The Vent and Rant Thread

[Katsunami]

Originally Posted by CRussel

[geek rant] WHY IN THE FREAKING WORLD would you create multiple cross-loops to switches in your server room???? The IDIOT that created this mess should have to clean it up! I've lost TWO DAYS of a limited trip trying to sort through this mess. With mislabeled ports, machines no longer in the rack they're documented to, and a total networking MESS. And I wasn't even supposed to have to deal with networking at all! [/geek rant]

What's the problem? It's IT. That's easy. Everybody can do it, because everything you need to know is on Google. Right? I've been told so repeatedly. Networking is even easier; all cables fit everywhere, so you can't even be wrong.

*runs*

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by Hitch

You know...I find that very hard to believe. Not disbelieving you; just...when I view my own life, that seems bizarre. My mother had gorgeous teeth as a teen. Her dentist convinced my grandmother that she needed braces, and from that point forward it was all downhill. Both her parents had their own teeth upon their own demises.

I find the notion there is no genetic component to tooth wear and longevity impossible to believe, but don't assume it necessarily breaks down on geographical or ethnic lines. I suspect I'd discover bad teeth were prevalent in both my mother's and father's family lines, and I simply inherited the pre-disposition.

I will agree that proper dental care from the beginning will go a long way toward preserving teeth,

I had braces as a kid - I simply had too many teeth for the size of my upper jaw, and the answer was to extract a couple and use braces to readjust the positions of the others. (I was sometimes called "bucky" as a small child because of the ferocious overbite braces were intended to correct.)

I had the odd cavity and fillings, too. One difference between current dentistry and what I got as a kid is fillings. Back when, fillings were a silver amalgam. The ones I got more recently were resin composites, packed into the drilled out cavity and bonded with UV. Unfortunately, they never seemed to hold as well as the old silver amalgam, and I had several that simply fell out and had to be replaced.
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Dennis

[CRussel]

Originally Posted by Katsunami

What's the problem? It's IT. That's easy. Everybody can do it, because everything you need to know is on Google. Right? I've been told so repeatedly. Networking is even easier; all cables fit everywhere, so you can't even be wrong.

*runs*

You can run, but you can't HIDE!

Yeah, I know. Just needed to vent a bit. Office full of developers, who all think they know IT.

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by CRussel

[geek rant] WHY IN THE FREAKING WORLD would you create multiple cross-loops to switches in your server room???? The IDIOT that created this mess should have to clean it up! I've lost TWO DAYS of a limited trip trying to sort through this mess. With mislabeled ports, machines no longer in the rack they're documented to, and a total networking MESS. And I wasn't even supposed to have to deal with networking at all! [/geek rant]

Why? Because whoever did it in the first place was an idiot who didn't know what they were doing.

And even a setup properly created may not stay so. Very few appear to be documented, and if they were, it's unlikely the documentation was updated when the installation changed.

At a prior employer, I once had folks from the consultancy that created and built out my employer's WAN show up in my computer room. The first question they asked was "Do you have a network topology map?" I told them I'd been trying to get my hands on one since I came aboard. They created the network in the first place. Didn't they have one? "<mumble> guy who did it out of office...<mumble>" That response was not a surprise.
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Dennis

[Cinisajoy]

Originally Posted by CRussel

You can run, but you can't HIDE!

Yeah, I know. Just needed to vent a bit. Office full of developers, who all think they know IT.

I can loan you some nice VG and RCA cables. I am sure you could find a use for them.

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by CRussel

Yeah, I know. Just needed to vent a bit. Office full of developers, who all think they know IT.

A friend is dealing with that currently. He's essentially in a DevOps role, but is primarily responsible for the architecture his employer builds out for their clients. He's getting increasingly picky about things like holding architecture meetings so the developers understand the underlying issues. Current languages and development environments tend to abstract away the places where problems can occur, and the devs won't be aware of them till something blows up.

I happened to be around when he got a call from the office about holding an online demo. The problem was, the stuff to be demoed was on a server not public facing and accessible from outside. It would be moved to a public-facing server once fully developed. His response was "If you really want to bend over and moon the Internet, "svcadm start apache" will start an Apache instance on the box and let you get to it. But we really need to plan these things and I need to know rather before you want to do a demo for a client..."

He said "The developer who created what was to be demoed is a front-end developer. He works in HTML, CSS, JavaScript and Php. You tell him what kind of website is needed and how it should look and behave, and he'll build one to spec. The security of the system his site will be hosted on is not his problem, and shouldn't be. It's my problem, and people need to learn to talk to me."
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Dennis

[cromag]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

OK, I confess I was only reasoning from my own experience (My first five years were spent in an area with naturally soft water. My milk teeth were terrible. Then we moved to an area with naturally hard water. My adult teeth are OK -- One crown, filled molars, none lost.)

[EDIT: And a brief bit of research (which I should have done before posting!) shows that there is some heritability in tooth decay - the surface structure of the teeth does affect how susceptible they are to decay, and that structure is heritable. Apologies!]
...

