A pointer update, new blog entry available at http://www.montaraventures.com/blog/.


I've made several references to the amount of time I've spent traveling in the past few years. When I mention places I've been people who don't travel frequently tend to say things like "Oh, that's sounds great, I wish I had the opportunity to do that." And you know what, I agree if the travel is reasonably limited. If the travel is frequent, it feels more like a curse than anything else.


A peculiar habit I formed was keeping the ticket stub from each segment flown. Once home, the stub was impaled on a wire holder. Here's a snapshot of my ticket stub collection from the past 5 years - business travel mind you, not personal.


5 years of business travel on a stick



Here's a slightly different view, a layout of the stubs on the floor



Before you take the time to count them, there are 224 stubs. That's an average of nearly 1 flight per week over 5 years. No wonder I feel tired when I think about travel. Consider, 1 whole year of that time I took only 1 flight due to budget constraints and travel restrictions, it's even worse compressed into 4 years.


I'm not complaining, clearly there are people who travel more than I. But, it's interesting to see such a physical representation I think.


Technorati Tags: Travel | Ticket Stubs | Collections

Originally published in my personal blog.

To everything there is a season
And a time for every purpose under heaven


A time to be born, a time to die
A time to plant, a time to reap
A time to laugh, a time to weep
A time to rend, a time to sew
A time of war, a time of peace

Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 (or The Byrds/Simon & Garfunkel if you prefer)

Change is an interesting phenomena. Some fear change, some crave change, some flee change, and some embrace change. Ultimately, it is change that enables us to grow and mature. Today brings a big change for Sun, for my team, Customer Network Services, and for me.

Sun has been very transparent about changes the company intends to make in order to achieve and sustain profitability. As a result of these stated plans, we have executed a reduction in force in Customer Network Services today.

Consistent profitability is vital to Sun's long term survival. As a consequence, many difficult decisions were made to ensure that appropriate focus and investment are channeled into the most important products, programs, and activities. It's easy to criticize any of the decisions that have been made; the encouraging thing is difficult decisions have been made and executed against for the greater good of the company. Hopefully, this is the last time Sun needs to resort to such measures to achieve stated financial objectives. If you haven't been through this sort of thing before, I can assure you the selection processes for what to continue, what to dial back, and what to stop are gut wrenching. There is no good answer available, only "less bad" alternatives.

While it is disappointing to be affected by these choices, they are necessary to allow Sun to move forward. That doesn't mean our work has been in vain or not had an impact. During this era of CNS, we've been able to create a platform over which network services can be created, deployed, and operated. We've released several new network services including Sun Update Connection, Hosted and Enterprise in production and for sale. In addition Eco Connection, Security Connection, Asset Connection, and Knowledge Connection have been developed and released into Fresh Tools. We've also been the key technology provider for Sun's Services business, with Sun Preventive Services the foremost client therein. We've been able to maintain and improve some 50 odd services products and tools as we've advanced the overall state of network services. The network services capabilities have either been embedded or are being embedded in all of Sun's technologies since Solaris 10, Update 1. We've successfully acquired and integrated a company into the network services team, and released the first product within the first quarter of joint operations. The financial impact has been impressive in terms of direct revenue, enabled revenue, and efficiencies. I am proud of what our team has accomplished.

There are several messages I'd like to convey in this entry; to our customers and partners, to those team members leaving Sun, and to those team members remaining with Sun.

First to our customers. You are why we're here. We've provided a number of interesting innovations that you can choose to take advantage of by connecting and participating in our network services infrastructure. If you like what you see, provide feedback and lots of it. We'll continue to support and develop network services in production today. If you see something in Fresh Tools that you really like, let us know. That will help us prioritize and promote the right network services for your benefit.

To our partners, we'll maintain the same level of engagement with you and continue to provide network services you can take advantage of in your business. Like the advice to customers above, if you like something in Fresh Tools, let us know.

