Hmm ... I am definitely not a car lover (btw that's both my wife's and my father-in-law's biggest disappointment in me ) but hey, when a 76 year old leader is upstaged from the market, one has to sit up and take notice ...
Thats about Toyota finally getting ahead of GM in global vehicle sales. Okay quickly, Toyota just managed 2.35 million to GM's global 2.26 ... so GM who has been the world leader for 76 years may just come back ... But this quarter atleast Toyota is the world leader. My friend Yash, who loves his Toyota is going to be happy over this ...
Me? I still am a Maruti-Esteem fan (thats my first and ex-car) & would go for a Nissan Pathfinder as and when I get a driving license here in Kuwait ... Aha ! But that driving license is another story altogether ...
Btw this story about cars made me remember how my best friend Navin used to be all crazy about good looking cars when we were kids ... Hes in Oregon (hoping that I spelt it right), USA now and I hope he has a great car with him ... Wonder if it is a GM ?
Tuesday, April 24, 2007
Sunday, April 22, 2007
Blackberry blackout
Last week's Blackberry blackout refreshes two important lessons for IT Operations.
First is ofcourse never deploy without adequate testing. RIM went on record to state that the outage on Tuesday/ Wednesday which left millions of users affected was caused by an untested (or atleast 'not tested sufficiently enough') system update. Talk about explanation being worse than crime ...
http://www.topix.net/business/telecom/2007/04/system-update-led-to-blackberry-outage and
http://news.com.com/2100-1039_3-6177829.html?part=rss&tag=2547-1_3-0-20&subj=news
Anyone who feels that testing is so much waste of time and resources (imagine setting up a separate test environment ... and what about all those deadlines) ... should just take a look at what RIM customers are just thinking about ... Blackberry Dependency Re-evaluated After RIM Service Outage ...
Another aspect comes from the following "Blackberry said in a statement that the failure was triggered by 'the introduction of a new, non-critical system routine' designed to increase the system's e-mail holding space. " -- From BBC News Report
Consider the 'non-critical'. If something that affects millions of users is 'non-critical', then there is something seriously wrong with the classification perception.
How is a technology asset classified? Is it on the value of the hardware or the number of lines of code in the software patch ? Or is it on the potential impact to customers or loss of value in business that could be caused by such a failure?
Was there a business owner for this asset who signed-off or approved the application of a change/ update? Was he informed of the "non-critical" classification with a reliable data? Was he involved at all in the classification process?
So many questions. RIM is a great company and I am sure they will already have thought about these and many more things. They will only grow stronger and come back with stronger processes to avoid such things in the future.
The point is if such a great company can make a mistake that can lead to such a high impact, the rest of us need to be doubly careful ... So are, your technology assets classified adequately?
Have a good time ...
First is ofcourse never deploy without adequate testing. RIM went on record to state that the outage on Tuesday/ Wednesday which left millions of users affected was caused by an untested (or atleast 'not tested sufficiently enough') system update. Talk about explanation being worse than crime ...
http://www.topix.net/business/telecom/2007/04/system-update-led-to-blackberry-outage and
http://news.com.com/2100-1039_3-6177829.html?part=rss&tag=2547-1_3-0-20&subj=news
Anyone who feels that testing is so much waste of time and resources (imagine setting up a separate test environment ... and what about all those deadlines) ... should just take a look at what RIM customers are just thinking about ... Blackberry Dependency Re-evaluated After RIM Service Outage ...
Another aspect comes from the following "Blackberry said in a statement that the failure was triggered by 'the introduction of a new, non-critical system routine' designed to increase the system's e-mail holding space. " -- From BBC News Report
Consider the 'non-critical'. If something that affects millions of users is 'non-critical', then there is something seriously wrong with the classification perception.
How is a technology asset classified? Is it on the value of the hardware or the number of lines of code in the software patch ? Or is it on the potential impact to customers or loss of value in business that could be caused by such a failure?
Was there a business owner for this asset who signed-off or approved the application of a change/ update? Was he informed of the "non-critical" classification with a reliable data? Was he involved at all in the classification process?
So many questions. RIM is a great company and I am sure they will already have thought about these and many more things. They will only grow stronger and come back with stronger processes to avoid such things in the future.
The point is if such a great company can make a mistake that can lead to such a high impact, the rest of us need to be doubly careful ... So are, your technology assets classified adequately?
Have a good time ...
Monday, April 16, 2007
Business Continuity Management
BSI has recently come up with a new standard for Business Continuity Management (BCM) -- the BS25999 ... This is a continuity of PAS 56 which is now withdrawn. You can buy the standard here at http://www.bsi-global.com/en/Shop/Publication-Detail/?pid=000000000030157563
In step with it, The BCI (Business Continuity Institute) has updated its Good Practice Guideline (GPG) which is available for free download at http://www.thebci.org/gpg.htm
The GPG (2007 version) is nicely aligned with the BS25999 so that even if you have not seen the Standard, the guideline has the entire information and more. So I would definitely recommend it for those who want to study or implement BC in their organization.
