Better Living Through Thinking

A conversation at the printer

Tue, 24 Apr 2007

Person: (taking my printout off the printer tray) "Cool! Numbers. Hex. Right? Are these hex numbers?"

Me: "Octal."

Person: "Oh, right, of course, because there's no letters. (slight pause) What *is* this?"

Me: "It's an octal dump of the taskstats struct in our kernel."

Person: (with an intelligent and approving smile) "Fun!" (slowly turns and walks away).

Why Buy an Apple Macintosh?

Fri, 16 Dec 2005

Someone asked me recently if they should get a Mac for their next computer. I practically choked evangelizing my pro-mac views (I'm a recent convert to the Church of Mac: August 2004).

I think the next time I'm asked that, I'll just answer with another question:

...

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Independent Viewpoint of Katrina Preparation and Recovery

Fri, 23 Sep 2005

My good friend Mark Dallon works for the BLM in Wyoming (Worland, of all places). He was sent to Mississippi two weeks ago to help with recovery as part of a saw team, equipped to clear fallen trees, etc.

Mark observes several things: First, news reports should not be taken at face value as fact.

Second, local governments (city, county, state) who should have been responsible for disaster preparation were completely unprepared and ...

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Upper Management as a Circus

Thu, 12 May 2005

This is not a commentary about my own upper management, whom I think is wonderful. This is about the upper management of a friend of mine who I'll call Bryan.

Senior management is like a travelling circus. They come into town, put on a big show, support each other, give each other promotions and raises, etc. Keep moving things around, but never really do anything of direct value to the company.

...

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Toaster Technology

Mon, 21 Jun 2004

People want their computers to be like toasters: simple--just put some bread in it, push a lever down and wait for nice things to happen to the bread.

Large vendors such as Apple and Microsoft has done a fantastic job of making people believe that a staggeringly complex piece of hardware and software is as easy to use as a toaster.

The price of this simplicity, of course, is that people who can do ...

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How to Run a Company

Mon, 24 May 2004

1. decide what kind of company you want to be. a) a company that does what all the other companies do and competes by finding efficient processes to do things everyone else can do already, or b) a company that innovates and finds solutions to problems that no one else has done before.
2. if you chose a), move ahead 3 spaces. You will be able to enter any market with a low barrier-to-entry by hiring cheap labor and buying ...

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   [ category: /observations | link: company ]

Where Yes-Men Come From

Fri, 14 May 2004

People who lack talent or creativity are quick to fall into line with management and become "yes-men". Eager to prove their "worth" as non-thinking agents of the higher power, they quickly respond to all requests, foolish or no, with zeal and see those who do not respond with the same enthusiasm as a threat and a curiosity.