To our team members affected by the reduction, you've all done a fantastic job. I am proud of each of you for helping to make the network services business a reality. There's no way around it, being notified that your job is gone sucks. It's going to feel bad. However, I hope that with the passage of time you can reflect on what we've accomplished and feel the pride of a job well done. Meanwhile, use your packages to craft a new era for yourself: start a company, get a new job, switch careers, go back to school. Whatever you do, make sure it's something you love to do in a place where you are surrounded by good people.

To our team members staying with Sun, you've also done a fantastic job. And in some ways, your mission is more challenging now than it has ever been in the past. The scope of the mission has narrowed and you're left to carry it forward. You can do it. We've laid the groundwork to make network services a success at Sun and to help drive and lead the industry in this area. Keep your eyes on the prize and excute with the same intensity and focus and everything will come out right. Roll with the changes, embrace them, and improve upon them. In this way, you can help Sun win.

Finally, a word about me. Like Jay Littlepage before me, I've made the decision it's time to pass the baton to the next runner in the network services race. Steve, get ready, here's the pass. Go! As for my future, I've decided that the time is right to leave Sun and take on a new challenge. Watch my personal blog for details if you're interested.

Change is inevitable. In every change there is opportunity. Seize your opportunity and make the most of it.

Technorati Tags: Sun Network Services

Haven't gotten back to my smart wear series yet, I will get back to it in due course. But, I did run across this fascinating story in the meantime.

The Blue Crab

It seems that some enterprising researchers at the University of Maryland have found a way to use chitosan (think kite-o-san) in combination with micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS) to detect many different chemical and biological substances. Chitosan is harvested from the shells of the crabs. The function is pretty simple, chitosan is placed on an arm that is allowed to vibrate, the frequency is monitored. When a substance is detected, the chitosan changes causing the vibration to change which can then signal the presence of a particular substance. The coolest things are often simple in concept.

Nano Cantilever

The hope is to be able to apply this knowledge to create biological and chemical substance alarms, perhaps to help aid in the fight against terror. Pretty cool stuff.

Technorati Tags: Crab | Nanotech | Science | Sensor

A couple of my prior entries, the smart bikini and buzz off hat, were about clothing that was capable of doing a little more than covering us up (yes, I know it was a bikini and a hat) and being stylish. So I set off to discover what else could be categorized in the smartwear world. (Note: I'm something of an obsessive autodidact, once something like this interests me, it becomes my mission to learn everything possible about it.)

Whenever I explore a new area like this, I find it helpful to establish some sort of framework to view the area through. My initial explorations have led me to establish some high-level categories to lump smart clothing innovations.

• Material innovations
  
  
  
  • Phase Change - Uses phase changes (solid to liquid) for benefit
    
  • Shape Memory - Uses current to form (or reform) to a set shape
    
  • Chromic - Uses external stimulus (light, heat, liquid, pressure) to change properties (color is most frequent)
    
  • Conductive - Uses high metallic content to gain benefit (insulation, EMI shield, sensing, etc.)
    
  
  
• Integration innovations
  
  
  
  • Energy - Photovoltaic (solar) cells, batteries, and hand generators
    
  • Electronic/Communication - mobile communication devices, ipods, and gps with an emphasis on hands-free
    
  • Chemical - Weatherproofing, insect repellent, and stain resistance
    
  • Sensor - Primarily medical or athletic performance monitoring sensors/devices
    
  
  

Technorati Tags: Geek Chic Smart Clothes Smart Wear

As previously noted, I'm something of an Ohio State football fan. One of the joys of being a football fan in the preseason is that all things are possible: winning a national championship, winning the Big 10 championship, beating Michigan, and even having a Heisman Trophy winner. It's great to dream and hope your team will achieve some measure of success.

Recently I stumbled across Adam Jardy's series for BuckeyeSports.com where he is using a video game to model how the season might go for the mighty Buckeyes. If it goes like it has in his simulations, there will be a very happy Buckeye Nation.

Read for yourself:
Northern Illinois
Texas
Cincinnati
Penn State
Iowa
Bowling Green

The rest of the season (Michigan State, Indiana, Minnesota, Illinois, Northwestern, and Michigan) to come in the next few weeks. Let's hope that the Bucks continue to roll, and more to the point, that the real season tracks this story line. Thanks Adam for an excellent series.