It is common sense that BCM is desirable and that organizations should implement BCM. But in real life only a limited number of organizations consciously work towards creating and maintaining their BCM plans. So I was wondering what is it that motivates those organizations or their Managements to put BCM on their radar? Are there some differentiators between those organizations that do put in the efforts towards their Business Continuity and those that pay only lip service ?
As a corollary, what could motivate an organization to start or increase its efforts towards establishing a BCM? Do post your comments ....
In step with it, The BCI (Business Continuity Institute) has updated its Good Practice Guideline (GPG) which is available for free download at http://www.thebci.org/gpg.htm
The GPG (2007 version) is nicely aligned with the BS25999 so that even if you have not seen the Standard, the guideline has the entire information and more. So I would definitely recommend it for those who want to study or implement BC in their organization.
It is common sense that BCM is desirable and that organizations should implement BCM. But in real life only a limited number of organizations consciously work towards creating and maintaining their BCM plans. So I was wondering what is it that motivates those organizations or their Managements to put BCM on their radar? Are there some differentiators between those organizations that do put in the efforts towards their Business Continuity and those that pay only lip service ?
As a corollary, what could motivate an organization to start or increase its efforts towards establishing a BCM? Do post your comments ....
Tips for a successful Blog
A question today on LinkedIN (not from me) put into words exactly what I had been thinking ... how to build a great blog.
The answers are still coming in but the initial ones pointed to a couple of very good links at:
http://www.avivadirectory.com/successful-blog-launch/?p=1 (21 Surefire Tips ... a very interesting compilation of tips for the new blogger. Hope I manage to follow it well.)
http://www.cafemama.com/etiquette.html (This one is about etiquette in the blogosphere ...) .
Speaking on etiquette, Tim OReilly has an interesting "Code Of Conduct" proposed some time back at http://radar.oreilly.com/archives/2007/03/call_for_a_blog_1.html which took a lot of bouquets as well as brickbats.
Happy Reading ....
The answers are still coming in but the initial ones pointed to a couple of very good links at:
http://www.avivadirectory.com/successful-blog-launch/?p=1 (21 Surefire Tips ... a very interesting compilation of tips for the new blogger. Hope I manage to follow it well.)
http://www.cafemama.com/etiquette.html (This one is about etiquette in the blogosphere ...) .
Speaking on etiquette, Tim OReilly has an interesting "Code Of Conduct" proposed some time back at http://radar.oreilly.com/archives/2007/03/call_for_a_blog_1.html which took a lot of bouquets as well as brickbats.
Happy Reading ....
Wednesday, April 11, 2007
Telecom Gyan Blog
Taking a cue from Peter's post ( http://iwrotethebookonblogging.blogspot.com/2007/03/44-if-you-dont-know-who-you-are-writing.html ) , I decided to set up another blog. This one for those who want to learn about and discuss Telecom Industry -- both technology and Operational processes.
Btw, I strongly recommend reading Peter Nguyens blogs at
http://iwrotethebookonblogging.blogspot.com/index.html
http://realtimesuccesssecrets.blogspot.com/index.html
The telecom blog is at http://teletechgyan.blogspot.com/ ... As usual here is hoping that I actually keep putting some content there :-)
Cheers
Btw, I strongly recommend reading Peter Nguyens blogs at
http://iwrotethebookonblogging.blogspot.com/index.html
http://realtimesuccesssecrets.blogspot.com/index.html
The telecom blog is at http://teletechgyan.blogspot.com/ ... As usual here is hoping that I actually keep putting some content there :-)
Cheers
Tuesday, April 3, 2007
The WC Show
Uggh ... sorry if this sounds under the belt ... particularly for those who know nothing about Cricket or the World Cup ...
The headline is "Sachin, Sourav questioned for poor WC show" (really ?) ... The brave can read it all at ... http://worldcup.indiatimes.com/articleshow/1850356.cms
Cheers
PS: Thanks to Shehryar Malik ... my Pakistani brother ... for pointing out this great headline ...
The headline is "Sachin, Sourav questioned for poor WC show" (really ?) ... The brave can read it all at ... http://worldcup.indiatimes.com/articleshow/1850356.cms
Cheers
PS: Thanks to Shehryar Malik ... my Pakistani brother ... for pointing out this great headline ...
National Cricket team
The below is from an email I sent this morning to a friend in reply to an email over the World Cup. Just some random thoughts.
