Farwell 2011(and good ridance)

It is quite possible I will remember 2011 as one of the hardest year of my life.

• We called 3 different locations home as our family moved around in an attempt to save money to buy a house. (still trying to buy)
• We went from one child to two, which I found to be exponentially harder than one.
• I survived a contract renewal, broken vehicles, sick children, and more.
• I changed to Paleo based diet which has done wonders for my family and I
• I finally passed an IT certification

Looking back, 2011 was a year of growth.  Through attrition and necessity, I’ve become increasingly aware of life’s most fundamental truths.

• Life is Fragile: Life is incredibly fragile and delicate.  Having children has made me acutely aware of this.  We are guaranteed now and nothing more.  We all live being seconds away from having our lives radically change.   A phone call, a car ride, a set of tricky stairs…all our plans and diligent work can be upended, spun around and spit out…Live with the hope for the future but with purpose and sincerity for today.
• It Will Fail You:  It will.  Whatever that “IT” is.  Money, health, logic, science, a material object, spouse, child, friend, etc.  We put our hopes that these things can bring us  happiness and peace.   We maybe are afforded moments of peace and beauty from those things, but the bleak reality of our broken world will always war against them.  And as mentioned above, all our hopes can be crushed in a second.  Personally, having my hope in Jesus is the only thing I have at the end of the day.  So with that in mind, while I’m here, I’m going to work to love people to the best of ability and give them a few moments of happiness and peace.

I’ve learned and observed some other items from this year.

• Some men need kids: In our day and age, there seem to be a lot more boys who can shave than actual young men.   Having the responsibility to put food on the table and a roof over your family’s head is a beautiful thing.  There are times I half jokingly think, “That guy needs a couple of kids in his life to become a better man”.  Nothing will be beat selfishness and immaturity out of you like children.
• Growing Thicker Skin:  Working as a Government contractor has been a huge blessing for my family.  It has also been a huge challenge to work and adapt to the culture and work environment of the US Government.  A challenge that is still very much in process

Some IT related nuggets

• To Educate or Not:  This will be a big one for me in 2012.  It’s a discussion I’ve started with a number of IT professionals.  The question is should an IT tech pursue education and certifications or not?  I’ve heard arguments from both sides.  I’ve seen guys become senior architects over massive projects that have no certifications or degrees. I’ve also seen Techs with certs out the wazoo struggling to get past Tier 1 help desk and everything in between.  As I look to continue to advance in my career, I’m positive this issue will present itself.
• Cloud Smoud:  Do you know what it means?  Probably not.  The good thing very few people do or at least to agree on what it means.  What’s funny is that the general public and IT professionals are equally confused and misguided.  Ask a consumer about the cloud and they might bring up the Windows “to the cloud” commercials or Apple’s iCloud.  Ask a tech professional and they might bring up IaaS/PaaS or Public/Private or whatever.  The bottom line is there are some very cool and new(er) ways of doing IT.  But in mean time, you will still here the buzz words cloud, big data, etc.
• Security:  2011 saw some pretty brazen and public security breaches.  From the PlayStation network to social media sites, and everything in between, security breaches stole the headlines.  Even security companies were victim to hacker groups such as Anonymous and LultzSec.  Viruses and Cyber-attacks saw giant leaps in innovation and sophistication.  Cyber-warfare is here.
• Stephen Jobs: I’m currently reading his biography and the dude was brilliant (but also a gigantic ass?).   I’m thinking now that being borderline crazy is what it took to build a company like Apple.  Apple currently has something close to 80 billion dollars on hand.  That’s absurd.  It will be interesting to see how Apple grows and changes over the next few years.  The man left behind a legacy that most of us won’t appreciate until we’re older.  He will be missed.

Bold and Unfounded 2012 predictions;

• Cyber-security: If you thought 2011 was bad, just wait for this year.  The attacks of 2011 are just a precursor to what I think will happen in 2012.  Techniques funded by the state will become more sophisticated and dangerous.  Stubborn companies that still think “Password1” is secure will reap the reward for being so foolish.  With the growing pervasiveness of social media, social engineering will become more prevalent. 2012 will make the attacks seem elementary and childish in comparison.
• Europe:  The collapse of the Euro will be an unmitigated disaster.
• 2012 Elections: More hot air and BS than ever.  The outcome will only contribute to rise of increased disillusionment with the political system amongst the general population.
• I might actually take a vacation this year

So I’m uneasily looking forward to 2012.  There are still opportunities to be had, difficult people to love, and lessons to be learned.  May 2012 afford you a few more moments of peace, grace, and joy.

Cheers,

Jeremy

Forward Is Good

Every year, I get together with three guys to play in the Annual Bay Hills Classic.  With exception of one in our party, we all are miserable at golf.  And while the name might sound a tad fancy, the event is anything but.  There is a good amount of beer drinking, cigar smoking, and tee shots into the trees.  Regardless it’s a grand time of which we look forward to every year.  Often times, one of us will hit a shot so poorly that it manages to only advance a few feet.  The good golfer of the group has a saying that we use incessantly, “Forward Is Good”.  While we use it mainly to playfully mock each other, the heart of the saying has a greater virtue.  The saying was taught to my friend by his grandfather when he was just learning on how to play the game.  My friends grandfather used it to encourage him that every shot closer was indeed closer that you were before.  Forward is good.