Yep. I have enamel dysplasia and passed it along to my kids. (We often laugh about how unfair genetics has been to them!)

On the other hand, they had the benefit of flouride treatment, enamel sealants, etc., and their teeth have fared much (much!) better than mine! Seriously, dental hygienists lectured me on the proper way to brush my teeth at each and every appointment (which were frequent, given the number of cavities I had) even though I insisted that I was brushing them!

When my son was three and problems started showing up the dentist said, "Oh, yeah. Enamel dysplasia. We can handle that."

Gotta love progress!

[cromag]

Originally Posted by ProfCrash

Well, some of us are ADHD and don't realize what we are doing because that is simply how our body/mind works. I normally have some body part in motion and my leg wiggling can be problematic. I enjoy bouncing a ball between my hands but I only do that when I am alone in my office. The people who share an office with me know that they can say "You are shaking the desk" or "Stop with the ball" or whatever else it is that I am doing and I will stop. I also cannot control the loudness of my sneeze and I am a loud sneezer.
...

I am far more ADD than ADHD, but anyone who knows me long enough knows that it it isn't a truck passing by outside, it's me running my knee. Just bring it to my attention and we're good!

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by cromag

Yep. I have enamel dysplasia and passed it along to my kids. (We often laugh about how unfair genetics has been to them!)

On the other hand, they had the benefit of flouride treatment, enamel sealants, etc., and their teeth have fared much (much!) better than mine! Seriously, dental hygienists lectured me on the proper way to brush my teeth at each and every appointment (which were frequent, given the number of cavities I had) even though I insisted that I was brushing them!

When my son was three and problems started showing up the dentist said, "Oh, yeah. Enamel dysplasia. We can handle that."

Gotta love progress!

I certainly do. I date from before flouride treatment, enamel sealants and the like, so I had rather more problems than someone might have currently.

But on different lines, when my mother died, she was legally blind from macular degeneration. She lived in Philadelphia, whose Wills Eye Hospital is one of the premium centers for eye problems in the world, but they had no effective treatment.

I found myself with wet macular degeneration in my right eye, but now there is treatment. In my case, a blood vessel had burst being the retina in the center of my visual field, and distorted the retina. I got injections of Avstatin, a drug originally developed to fight cancer. It stopped the bleeding and shrank the distortion. I still have blurring in that eye, but my brain compensates by using the left eye's vision for that part of what I see. For the most part, I'm unaware of it. (I was amused by the fact that Avstatin is considered an experimental treatment, and I had to sign a form every visit stating I understood that before I could get treatment.)

Going blind when I got old was a background concern given my mother's experience, and vision is entirely too important to me. If I did go blind, I'm not sure how much I'd want to continue living. Knowing that's less likely is a considerable comfort.
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Dennis

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by Hitch

It's a damn good thing, too. Excellent for kids to get a good start. Now...how can we get them to have super teeth, AND a love of reading? :-)

Years back, I was out to dinner with folks at an SF convention. The subject of declining literacy came up.

I asked "How many of you had parents who read to you when you were little kids?" Every hand at the table was raised.

My mother read to me as a toddler. I've always read anything that didn't read me first, and I know where I got the habit. Mom told me when I was older that I got the idea somewhat before I was fully able to do it myself. She'd fast forward in the story she was reading to get me to bed and get on to other chores, and I'd say "No, mommy! You skipped this part!", and point unerringly at the part she'd skipped over.

I contrast that with my SO's bother Bill. He was a voracious reader. His wife was not. He'd come home from work and plunk himself in front of the TV while he waited for dinner. Guess what his sons also did? (I watched his older son go into an alpha trance as soon as the TV was turned on...)

Enormous numbers of folks never learn to see reading as fun. It's a chore they do because they have to, and they do only as much as they have to.

The best way I know to instill a love of reading in kids is to read to them, and demonstrate that it's fun. Learning to read is work, and like any other effort, people need to see a benefit to willingly make the effort.
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Dennis

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by DMcCunney

Years back, I was out to dinner with folks at an SF convention. The subject of declining literacy came up.

<snippage>
The best way I know to instill a love of reading in kids is to read to them, and demonstrate that it's fun. Learning to read is work, and like any other effort, people need to see a benefit to willingly make the effort.
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Dennis

AB-solutely. I genuinely don't recall my mother reading to me, but I know she must have. I was reading at a 3rd- or something grade level when I got to kindergarten. Was already reading middle-reader books by the time I got out of kindergarten. (AND, of course, there was some kindergarten teacher who COMPLAINED to my mother about it. Apparently, I would get restless and antsy when they were singing songs or whatever.)

Hell...I read to the cats daily. While I'm not holding out hope for library cards, I do find unmistakable traces that they've been using the competitive keyboard for SOMETHING. Probably kitty porn, but I can always hope.



