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30 Jun 10 | How Google Will Ruin the Cloud
I really enjoy having access to my stuff in the cloud. Docs I can pull down anywhere, anytime, mail that isn’t tied down to a single machine, etc.
Unfortunately, there are problems with the cloud, and with handing off services to companies like Google, which most of us aren’t thinking of.
Over the past couple months I have had 4 major problems big cloud based services. In each case, save one, it was impossible to get actual customer service from the company to resolve the issue. Not only could I not get a person on the phone to fix my problem, there wasn’t an email, or in fact, any way whatsoever to contact the people responsible for the service.
Now I am not talking about Joe’s Web Service and Tattoo Palor. I am talking about Google and Yahoo, and their services FeedBurner, Picasa and Flickr. It wasn’t like I was asking the world, simply to get access to my content, account, etc. and in each case I was unsuccessful at getting any level of response.
None…zip…nadda.
So ask yourself, how will you feel when you go to fire up your big presentation at ToolCamp 2014 and you find you can’t access, then to compound the problem, you find that you cannot even get email support, much less someone on the phone.
Its widely known in technology circles that Google hates people. They don’t want to interact with us on a personal level at all, preferring to let us talk to each other in Google Groups. This is all fine and dandy, right up until the point that they have something wrong in their system that needs to be corrected.
The model cannot work. We shouldn’t accept it, and we certainly shouldn’t count on it. The cloud is powerful, but its doomed if we’re expected to fly without a customer support net. No matter how good your system is, its going to have problems and at that point you (Mr. Google) need to actually talk to the customers you just screwed, so you can fix their problems.
Don’t hold your breath.
Updated to WordPress 3.0
Nothing major, just did a quick backup then hit the upgrade button. While things may have changed significantly in the backend code, there really isn’t much to show you here.
- WordPress MU (the multiblog variant of WordPress that is used on WordPress.com) is now built into the maintstream code. Thus endeth the tyranny of MU, a code branch I personally despised.
- Custom menus make it really easy to create a special nav menu. I’ve already used this, and it’s a nice feature.
- They finally let you pick your own username and password for the admin user during installation. Seems like a little thing, but it’s been a system issue since day one with legions of users forgetting to either change the admin user password or to write it down.
- Custom Post Types and Custom Taxonomies – I haven’t used either, but I suspect that I will soon. Both of these are hardcore CMS functions.
- Scads of new hooks and functions for plugin and theme developers.
Thoughts on Hitting the Half Century Mark
It’s official, I’m now 50 years old. So get off my lawn, ya darned hippies! Get a haircut!
The transition to “grumpy old man Cahill” is now pretty much complete. In addition to a new found desire to buy a straw fedora, drive 40 in the fast lane on the Pike, and hit the early bird special at Denny’s, I’ve also got some advice for all you young whippersnappers
- Get better by being better – talking about it is one thing. Actually making the changes that are needed to improve is much harder. In the long run, the harder route is often the best.
- Surround yourself with the best – you can’t do it all, so try to have the best team around you.
- Find a mentor and be a mentor – I’ve been lucky to have had some great people like David Churbuck, Max Jordan, Marcel Badowski, Ed Andrews and others help me in the past. I try to return the favor every chance I get by helping the younger team members.
- Humor helps – there’s so much in life that can tear you apart. Keep your humor and it’ll be that much more bearable.
- Find problems and fix or eliminate them – life’s too short, don’t tolerate the crap. Make it better or make it go away.
- Keep your friends and family close – in the end, the time you spend with them is the time you cherish. Call someone you haven’t talked to in a while today, or better yet, go and see them.
- Crush your enemies coldly and without mercy lest they rise again – what did you expect, all puppies and unicorns? When you need to do something, get it done!
For anyone that’s interested, we’ll be celebrating the birthday Saturday night at the Point Breeze in Webster at 8pm. Come on down if you’re in the area!
My Open Source Web Dev List
Here is the list of stuff I load onto my machine right after firing it up for the first time:
- 7-zip – open source package for handling zip, tar, gzip
- WinSCP – ftp, scp, sftp
- Putty – in case I need to talk to a server, this is my preferred SSH client
- TextPad – all the text editor I need for just about any task. Don’t forget to tell it to syntax highlight PHP and turn on line numbers! (not open source, but cheap and good)
- Mysql Workbench – a nice little tool for MySql admin and query browsing
- Firefox, Safari, Chrome browsers – gotta test in all the browsers!
- Firefox web developer toolbar
- Hex Color Finder – use the dropper to get the hex color of anything on your screen
- Tortoise SVN – my fav svn tool
- OpenOffice – for all the stuff you used to use Windows Office for…
- Gimpshop – taking the place of Photoshop (hint: do not install anywhere other than program files – BE SURE!)
- Irfanview – batch editing photos, contact sheets, etc.
- Handbrake – video editing
- Audacity – Audio editing
- Tweetdeck – twitter client
- Skype – internet phone and chat
That’s it. With all that loaded, I’m ready for 95% of my computing needs. What would you add to the list?
Random Thoughts
A bit of randomness…since I’ve been working like crazy the past two weeks.
- Once again we have a foiled terrorist attack and the media immediately blames the usual suspect, middle age white guys. Talk about racial profiling…
- The striped bass have hit Boston Harbor. Personally, I want to head to the Cape and try the rivers for schoolies this weekend.
