Saint Vitus’ Cathedral

April 25, 2011 By Stephen Leave a Comment

GPS Time Rollover Failures Keep Happening (But They’re Almost Done)

This is week “1111111111” in the GPS system. Tomorrow morning it will roll over to week “0000000000”. How well will various systems handle this change? Not well, judging by what we’ve seen so far!

Ranting and Raving About the 2018 iPad Pro

I remain enthusiastic about the iPad Pro, despite getting a scratched screen and my concerns about durability. It’s a worthy successor to the original and offers enough improvements that I’d recommend the upgrade for just about anyone who uses their iPad for serious work. It’s still not yet a laptop replacement, but this is due more to a lack of desktop-class software for iOS than anything in Apple’s control.

Why Are PCIe SSDs So Fast?

June 12, 2013

The world of storage can be confusing, with obscure terms hiding massive differences in technology and performance. Such is the case for the latest PCI express SSDs: They are much faster than traditional SAS or SATA SSDs, but many aren’t sure exactly why. In this article, I will try to explain the real difference.

Why I Am Biased Against FCoE

October 21, 2011

I am biased against FCoE because it’s too new to be blithely and broadly recommended for production enterprise use. That’s all. Yes, the standards are standardized and there are products extant. But that’s not enough for me.

Aerobie AeroPress Review: The Hacker Coffee Maker

February 7, 2011

Computer geeks like me love coffee, the stronger the better. We computer folks are also known for experimentation and a do it yourself ethic. Some of us even love to get outdoors and toss around a flying disc or football. What happens when you mash up all of this? You get the Aerobie AeroPress, the hacker coffeemaker.

Are You a Hypervisor Hugger or a Storage Stalwart?

November 14, 2011

The time has come to take sides on the core question of storage for virtual servers: Do you want storage intelligence to live in the hypervisor or the array? Most administrators are already lining up on one side or the other, unintentionally casting their vote while the rest flounder. But the storage industry must wake up and embrace the divide.

Why You Should Never Again Utter The Word, “CIFS”

February 16, 2012

CIFS is not the network storage protocol used by Microsoft Windows, and many other clients. The protocol used to share files over a LAN by the majority of personal computers is called SMB. I wish everyone in the industry would get that through their heads.

Scaling Storage In Conventional Arrays

November 19, 2013

It is amazing that something as simple-sounding as making an array get bigger can be so complex, yet scaling storage is notoriously difficult. Our storage protocols just werenâ€™t designed with scaling in mind, and they lack the flexibility needed to dynamically address multiple nodes. So my hat is off to these companies and others who have come up with clever ways to maintain compatibility while scaling out beyond the bounds of a single storage array.

Thinking About Storage In a New Way, From Cloud to Flash, with Dropbox and Fusion-io

July 23, 2013

I’ve been a storage revolutionary for quite a while, looking for new ways of data storage rather than technologies that perpetuate the same old approaches. That’s why I’m excited about the implications of two very different API access methods announced by Dropbox at DBX and by Fusion-io today at OSCON.

United Boeing 787 Dreamliner: Butt-In-Seat Economy Plus Review!

November 13, 2012

Most of my readers know that I love getting my hands on the latest high-tech products. But, last week, I spent a few hours insideï»¿ one of the latest and greatest products on earth: United’s latest Boeing 787 “Dreamliner” composite jet! Here’s my “butt-in-seat” review!

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