuss this after the Scrum". Usually when people get off track, it's because they need to talk to someone specifically instead of the group. We don't usually have a problem with this, but we don't mind if a Scrum goes half an hour or so once or twice a week. Sometimes we just decide to break out and brainstorm and let others go about their day. You've got to deal with it on a case-by-case basis.

Comment Re:I've seen a place like that (Score 1) 232

by Gazzonyx (#47925291) Attached to: Ask Slashdot: Have You Experienced Fear Driven Development?

[...] They once had a brilliant young developer who wrote more in three months than their team did in years, before being sacked for delivering code with a bug that caused an outage. [...]

Please tell me this is an exaggeration. Show me a single developer who hasn't caused an issue of some sorts, in production, and I'll show you a developer that hasn't fully matured yet.

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