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Did you consider that when there is a manual process it is in place to bring combined attention to what surely is (by 2019) a critical section: that needs conse

Did you consider that when there is a manual process it is in place to bring combined attention to what surely is (by 2019) a critical section: that needs consensus not provided by some monitoring hook. Sure, everything is about automation and it has been since 1999 in my experience.

jordanbeiber 8y ago
Of course. I’ve been employed and consulted enterprise IT&Dev for almost 20 years. The amount of people heating office spaces at your non-tech large enterprise is astounding in my opinion. I enjoy discussing the reasons for this, but it’s a lenghty one! In super-short: lack of competency, meaning IT support and tools are not used even remotely optimal. This lack of competency, which starts at the top, results in laughable lead times for the simplest of tasks and processes. This in turn has resulted in mass outsourcing and off-shoring of a bunch of tasks (processes) that really should have been automated years ago. Usually the incentive to improve this is 0 with these ”service providers” and things detoriate even further. The sad state of affairs is that many believe this is the way ”IT” works — slow and error prone. Awesome example: one place, one of the 500s, built an on-prem ”cloud” within a business unit. Over 2000 physical xen hosts. I wanted them to apply a patch. They refused. The last patch had taken 6 months to roll out. The process was: ssh to server, scp patch, run sudo install patch. The entire operation was bought by a renowned ”service provider”. Ouch. I could talk about this for weeks! Of course there are those that manage an awesome shop, but my experience is that this is usually isolated teams that are somewhat shielded from the crazyness of big money politics.
- jordanbeiber 8y ago
  Also, David Greaber has some points with his ”Bullshit Jobs”. I personally believe a society built on and around services in the end need either massive amounts of bullshit jobs or basic income of some sort.
- romeisendcoming 8y ago
  Agreed with your experiences. Identified my niche a long time ago in HPC and scientific development enterprise and core internet services (DNS, IP routing) + security (even though snake oil is big in sec now). The type of incompetence you describe doesn't flourish in these domains.

jordanbeiber 8y ago

Of course. I’ve been employed and consulted enterprise IT&Dev for almost 20 years. The amount of people heating office spaces at your non-tech large enterprise is astounding in my opinion. I enjoy discussing the reasons for this, but it’s a lenghty one! In super-short: lack of competency, meaning IT support and tools are not used even remotely optimal. This lack of competency, which starts at the top, results in laughable lead times for the simplest of tasks and processes. This in turn has resulted in mass outsourcing and off-shoring of a bunch of tasks (processes) that really should have been automated years ago. Usually the incentive to improve this is 0 with these ”service providers” and things detoriate even further. The sad state of affairs is that many believe this is the way ”IT” works — slow and error prone. Awesome example: one place, one of the 500s, built an on-prem ”cloud” within a business unit. Over 2000 physical xen hosts. I wanted them to apply a patch. They refused. The last patch had taken 6 months to roll out. The process was: ssh to server, scp patch, run sudo install patch. The entire operation was bought by a renowned ”service provider”. Ouch. I could talk about this for weeks! Of course there are those that manage an awesome shop, but my experience is that this is usually isolated teams that are somewhat shielded from the crazyness of big money politics.

jordanbeiber 8y ago
Also, David Greaber has some points with his ”Bullshit Jobs”. I personally believe a society built on and around services in the end need either massive amounts of bullshit jobs or basic income of some sort.
romeisendcoming 8y ago
Agreed with your experiences. Identified my niche a long time ago in HPC and scientific development enterprise and core internet services (DNS, IP routing) + security (even though snake oil is big in sec now). The type of incompetence you describe doesn't flourish in these domains.