It’s been a hellish couple of weeks, because I took over a night class for a colleague who had a death in the family. Working 9-9 for any number of days will make one week/weak. Glad to be past that.
But what do my many active contributors feed me during this time? Good lord.
First, faithful follower Herbbie R. sends me this link about the private BSD/Linux distributors’ security email channel. Apparently this channel is no more, useful as it may have been in keeping the makers and distributors at least caught up with the curve, because somebody broke in and monitored those emails. You’da sorta thunk those BSD/Linux gurus would have their security down tight! But I’ve been hacked myself, so I won’t dig too hard. Read about it here: http://www.zdnet.com/blog/security/linux-distributor-security-list-destroyed-after-hacker-compromise/8313?tag=nl.e550.
Speaking of insider emails, I received an email that sorta-kinda looked like the ones I get from an organization to which I belong. I urged me to click all kinds of links plainly labeled with their destination (like my link just above). The difference is that if you hover over my link, you’ll see its destination is exactly what I say it is. This particular email’s links revealed very different destinations than they claimed. I fired off a warning to the organization, but later found the email was in fact valid. Safe? Trustworthy? No, but valid; the organization uses a third-party polling service for some of their activities, which was responsible for the misleading links.
You will be safe in imagining my response to learning this. Let me just say this: It is a serious violation of the Trust (I capitalize on purpose) I place in you, for you ever to send me misleading links. This is not a forgivable offense; it is a practice about which I most emphatically warn my clients. Misleading links are, in the vast majority of cases, pure evil. Asking me to click your misleading link just makes me really mistrust you. Is this really what you want?
And finally, about the onset of “Cloud Computing”: which makes me think of the weird Windows commercial of the couple trapped at the airport, who Remote Desktop into their home PC to watch recorded TV. As the woman says, in a strange faint strangled voice, “Yay cloud.” No, that’s not the cloud. That’s just scary: they’re still trapped in the airport!
Those of you who know what the cloud is, and are taking advantage of it, will be glad to read the article Cloud Computing Elevates the Role of IT at http://www.echannelline.com/usa/story.cfm?item=26619. Read it and see the next great area of IT job demand. I’ll see you there.