Entries for the 'Offtopic' Category

Tagged: New Year’s Resolutions

David Stein started a new and timely thread. He tagged me.

This article is about the professional resolutions for improvement that I intend to make in the new year and I will tag a couple other people to do the same.

1. Learn enough linux to manage a database on that platform.
2. Become an orange belt(or better) on Oracle and MySQL
3. Master Inbox Zero.
4. 2.5 technical blog posts a week in addition to the useless blabber and failed humor attempts.
5. Maintain balance between work, family and community.

Next victims:

Denis Gobo(Twitter, RSS, LessThanDot)

Joe Sack (RSS)

Michael O’Neal(Twitter, RSS)

Chris Shaw(Twitter, RSS)

P.S. Exercise 4x a week and make it back down to size 32’s.

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The Internet Really is a Series of Tubes

See.

Pic credit to TechCruch.

If you don’t get it, then you have not seen this:

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Detroit Techno

http://statisticsio.com/jmass%20-%20detroit.mp3

It has been a while since I have time to put together a mix. This one is themed around my favorite genre and most painful points of my life. I remember being in Detroit and hearing “Clear” over the intercom in Taco Bell while ordering food through bullet proof glass. That is the theme of Detroit in general. Melancholy at best and a life or death struggle at worst.

I read somewhere that in the 70\80’s, Detroit was about the only major metroplex that black folks had a widespread good future due the auto industry. Some of the children of that generation took the soul from Motown, bought synths and drum machines and turned it into techno.

This is my tribute. If you are “in the know”, some of the classics may be played out to you and some are only influenced by Detroit. This mix is aimed at someone who has never heard this music but you may find a good tune or two here as well. I hope enjoy. You can find out more about these artists here http://discogs.com

I kinda have been trying figure out if I wanted to post this or not. There is one song that I should have excluded and a bump in another mix. However, I decided the music is worth hearing especially if you like electronic music but have not heard Detroit Techno.

Morgan Geist - Detroit (feat. jeremy greenspan)
D5 - Oscillator
$tinkworx - Hu T'ieh
Dan Curtin - This was tomorrow
Jeff Mills - The bells
The Aztec Mystic - Jaguar (Original mix)
Morgan Geist - Room 120-2 (dan curtin re-work)
deep chord - step 3 (Mike Huckaby Remix)
Octave One -Daystar Rising
DBX - ?
Robert Hood - Public Enemy No. 1
Detroit Grand Pubahs - Thanks For Coming (Steve Bug's As Funky As Your Ass Mix)
Aril Brikha - Deeparture in Time
Los Hermanos - Birth of 3000
Model 500 - Starlight [Echospace Mix]
Soul Designer - Street Jazz Variations
Character Maps Remix - Perspects
Morgan Geist - In your electric
Audion - T.B.
Troy Pierce - 25 Bitches (Berg Nixon ZigZag )
Carl Craig - Demented Drums
Clé - Water
Photo - synthesis aka suburban knight
Phsyche - Crack Down
Orlando Voorn - Flash
John Tejada & Justin Maxwell - Pimp My Glide
Convextion - Frozen Surface
duplex - autosug
Marco Passarani - Clair
morgan geist - most of all (feat. jeremy greenspan)

http://statisticsio.com/jmass%20-%20detroit.mp3

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DBA Shenanigans

 Check all the other geek graffiti @ oddee

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Yup, I am that Douche

Wow, what stressful week. I would much rather do a total disaster recovery on a VLDB than do this again. Last week, I announced I had taken a new job. Leaving my current position of nearly a decade. Well, I took a counter offer. When I resigned I told them I was not interested in a counter offer. I was so confident that I even announced it here before my butt was in the new seat. I took the job because it was really cool. There was not anything wrong with my current job or company. I was perfectly happy. The prospective employer contacted me on linkedin. I was not out job hunting.

My current employer respected that I wasn’t interested in a counter offer but a week and a half into my final two weeks the Manager of Database Services and Escalations resigned and they offered me that job. I thought that my decision to take the new job was tough. Well, let me tell you taking the counter offer was 10x rougher.

I weighed all of the pro’s and con’s. The only con for staying was the fact that I would be going back on my word. I don’t take that lightly but it was the best move for my family and I.

It came down to a lot of reasons but two main ones:

• We started this process talking in September. The economy had a horrible October. The outlook is grim for at least the next year. Most people expect it to get much worse before it gets better. I would much rather go through a great depression scale recession here. That may be just because I know where the company stands in the market and with me. However, I would hate to be the low man on the totem pole who is working remotely if things get really bad.
• In October, Microsoft announced their cloud computing initiative at PDC. This basically makes the MSSQL DBA obsolete. There will still be some on premise installations but it will be for legacy applications and the largest application so the MSSQL DBA market will be much smaller. That may take a few years but I am making this decision with the next decade in mind. In my new role, I will gain MySQL and Oracle experience which will allow me to diversify.

Conventional wisdom says never take a counter offer. However, I took the new job for unconventional reasons. It wasn’t about money. It wasn’t because I was unhappy. It was all geek factor. I just wanted to work on something of that scale.

I don’t think there is a totally right answer and I will always wonder “What if” but now that the smoke has cleared, I am feeling more and more that I made the best decision.

Thoughts?

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A New Chapter

I have been with Terremark WorldWide(Formerly Data Return) since June of 1999. Almost 70 dog years or 100 IT years. Through the good times like the startup and IPO phases. The bad times; It was tough for a managed hosting company in the dotcom bubble. At one point, I was the DBA, AD admin, exchange admin and helpdesk after several layoffs. We fought our way through all of that with the help of some remarkable people and leadership. I would consider this another good time for the company but it is time for me to move on.

So what on earth could make a change adverse person like me do something so drastic? MySpace. I have accepted a position on the Database Administration team. Depending on how you count the beans, they have to be in the top 3 largest MSSQL installations in the world. I really liked the culture and clicked with the team members. I think this position will keep me happy for the next decade or more.

However, it is very weird. Pinch me.

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Google Reader Stats

I guess it is safe say I am a geek who is into SQL with my eye on the cloud. Anything in your top 40 that I am missing out on?

Note: You will have to be a google reader user for those links to work. Although, you can probably reverse engineer if need be.