[Gllug] Controversial Joel Spolsky article

[Bernard Peek]

In message <20031222174523.GA14297 at usb.cafod>, itsbruce at uklinux.net 
writes
>On Mon, Dec 22, 2003 at 04:03:06PM +0000, Bernard Peek wrote:
>> >Turning a computer on and copying some user files to a zip drive hardly
>> >represent the sum of an administrator's job.  Besides, most home users
>> >administer their home computers very badly, home computers absolutely
>> >*not* having been improved and simplified to the point where unskilled
>> >users can use them easily and efficiently.
>>
>> That depends a lot on what you mean by efficiency. Home computers have
>> improved to the point where most people can use them reasonably easily
>> and reasonably efficiently. The Windows way is to compromise on
>> efficiency to make the systems easier to use (and more secure, if you
>> believe Bill's latest announcements.)
>
>It's spin.  Most home computer systems sputter on till they fail from
>simple accumulation of errors, at which point the home user either
>reinstalls or buys a new PC, usually losing a large amount of data each
>time this happens.

That's true, but reinstalling the operating system and applications is 
no big deal for a home user with only one application suite. (At least 
it was before companies started shipping repair disks that reformatted 
the drive.)

>  In the meantime, the user is diverted from the tasks
>for which s/he originally bought the PC - games, Internet browsing,
>occasional letters or bookkeeping - to constant tweaking and
>maintenance.  The help forums of domestic ISPs are filled with people
>who have become amateur PC gurus (in a very small way) through necessity
>and who are now more or less hooked on it.

True, there are tens of thousands of people who post to newsgroups about 
problems. But there are tens of millions who don't, because their 
systems just carry on working. A lot of those people haven't yet had to 
upgrade their PC so they haven't yet had any real problems to deal with.

>
>>
>> There are several hundred million sites with one PC, administered by
>> people with little or no computer training. They aren't maintaining them
>> efficiently but they are maintaining them adequately.
>
>Even if that were true, it isn't relevant to the thread you parachuted
>into, which was discussing the inadequacies of Windows admins in
>traditional computing environments.  It's also becoming less true as
>those home computers become more connected to global networks, as the
>recent explosion of Internet worms has demonstrated.

The worms spread because most Windows systems aren't properly patched 
because up until now users haven't needed to. Now that the worms have 
drawn their attention to this lapse a lot of them will hook up to 
Microsoft's automated patch delivery service.

>
>> >Only because the demand for computing services has expanded
>> >significantly faster than the pool of skilled IT staff.  The fact that
>> >much IT administration and development is being done by poorly skilled
>> >staff doesn't mean that it is being done well.
>>
>> There are two ways around that. One is to hire people with lots of
>> computer skills to do the job efficiently. The other is to automate the
>> tasks so that someone with a little knowledge can do them reasonably
>> well. On a site with lots of computers it pays to hire a sysadmin to
>> make them run efficiently. On a small site it pays to have tasks
>> automated.
>
>Skilled admins are all about automation, that's why a skilled admin can
>run a much larger network than a poor one.  Windows is notoriously bad
>at automation and Windows admins tend to be ignorant even of the limited
>mechanisms for automation that do exist, which is why Windows systems
>require more admin staff than *nix systems.
>
>The extremely limited automation on a Windows home computer is crude,
>poorly planned, often too generalised to be useful and too vulnerable to
>user tampering.

True. I've noticed that Microsoft has started delivering more 
centralised administration software for server-based systems. But we are 
moving towards the point where every machine is permanently hooked up to 
the Internet. At that point Microsoft can handle a lot of the sysadmin 
work for Joe Average and his home computer.


-- 
Bernard Peek
London, UK. DBA, Manager, Trainer & Author. Will work for money.

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