Hitch

[Cinisajoy]

Originally Posted by Hitch

AB-solutely. I genuinely don't recall my mother reading to me, but I know she must have. I was reading at a 3rd- or something grade level when I got to kindergarten. Was already reading middle-reader books by the time I got out of kindergarten. (AND, of course, there was some kindergarten teacher who COMPLAINED to my mother about it. Apparently, I would get restless and antsy when they were singing songs or whatever.)

Hell...I read to the cats daily. While I'm not holding out hope for library cards, I do find unmistakable traces that they've been using the competitive keyboard for SOMETHING. Probably kitty porn, but I can always hope.



Hitch

According to my mother I learned to read because she wouldn't read to me as often as I liked. Don't know why she thought she should do silly stuff like cooking and cleaning when she could have been reading to me.
I was either 2 or 3.

[Blossom]

Originally Posted by Cinisajoy

According to my mother I learned to read because she wouldn't read to me as often as I liked. Don't know why she thought she should do silly stuff like cooking and cleaning when she could have been reading to me.
I was either 2 or 3.

Aww how cute! My mother was too busy running her restaurant. I learn to read by watching Sesame Street at 5. My mother never read to me. She sang and horrible so but that's it. Books were frowned upon alot. I didn't have any. I was the kid who sat in the doctor's office reading all the magazines. We were there a alot with my sister's health. I would read anything I could get my hands on.

I remember when I was 7 and we had to pick up this one kid from the library who my mother was babysitting. I never even knew all those books existed. I wanted to read them all! I remember while waiting I had like 50 books all around me on the floor. I was in heaven. I wanted to take them home. lol Mom wouldn't let me. The next year we moved and the new school had all kinds of book fairs, book orders and a library. I'll never forget when I got my first fiction book. It was a story about haunted house called 13 Shadow Lane or something like that. I guess I thought ghosts were cool or something. lol I kept my books at school or in my backpack so they couldn't get accidentally destroyed.

Now I have over 10,000 ebooks and about 1000 physical books. I've made up for my horrible childhood.

Hubby is one who hates reading. He just doesn't see it as fun. He'll read nonfiction but it's not fun for him. The only fiction series I got him to read was Harry Potter and we read that together.

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by Blossom

Now I have over 10,000 ebooks and about 1000 physical books. I've made up for my horrible childhood.

I have rather more than that in both categories. An exact count of the physical books would be tough to do, as many are in boxes in an offsite storage unit. I am double and sometimes triple rowed on the shelves.

Hubby is one who hates reading. He just doesn't see it as fun. He'll read nonfiction but it's not fun for him. The only fiction series I got him to read was Harry Potter and we read that together.

Too many adults never do learn to see reading as fun. It's forced down their throats at school, often in manners that will take any fun out of it, and it's seen as a chore to be done because they have to.

A VP at a bank I used to work for once commented "I haven't read a book since I got out of college." He had a degree from Harvard and a Wharton School MBA, and read an enormous amount. But all of it was work related and generally about finance. He was one of those driven folks who simply didn't have time to read for pleasure. I discovered a while back that he had actually written a book or two, but that didn't happen till long after I knew him.

The Harry Potter books are a bright spot because they got that kind of readership, and were read by enormous numbers of adults as well as the kids that were their intended audience. It was the first fiction a lot of adults actually read for pleasure.

(And Juvenile/YA publishing is an industry bright spot. I was in a mall Barnes and Noble location a while back. It was on two stories, and almost all of the books were upstairs. The ground floor was given over to the cafe, cards, games, magazines and gifts - stuff that sold. The only books downstairs were current Juvenile/YA hardcover bestsellers. If that store only sold books, they'd have long since been out of business.)
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Dennis

[Katsunami]

Originally Posted by Blossom

Aww how cute! My mother was too busy running her restaurant. I learn to read by watching Sesame Street at 5. My mother never read to me. She sang and horrible so but that's it. Books were frowned upon alot...

...

Now I have over 10,000 ebooks and about 1000 physical books. I've made up for my horrible childhood.

Hubby is one who hates reading...

In my family, my mother and aunt are the only ones who sometimes read; only 2-4 books a year, but still. No one else ever touches anything that takes longer than 5 minutes to read.

Often, I have the idea that my family members hate me, because I'm the only one with the necessary patience and concentration arc to have hobbies such as reading, and playing Chess and Go. They wonder how I can 'do nothing' for such a long time.

The one thing I'm always hearing is: "I don't know what to do. There is nothing to do. There's nothing on TV. I'm bored."

And still, they ask how I can 'do nothing.' I read books. I play Chess. I play Go. I (try to) play the organ and piano. Sometimes I even listen to music. (This means: listen to music being the activity; not just having music playing in the background.) I'm studying for an extra master degree. I have a lot to do on the computer, such as organizing my e-books and ripped music (still not done after two years; hell of a lot of work to get everything tagged to perfection).

This, together with doing my normal household, would be enough to fill up the next 20 years of my life. It actually often feels that going to work is like pausing my 'real' life for 10 hours.

I don't have time to be bored...