Author Archives: M@

Grading Sucks

Posted on April 2, 2008 by M@

Multiple choice or fill-in-the-blank questions are probably easy – Very black and white. Subjective grading of projects and papers just completely sucks. I have students who I know busted their hump and did a lot of research and probably learned … Continue reading →

Posted in Life, Work | 9 Comments

Critical vs. Important vs. *Yawn*

Posted on March 17, 2008 by M@

I have written previously about how my priorities are set. But what about service criticality? Which services do we care about 24×7 vs 8×5 vs 0x0? Well it looks awful similar. The most critical services we have, in general, our … Continue reading →

Posted in Work | Leave a comment

EXT4, AKA "Watching M@ Wrestle His Demons"

Posted on March 10, 2008 by M@

As someone with a history in filesystems, I have kept abreast of the EXT4 developments, most recently, an interview with Eric Sandeen on the topic, from an RH/Fedora angle. EXT4 will have lots of features new to EXT3 (as well … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Linuxy | Leave a comment

Dear Asshole,

Posted on March 9, 2008 by M@

You may have thought it was amusing to book a week at a posh Malaysian resort with my credit card. You may have thought yourself shrewd because you tactfully made the reservation the first day of the new billing cycle, … Continue reading →

Posted in Life, Rants/Tirades | 1 Comment

Back to Billboarding

Posted on March 4, 2008 by M@

Billboarding used to be the way to share groups of read-heavy bit or small-byte data across numerous processes or systems. The concept was simple: Have a file with a bunch of zeros in it, and on occasion change one of … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Linuxy | Leave a comment

On Lying

Posted on March 2, 2008 by M@

So I was reading in NYMag about lying, then I went over to Bruce Schneier’s blog and he quoted the same article, so for the sake of modding up this article on the Intertubes, I figured I’d link them in.  … Continue reading →

Posted in General, Life | Leave a comment

All IMAP Servers Are Not Created Equal

Posted on February 22, 2008 by M@

Many moons ago, we decided to move away from the old standard POP -based e-mail, and offer/promote IMAP instead. The paradigms are drastically different. With POP, users log in and [are supposed to] download their mail to their local computer. … Continue reading →

Posted in Linuxy, Opinions, Work | 1 Comment

Relative Labor Value: Aka Stars Amongst Superstars

Posted on February 18, 2008 by M@

I had an interesting conversation over the weekend with a couple old friends. It’s an ages-old topic, and I don’t pretend to be profound in my revelations, on it. But it’s come up in a number of areas in my … Continue reading →

Posted in Life, Opinions, Work | 1 Comment

What Bruce Said

Posted on January 15, 2008 by M@

I agree completely.

Posted in Life, Linuxy, Opinions | Leave a comment

Happy New Year

Posted on January 1, 2008 by M@

This year, please remember: If at first you don’t succeed, you fail. Stop whining about it, just man-up and move forward.

Posted in General, Life | Leave a comment