People Do Not Buy Computers

People do not buy computers.

People do not buy laptops.

People do not buy software.

People do not buy cell phones or iPhones

People do not buy iPods.

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People do buy ways to communicate with friends, family and work.

People do buy tools to help them get work done.

People do buy information.

People do buy convenience.

People do buy things that make them feel good.

Email is Dead

Email is dead. 

The new email is Instant Messaging.

The new email is writing a blog.

The new email is Facebook.

The new email is twitter.

The new email is my phone.

Email as we’ve known it is dead.

I use email for communications I want documented at work. That’s about it.

What do you use email for ?

Is IT embracing this change ?

Did Apple Test the iPhone 4 ?

The recently reported iPhone 4 problems make me think of testing. Did Apple know about these problems before the new iPhone was released ? Did they know about the problem but did not understand the severity ? Or did they just miss the boat completely and had no idea of the issues ? All good questions for the iPhone engineering and testing teams.

Testing can be really, really hard. Test plans, test cases, automation, bugs, triage, and all the other test activities can really bog down a tester. It’s really easy to miss something.

What’s the lesson here ? Testing needs to focus on the basic use cases. Does the phone work when I call someone ? Does it work when I hold it in these different positions. These are basic use cases that needed to be tested over and over again. All the other tests are important but if the basic functionality does not work then the other extras don’t matter.

July Website Meter

Here is the July website meter for our top 27.

Bing.com, ebay.com, espn.go.com, go.com, google.com, healthvault.com, hi5.com and wordpress.com all turned in a perfect month with zero recorded delivery issues during July.

Facebook.com was our lowest performer for July falling below 99% delivery.

Visit here for historical tracking data and more information on the website meter.

Write the Test Plan First

How many times does IT make a change only to find out afterwards that something broke? There was some application, some protocol or other dependency that was not supported with the latest change and a fire-drill is created to fix it. Sometimes the fix is to modify the just released change, rollback the change, or update the dependency to work with the new change.

The business and customers are typically impacted by these kinds of failures. The IT team is also impacted as they spend time in a reactive mode and never getting ahead of the curve.

One way to improve the quality of IT changes is to document the technical success and failure criteria of a change before executing a change. In engineering this is called a test plan. It can be as simple as a checklist. Teh most effective tests focus on the business use cases. For example, if a router is being upgraded that connects a website to a remote distribution center a success criteria (test plan) might include validating with the distribution center that they are receiving orders from the website.

Virtualization: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

Virtualization changes expectations.  In customer eyes that translates to free and now. While it is true that virtualization should lower overall IT cost and allow for faster deployments there are challenges. In comparison to the traditional physical IT world, virtualization has some similar costs and even new costs.

The Good:

Properly designed virtualization systems can take a huge step towards lowering IT costs.

• System resources can be used more effectively. For example, instead of 20 servers using 15% of systems resource, virtualizing those systems may only need 5 servers running 60% utilization. This also can translate into lower power consumption.
• Increase the number of ‘servers’ an SE can manage. Wouldn’t it be great if an SE could manage 200, 300, or more  servers ? The SE will spend less time managing HW and more time working on infrastructure projects and patch management.
• Lower deployment costs. Virtualizationcan provide the ability to provision pre-configured images with operating systems and applications very quickly.
• Simpler fault tolerance and disaster recovery. Images of systems can be stored for quick recovery in the event of failure.

The Bad:

• Some typical IT costs still apply – patching and system updates. And here’s the rub, those host systems now become really critical so coordinating downtime for patching becomes more difficult. Virtualization manufacturers have solutions but it means investing more in the virtualization infrastructure in terms of fault tolerance.
• Higher get-in-the-game costs. Creating a scalable and per-formant infrastructure will cost money and increase the initial cost to get setup. Shared storage (aka SAN) will be the largest cost driver. However, cost will be recovered quickly as more virtual machines are provisioned.

The Ugly:

Improperly designed virtualization infrastructures can actually increase costs.

• System complexity. These systems are complex and the systems engineers need to understand the full stack to design, implement and administer.
• When a virtualization host goes down it’s possible all the VMs hosted on that server will also go down. This is like losing a network device and having a significant number of your servers go offline. There are solutions but again the system needs to be designed properly.
• Expectation setting. It’s easy for incorrect expectations to be set when virtualization is available. From a project point of view, treat provisioning a VM just like physical, and know the steps and time-lines for the provisioning process and communicate appropriately to the customer.

So in summary, lot of good stuff and some bad and ugly. In general, virtualization is like any IT project — done correctly it will produce big returns and done poorly will be the next water-cooler joke.

Windows Phone 7 Preview Pictures

Found these awesome pictures of the Windows Phone 7 that is now out for technical preview.

http://www.zdnet.com/photos/image-gallery-90-images-of-microsoft-windows-phone-7-technical-preview/445782

Paint.Net

Paint.Net is a free imaging tool with a ton of features.

I’m not a graphics guy but there are times when I need an imaging editor that has more power than Microsoft Paint. Paint.Net is an easy to use program with features that that are easy to use. Jumping between images, resizing, layering and using the built in adjustments and effects are all easy to do. Plus, there is a great forum to ask questions and learn how to use Paint.Net.

Paint.Net is a toolbox essential for anyone that needs to do non-professional graphic design.

Is IT ready for Mobile ?

Mobile phones remind me of 1997.

In 1997 DSL and other high speed Internet options were starting to become available through the phone and cable companies.  High speed Internet really enabled  businesses to deliver their products and services to users through the web.

Today, we are seeing a similar evolution for mobile phones and the services that can be delivered to them. The introduction of 3G in the early 2000′s increased the network speed dramatically.  Phones are now being produced to take advantage.

IT managers need to be on the lookout for new technologies and technology shifts that affect their business. Enabling new technologies  is one way that IT can impact their business to increase sales or lower costs.  Having vision to prepare IT for the next business need is another positive business  impact IT can provide.

Change the Oil

For the past 5 years I have been using a yard service to mow the lawn at my rental property. This year I decided to do the yard work myself. I dusted off the old lawnmower that has been stored on the property and sure enough it didn’t start. I brought it home and after an hour of tinkering I decided to change the oil. The oil change took about 15 minutes and to my surprise the lawnmower started easily. Since then, I’ve done a few other maintenance items and the mower doesn’t run great but it does the job.

This experience reminds me how regular hygiene for any device or activity keeps the engine running well. Atrophy eventually sits in the longer anything sits.  This is very true with servers and systems. Software patching, monitoring and upgrades keep systems healthy. Once a system gets out of date it has incresed security vulnerabilites and may be incompatible with with latest software or hardware upgrades.

The mower is still running and more importantly cutting the grass. Eventually, it will be time for a new one but for now an oil change was just what was needed.