Google Glitches

As if we need more bad omens in these tarnished times.

PDQ From SourceForge

Thoughly fed up doing mind-numbing company income taxes for 2008 (Yes, I have to do them earlier than most to get my 1099s out to sub-contractors), I decided to take a break and see if I could compile PDQ (Pretty Damn Quick) by downloading it from our SourceForge project onto my new Macbook.

When BRisk Goes Bust

In a nice counterpoint to my previous post on BRisk Management, the latest director of Europe's new atom-smasher (the LHC, which I'll be talking about next week), says he will be more cautious than his predecessor, following the very public failure last September.

An ultra-cold, superconducting magnet on the big ring, collapsed only days after the \$10 billion LHC was switched on and will require more than \$26 million in repairs. With that price tag (even though it's only half what Wall St. paid itself in bonuses last year---for assessing BRisk rather than risk?), the pressure is on for these guys to produce. So, it's not too surprising that the new director said:

"The LHC will be double checked by outside experts before any attempt is made to switch the machine back on, probably in July. I want to be sure that everything works, so I'll also let an external group make additional checks on the accelerator."

Let's compare and contrast with the Bay Bridge situation, shall we? According to the SF Chron:

"...the inspection outfit that sounded the alarm has since been replaced."

In other words, the independent, external inspectors, for the Bay Bridge welds, were terminated for being too pernickety, which would inflate the CalTrans schedule.

Nothing like a good failure to reduce the risk in BRisk. I just hope I'm not on the Bay Bridge when it happens.

Update: To catch up to its 2010 milestones, it has since been decided that the LHC will remain running, continuously, for one year after it's rebooted this summer.

BRisk Management

In my upcoming Guerrilla Boot Camp class, I have a whole bit on Risk Management vs. Risk Perception. The point being that if you, as the performance analyst/capacity planner in your organization, don't appreciate the perspective of your manager, you are going to find yourself very frustrated when certain of your recommendations seem to fall on deaf ears.

Most managers are employed to look after one thing: schedules. If a manager perceives that your performance recommendation could inflate the schedule, it ain't gonna happen (no matter how sane or realistic it might be). I reinforce this perspective by saying:

Managers will let a project fail. As long as it fails on time!

This may sound a bit melodramatic but here is a statement of precisely that type:

"I can understand people being worked up about safety and quality with the welds," said Steve Heminger, executive director ... "But we're concerned about being on schedule because we are racing against the next earthquake."

This is a quote from an executive manager for the new Bay Bridge currently being constructed between Oakland and San Francisco. A section of the upper deck collapsed on this bridge during the Loma Prieta earthquake of 1989.

He's not an IT manager, but he is watching the clock and saying, let's increase the risk that the new bridge will fail (by being brisk about welding inspections), in order to beat the much lower risk that the old bridge might fail again in a quake. Substitute your favorite project, product or application, for the word "bridge" and you get my drift.

Updateof May 2013

The original high-risk Caltrans decision has prompted Gov. Jerry Brown to threaten delaying the scheduled Labor Day opening of the new Bay Bridge span. Erm... so, how did this brisk management decision save time (and money)?

Update of August 16, 2013

The on again, off again, new Bay Bridge opening is on again. As you can probably tell from this KALW piece, there is some skepticism regarding the rationale. [emphasis mine]

"the cracked bolts in the new bridge are apparently better than the totally unsafe old bridge, which wouldn't survive a minor earthquake. ... Experts say the old bridge is extremely unsafe, and won't hold through even a moderate earthquake."

Rubbish! Nothing has really changed significantly on the old bridge structure. This is all about saving political face (and possibly the $20 million contractor bonus). Would I drive the new span? Possibly. But more likely, I'd take BART (via the trans-Bay tube). :)

NorCal CMG Meeting Feb 3, 2009

If you're in the neighborhood, I'll be giving two talks:

1. "Mongo Measurement Requires Mongo Capacity Management"
   
2. "The Apdex Index Revealed"
   

at the next meeting of the Northern California Computer Measurement Group.

New Quantum Camera

Information is physical because it takes energy to create it and transform it. Instead of the digital bits that you're used to thinking about in the terrestrial computing world, quantum information technologies (QIT) involve encoding information as quantum bits or qubits. The photon has turned out to be a very amenable quantum particle for encoding qubits. For anyone following my progress in the world of QIT, here's the latest. Our invited paper: "A Quantum Imager for Intensity Correlated Photons," which describes a new type of camera has now been published in the European open-access publication New Journal of Physics.

Intel Still Tick-Tocking AMD

As I mentioned at CMG 2008, and also in my Guerrilla Boot Camp classes, it's important to keep your eye on the various twists and turns in the technology marketplace, so that you are not broadsided when it comes to things like server procurement. One example I referred to is the very aggressive microprocessor technology roadmap that Intel is pursuing; something they call "tick-tock".

Although I'm not tracking these events as closely as I was last year (when Intel was racing toward 45 nm parts), it looks like AMD microprocessor fabrication is essentially 1 yr behind Intel. One way this leapfrogging occurs is due to full automation. Intel can go from lab to fab essentially in one shot by uploading their lab "recipes" into the production chip fabrication line. They claim to have 32 nm working in the lab already and are planning to ship parts in 4Q09.

Update: In spite of that, Intel 4Q08 profits plunged by 90 percent.

Update: In related news, world-wide desktop PC sales have taken a pounding.