- I’m laying off the Red Sox tweets for a while. Still watching the games, but I see we’ve still got exactly the problem we had last year: streaky hitting that makes for decent personal stats and an early Fall golf season for the players.
- I’m shocked and dismayed that everyone is complaining about Arizona trying to enforce immigration law. Who would honestly suggest a full open border policy, especially with the drug crime alone our southern border? When our national government decides it will selectively enforce legally enacted laws, we’ve got a big problem. If immigration law is a problem, fix it, don’t ignore it. It sets an nasty precedent.
- Sutton, MA, where I live has one of the highest property tax rates in the state. They want to build a new high school, and honestly, they need it. The old one is in horrid shape, I’ve been there recently. The funding battle ought to be interesting…
- WordPress 3.0 will be out soon. This merges the WordPress MU fork and regular old WordPress. It ought to be interesting. I am looking forward to getting rid of one MU setup I have laying around in favor of the more familiar main branch of code.
- I’m particularly feeling the lack of a boat this season. I REALLY want to get something…
History Channel tackles “America The Story of Us”
I’m an unabashed history nerd. I love history, and I’ll admit I’ve had a real chip on my shoulder for the History Channel for the past two years, since they stopped doing history and started running shows like “MonsterQuest”, “UFO Hunters” and “Ice Road Truckers”. No offense to those shows, I’m sure they’ve got their audiences, but they most certainly are not history, and neither is most of the other content that’s filling the schedule at History.
Its easy to understand why they’ve gone the route they have. Surely there is a finite market for shows on the Battle of Antietam, or the cumulative affect of the protestant reformation, and yes, even with Dan Brown’s books, we have pretty much exhausted the tales of the Templars.
So it was with an wary eye that I sat down to watch last nights “Amerca The Story of Us“ series.
One first glance, I noticed they played fast and loose. They mentioned Plymouth, they mentioned Jamestown, then they jumped forward to the decade just prior to the Revolutionary War, which would be akin to jumping forward in history from the First World War until now. After all, nothing much to see there.
Then I had issue with the obvious high level view. They had Paul Revere completing his ride to Lexington and Concord, while any self-respecting Bostonian can tell you it was indeed Samuel Prescott that completed the ride, with Paul Revere detained by the British in Lincoln.
It continues that way, jumping from Concord to the Capture of New York. Southerners will delight in getting nary a mention until Yorktown.
Still, the note at the end of the show wraps it all up nicely. They will be providing copies to every school in the country. As such, the show probably hits it’s mark. A high level summary that may, in it’s fast paced vignettes manage to make in roads into the minds of our youth.
The first episode replays Wed. night and it is my intention to make a special evening out of it in the Cahill house with my 10 and 12 year old daughters *(who will sign in unison the second they see the History Channel logo…). I encourage you to consider the same.
This isn’t meant as a authoritative history of us, it is meant more as an entre to the history of us, and in that regard, it hits the mark. We’ll see how my two tweenage critics like it Wed. In fact, perhaps I’ll let them blog their thoughts here.
Aaron Barnhardt *(my go to tv critic) of The Kansas City Star (and TVBarn.com where I grab his stuff…) summed it up nicely:
What is surprising — not to say disorienting for anyone older than 30 — is how shamelessly History has aimed “America: The Story of Us” at Generation ADD.
But that’s for a reason. The channel’s PR department informs us that History “will for the first time offer a DVD of the entire 12-hour series to every single school and accredited college in America — free of charge.”
Lack of posts…
I’ve been ultra-busy as of late. I’ll be posting over the weekend so look forward to some new and substantive content soon.
Friday Music Video – Bow Thayer
Bow Thayer and Perfect Trainwreck performing ” RU Willin”. Bow is simply one of the best musicians I’ve ever heard, and a great guy. Check out his site at http://bowthayer.com/
You just have to love anyone that describes their musical style as “greasy” or “modern mountain”, right?
Show a Little Pride
I’ve been working with software engineers for a long time. The best are all united in one common attribute: pride.
Not pride in the sense of the deadly sin, no, I mean the good kind. The kind that makes them make that extra effort to ensure their product works right, or their website stays up, or their system isn’t going to need constant care and feeding.
Most of these folks (and I say folks as this certainly isn’t males only crowd…) would be utterly chagrined if I called them out here, so I won’t. What I will do is call on everyone else to try to be more like the best. Show the pride in your work!
Some things to do:
- Don’t leave your problems for other people to sort out later.
- If you see something broken, even if it isn’t yours, perhaps you ought to consider fixing it. Or starting the ball rolling towards a resolution…
- Don’t stand for lousy architecture, esp. just because “we don’t have the time to fix it.” We all know you’ll spend more time in the long term maintaining junk.
- Lead by example – show the other team members the way to success, esp. the junior members. At the very least it’s less time you’ll spend in the long term fixing problems they make, but more over, it’s your duty. Someone at sometime helped you…now it’s your turn. Make someone else better!
Further, the general suggestion works well throughout your life. You’ll find yourself much happier when you are proud and help the people around you. Trust me on this…
About Us
I'm Mark Cahill - Online community developer and content management wonk since 1995. I'm interested in new media, communities and social networking, and love saltwater fly fishing. For a longer version, you can read my full about us page.
I am mncahill on Twitter
Email me at allthingscahill at gmail
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