Technorati Tags: Buckeye Football Video Game

A colleague of mine has a thing about bugs - he doesn't like them, but they like him. So, on a recent vacation he accidentally stumbled into something that helped with the bugs while attempting to solve a sunburn problem. It's important to note that my colleague doesn't have a proper hairstyle, like me. And as a consequence, his neck is left bare - exposed to the elements. Not wanting to become a redneck, he decided that he'd better get a hat that would provide protection for this tender area.

While the smart bikini is interesting and has UV sensors, the smart hat is practical. No sensors in the hat yet I'm sorry to note.

"Buzz Off" Smart Hat

Note: This is not the actual hat as my colleague's spouse has forbidden him to wear it outside the garden at this point. But I did attempt to convince him to send me an action shot. Stay tuned, he might yet.

What makes this hat so special aside from its obvious style and good looks? It has an insect repellent native to the fabric. You can't detect that the chemical is present (no smell, no residue) but the insects do and leave you alone. It's good for up to 25 washes. Check it out at Buzz Off. By the way, they sell more than just hats... This trend of making clothing smarter and more than just a coverup is interesting. I'll see what else I can find related to this trend and share.

Technorati Tags: Insect Repellent Hat Smart wear

Sensors, sensors, everywhere. Everytime you turn around, there's another sensor embedded somewhere you just wouldn't naturally think. That's the case here, where a sensor for exposure to sun light is now in the bikini. Yes, that bikini, the 60 year old swimsuit. Now, if we can just network them.....only kidding. These sensors do provide a practical convenience, to let you know when you are increasing your risk of cancer with prolonged exposure to ultraviolet light.

Available in two flavors, geeky with a gauge and camoflauged using color recognition. Photos courtesy of Solestrom. I think they're on to a new trend in "smart wear."

Geeky with gauge

Camoflauged with color

Technorati Tags: Bikini Sensors Smart wear

That is, Sun Update Connection, Enterprise version.

It's been three short months since our acquisition of Aduva. In that time, the former Aduva team along with the Sun Update Connection product team have produced the first release of our new product which incorporates all the goodness of Sun Update Connection Hosted and adds a slew of new features and functions:

• Baselines - Create groups of changes to be applied
  
• Automated application - Apply a single change, group of changes, and/or baseline to one or more systems
  
• Simulation - Model proposed changes to your environment before commiting to them
  
• Rollback - The "oops" protection, revert to prior state at the touch of a button
  
• Auditing - Know who made which changes when to aid in compliance
  
• Staging - Pull bits from many different places to a staging ground, mix and match the content in automated change tasks
  
• Introspection - Don't trust what the description says, active comparison of symbols in changes vs. claims in descriptions (metadata)
  
• Provisioning - Deploy configurations to bare metal as workloads and demands change
  
• Management - Be it a data center, an application service, or a grid, actively manage the assets for workload, performance, cost, and availability.
  

Technorati Tags: Patch System Administration Systems Management Grid Software as a Service

Note: I was poised to post this Friday, July 21 in the morning. But the news that Devil's Slide would reopen August 4th preempted the posting and relieved some of my frustration. However, I'd still like to understand the variability of sensor readings to actual timed experience.

Start original blog entry: While I applaud CalTrans for instrumenting the roads and giving helpful clues to commuters about travel times from point A to point B, the accuracy reflected in these clues leaves something to be desired.

Thursday afternoon the 511.org web site and the sign onsite for highway 92W indicated that it was 33 minutes travel time from I280 to Highway 1 on 92W. In reality, it took 18 minutes to move from the sign through the traffic light at 35N and 92W, 0.75 miles. The time for this travel segment, a 7 mile trip over the hill from I280 to Highway 1? 46 minutes.

CalTrans, clearly you've instrumented the road. Why the heck aren't you reading what you collect from the sensors and reflecting it accurately? Bad information is worse than no information. 39% error in travel time is a bit high when actual data is available.

Technorati Tags: Devil's Slide Sensors Commute

Recently I received a telephone message from Congressman Tom Reynolds indicating that I was a winner of the "National Leadership Award." In the background of this message, there was the usual cacophony associated with those telemarketing boiler room setups, which definitely sent the antennae up. Not to mention, I live in California, not New York, where Tom Lantos is my local Congressional representative.