Somehow that saying has found its way into other aspects of my life.  Whether playing a bad game of golf or adding just a little bit more to a savings account, forward is good.  Most recently, I find myself pondering these words in relation to my work.

Out of the places I’ve worked in my short lifetime, non have presented the challenges I’ve faced being a contractor for the US Govt.  The agency I work for seems to be allergic to competency, efficiency, or ingenuity.  Today seemed to be no exception.  All of a sudden projects scheduled to take six months now had to be done by now, stat, asap….  Instead of set of documented approval processes, there are now 3.  Not only that but the whole organization was going to realign.  When or how is anyone’s guess.

For a while, I was just angry, upset with the situation and seemingly impossible tasks at hand.  I thought grabbing the good ol resume and casting it out there to see if I could any bites.   It wasn’t until I drove home that it dawned on me I have an incredible opportunity.  It’s not every day you get asked to throw together and deploy a Continuation of Operations Plan within a couple of months time.  Or deploy a dmz and public facing web application with no available infrastructure or support. Daunting and initially overwhelming…yes.  Will I want to slam my heads through a wall at times? Counting on it.  Is it doable? Yes.  Beneficial? Yes

I generally believe that when faced with challenges in life, we can gird up our loins like a man or run away from them like sir robin.  So tonight, I look at these projects and issues and think “Forward is Good”.  I’m going to learn something and be a better man for it at the end of the day.  So the next time your playing golf or rolling your eyes at management’s latest IT debacle, remember…Forward is Good.

Cheers,

Jer

Cisco UCS Adventure – And So It Begins

It’s been quite some time.  Figured now would be a good time to get started again.

I write another blog on how we got here, but last week we got a lovely shipment of our new Cisco UCS servers.

Servers & a bunch of dead tree

We choose UCS for a few reasons.  Obviously, since we’re talking federal government, cost played the primary factor in the deciscion.  From a gadget guy, UCS has a lot to offer.  The performance, management features, and configuration leverage options are very appealing.  I’ll be documenting the deployment and configuration of the system over the next few weeks months.

Reboot

I’ve had this blog for almost three years.  Looking back, I felt that most of my posts were garbage.  So naturally, I deleted them.  I hope to use this blog more as I try to leverage the ever changing landscape of technology and social media in more productive and innovative ways.  And in case you are worried, let me put your fears at ease.  I will still be posting poorly written and completely unfounded thoughts.  But now those thoughts will encompass many other topics besides religion with a focus on technology and sports.  Tune in soon.

College is Silly (just joking but seriously)

I stumbled on this article today and thought I share it with everyone.   It shares a story about an individual who writes thousands of college papers for cheating students from undergrads to PHD dissertations.   For me, it brings up a topic that I’ve been slightly annoyed with…college.   I believe college is important but in ways, overrated.

I am incredibly lucky and blessed to have the job I have.  I have no certifications or formal education but I’m in charge of  data center, albeit a small one.  I got this job through my experience and hard work.  However, if I where to apply for a new job, I would probably get pummeled by another applicant simply because he went to college and has the degree or as I call it, the golden ticket.  I’ve met plenty of “college” guys in the tech industry.  More than not, they are awful.  Even though they are certified and “educated”, I’m the one bailing them out.   They are ones calling me when they are stuck.  I’m the one that people call, when they need a job done right and quickly.  Yet, they are the ones getting promoted and receiving a higher salary.  As referenced in the article, I have bosses in which I seriously doubt could write a coherent sentence in an email.

This dichotomy fuels my love/hate  of college. Having that golden ticket, increases your likely hood of getting a job.  That golden ticket helps you get promoted and gets you a higher salary.  Yet, as the article showed, you can be an absolute lazy incompetent moron and still get a college degree.  Regardless of how annoyed I can get, the reality still exists.  If I really want to excel in today’s workforce, I need the credentials.  That’s why I’m taking my first certification test in February.  That’s why I’m hoping to have a number of certification under my belt by the end of this year.  Maybe some day, I’ll actually get a golden ticket of my own.   At least I know I can pay a guy to write my papers.

Peace and Love,

Jeremy

Is Google Making Us Stupid?

My good pal sent me an article, Is Google Making Us Stupid? Essentially, the article talks about how in the age of twitter and Facebook, our brains, and more specifically our ability to sit and focus on one item for an extended period of time, has become severely atrophied.

Think about it.  When was the last time you went to a web page and read the entire thing?  How many seconds does it for your mind to wander when you sit down to read a book or a magazine article, or dare I say, a blog posting?

Being in the technology industry, I’ve found more websites are restructuring themselves so that the information their pages present can be consumed and processed in seconds.  Take this website for example…http://teixido.co/

After quite a long time, I finally forced myself to sit down and read a book I received for Christmas.  It took me 30 minutes to wrestle through 10 pages.  I constantly found myself drifting off to another subject or reading a paragraph and realizing I hadn’t actually read it at all.  It’s somewhat ironic as the book I’m reading talks about the daily practices in life that shape our being.  Like working out or a strict diet, reading takes time and practice to become proficient at it.

I’m curious to what the future will bring and how technology will shape it.  Can’t you just see in 20 years teens who rebel against using the web because its way cooler to read on paper.  Some I’m wrestling with is how we dissect and process information a bad thing?  Just as we diet and exercise our bodies, should we now take time to put our brains on a diet and exercise plan?  Or did you even read this far in the blog to care?

Love and Peace,

Jeremy