michael.saul - Slashdot User

When Does Powering Down Servers Make Sense? 301

Posted by timothy on Thursday October 30, 2008 @03:35PM from the after-coffee-is-served-of-course dept.

snydeq writes "Powering down servers to conserve energy is a controversial practice that, if undertaken wisely, could greatly benefit IT in its quest to rein in energy costs in the datacenter. Though power cycling's long-term effects on server hardware may be mythical, its effects on IT and business operations are certainly real and often detrimental. Yet, development, staging, batch processing, failover — several server environments seem like prime candidates for routine power cycling to reduce datacenter energy consumption. Under what conditions and in what environments does powering down servers seem to make the most economic and operational sense, and what tips do folks have to offer to those considering making use of the practice?"

Shuttleworth On Redefining File Systems 414

Posted by Soulskill on Saturday October 25, 2008 @01:52PM from the as-long-as-we-don't-call-it-2.0 dept.

moteyalpha writes "Mark Shuttleworth described the beginnings of what could a great step forward in making file systems more usable. I've personally had the experience of trying to find a file for a customer who had just finished editing a critical report, saved it, and then couldn't locate it to deliver to their client. Quoting: 'My biggest concern on this front is that it be done in a way that every desktop environment can embrace. We need a consistent experience across GNOME, KDE, OpenOffice and Firefox so that content can flow from app to app in a seamless fashion and the user's expectations can be met no matter which app or environment they happen to use. If someone sends a file to me over Empathy, and I want to open it in Amarok, then I shouldn't have to work with two completely different mental models of content storage.'"

Comment Re:in the perfect world... (Score 1) 559

by michael.saul on Wednesday April 02, 2008 @10:05PM (#22947328) Attached to: Should IT Shops Let Users Manage Their Own PCs?

I work for a large IT organization, and our IT department lets us have it both ways.

For people who can't be bothered to deal with administering their own computer, updates, software and everything else that is normally provided by IT is managed. As an alternative, many of these services also have a self administration tool. From software installs and OS installation images, to directory and computer account management I have self service web tools available to manage what I want. To maintain a certain baseline, IT makes use of a quarantine client to make sure our OS and antivirus patches are kept at a minimum.

If I call helpdesk, they will instruct me to get on the common build, but that is about it. This way I can administer my own system, and it has to be kept to minimum specs but a certain level of support can be maintained for poeple who can't be bothered to play IT.

Like I said, however, I work for an IT company and this might not be the best approach for a company filled with sales drones.

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