-------------------------------------------------
With reference to cricket or any other sports, I really fail to see why any country (or atleast in our own context, why India) should have any 'national team'? Let me explain
Whether cricket or football or hockey or even Kabaddi, it is a game played by n number of players for their own recreation. Possibly these games are watched for recreation or 'pass-time' (or worse, time-pass) by whoever need the 'recreation' or 'time-pass'.
Further, with the due commercialization each individual sportsperson is a business-man or professional out to earn his income - no grudges to that. Each sport is hence only a mechanism or vehicle for that businessman to achieve his business goals.
Now the question comes: Do we have a national business? Are there world-cup competitions of engineering (bridge-building or running railway trains or making roads) or of the medical profession ( treating ordinary colds to high precision surgeries in the most sensitive parts of the body)? Do we have competitions of 'selling chappals' or of 'auditing corporate finances'?
Now consider these sports businesses. Hundreds of people go crazy with saying "Indian" team and "Pakistani" team and whatever. Songs are written about football teams ("Braazzziiiil ... ara ... ra.. rara .. rara .raaa) :-)
But what is worse is using national flags and symbols - even use of anthems and national songs. Who gave any crowd the right or the moral ground to burn flags whether our own or even of Pakistan (our highest visibility 'enemy' in India) in the name of sports? Consider any high profile match ... people wave about national flags, then when they are tired these same flags are kept to a side without any respect and sometimes people even sit on them. Finally at the end of the match there are incidents of flag burning and desecrations. So why?
People often give the argument that BCCI is a profit making organization and is not taking subsidies from government. Same is not the case with other sports businesses. Even in case of the profit making ones, how much are they then paying the Government or the People of India to use and insult the Indian national flags? Does our flag have a price?
It works both ways when 11 people go and win the 1983 world cup or when another 11 people go and lose to the Bangalis in 2007, why should the nation feel either pride or sorrow or why should the nation be affected at all? Is the Nation smaller than the abilities and priorities of the 11 people out there? Sad is the day when a loss on a sports field is taken to affect the destinies of millions of people in the country.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Okay so ramblings ... but I wonder if there are people who think on similar lines ...
Cheers
Gautam
-------------------------------------------------
With reference to cricket or any other sports, I really fail to see why any country (or atleast in our own context, why India) should have any 'national team'? Let me explain
Whether cricket or football or hockey or even Kabaddi, it is a game played by n number of players for their own recreation. Possibly these games are watched for recreation or 'pass-time' (or worse, time-pass) by whoever need the 'recreation' or 'time-pass'.
Further, with the due commercialization each individual sportsperson is a business-man or professional out to earn his income - no grudges to that. Each sport is hence only a mechanism or vehicle for that businessman to achieve his business goals.
Now the question comes: Do we have a national business? Are there world-cup competitions of engineering (bridge-building or running railway trains or making roads) or of the medical profession ( treating ordinary colds to high precision surgeries in the most sensitive parts of the body)? Do we have competitions of 'selling chappals' or of 'auditing corporate finances'?
Now consider these sports businesses. Hundreds of people go crazy with saying "Indian" team and "Pakistani" team and whatever. Songs are written about football teams ("Braazzziiiil ... ara ... ra.. rara .. rara .raaa) :-)
But what is worse is using national flags and symbols - even use of anthems and national songs. Who gave any crowd the right or the moral ground to burn flags whether our own or even of Pakistan (our highest visibility 'enemy' in India) in the name of sports? Consider any high profile match ... people wave about national flags, then when they are tired these same flags are kept to a side without any respect and sometimes people even sit on them. Finally at the end of the match there are incidents of flag burning and desecrations. So why?
People often give the argument that BCCI is a profit making organization and is not taking subsidies from government. Same is not the case with other sports businesses. Even in case of the profit making ones, how much are they then paying the Government or the People of India to use and insult the Indian national flags? Does our flag have a price?
It works both ways when 11 people go and win the 1983 world cup or when another 11 people go and lose to the Bangalis in 2007, why should the nation feel either pride or sorrow or why should the nation be affected at all? Is the Nation smaller than the abilities and priorities of the 11 people out there? Sad is the day when a loss on a sports field is taken to affect the destinies of millions of people in the country.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Okay so ramblings ... but I wonder if there are people who think on similar lines ...
Cheers
Gautam
Monday, April 2, 2007
Sudan Pictures
Pictures from our Nile boat trip taken over the Blue Nile in Sudan are here
http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/gotya101/album?.dir=/c601re2&.src=ph&.tok=phQO7cGBtUxE1.k2
Hope you enjoy these ...
http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/gotya101/album?.dir=/c601re2&.src=ph&.tok=phQO7cGBtUxE1.k2
Hope you enjoy these ...
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