I decline to state my own political views and affliations in this blog. So draw no conclusions about this statement other than it's a fact: This award is sponsored by the Republican Party.

Here are some more facts collected during the return call to Reynold's office:

• It was confirmed that I have indeed won a "National Leadership Award"
  
• The helpful staffer I spoke with was unable to tell me who nominated me or why I was selected
  
• A recorded message from Tom Reynolds was played congratulating me on winning this prestigious award
  
• The award winners names will be in a full page advertisement supporting a Republican-backed tax cut proposal
  
• Award winners are asked to contribute $300 to "defray the cost of the advertisement"
  
• I asked "Do I still win if I don't contribute?" Yes was the answer.
  

All of this reminds me of an episode of The Simpsons where Montgomery Burns gives Homer Simpson the award for "Outstanding Achievement in the Field of Excellence." Burns creates the award in a bid to get Homer to release the nuclear power plant from liability due to it's sterilizing effect on Homer.

Scam or innovative fund raising? You be the judge. Whatever you decide, if you get the call indicating you've won, you can make an informed choice about how to respond.

Technorati Tags: National Leadership Award Scam Fund Raising

The League for Coastside Protection has been graphing commute times (due to the CalTrans sensors in the road - see this blog entry.) Here are the archives for June and July to date. The interesting thing looking at this data is just how erratic the commute times are. Great to be able to view this all due to networked sensors. But still a pain in the neck for those of us living through the chaos.

CalTrans continues the repairs on the slide and seems to be ontrack for a late September finish. Check the updates section for the latest progress.

July 13 Morning Commute

July 13 Evening Commute

Technorati Tags: Devil's Slide Sensors Commute

Smugglers in the Phillipines have been caught attempting to smuggle 1 peso coins out of the country for their metal content vs. their face value.

Interesting world we live in....copper prices have gone up by 75% this year. Now, where did I put that big bottle of pennies the bank won't count....

Technorati Tags: Smuggling Currency Coins

I don't know about you, but I think 100:1 odds of death for an occupation aren't great. That's what the most recent space shuttle crew has been informed of to quantify the risk they're signing up to in the next planned launch (STS-121).

Consider other occupational statistics:

• Stay out of the forest: 118 fatalities per 100,000 for timber cutters
  
• Stay off the street: 20 percent of the 6588 fatal work injuries happened on the road
  
• Stay above ground: 23.5 deaths in mining for every 100,000 workers in 2002
  
• Stay on dry land: 103 in every 100,000 fishermen died while working
  

Technorati Tags: Space Shuttle Jobs Death

Mike Davis recently showed me a cool mashup of the Sun Knowledge Connection with his Google homepage. Way cool. Also, Software Update moved to a new provider over the weekend which included an upgrade to Solaris 10, T2000s, and some new switches. The punchline? The performance has improved 3x and the cost has dropped by 50%. Amazing. If service providers aren't using this technology, they're bad at math.

Technorati Tags: Mashup Solaris T2000

Here in the US football is played with an oblong ball that is only, on special occasion, kicked. However, right now the rest of the world is crazy for football (soccer) played with a round ball that is primarily kicked. The ultimate event is well underway, the FIFA 2006 World Cup.

Since the US team is in, and some of our colleagues are "worldly" caring about the event a bunch, we decided to have a little challenge using the BBC's World Cup DAQ game. This is a market economy where one competes by buying and selling shares in teams, angling for special bonuses (dividends if you will,) and hoping for an outcome of the highest percentage gain in a week. Thus we've assembled a league. What's at stake? Pride.

The thing I wasn't prepared for is how sticky this is. We've got people who've never participated in such an event and are typically non-sporting buying up shares of Poland because of win bonuses and wondering if that's the right selection of if Costa Rica will recover from the thrashing Ecuador provided this week.

If you ever doubt the network is the computer and that fact fuels the participation age, try one of these online events. It'll cure you of that doubt in a heartbeat. Meantime, go Poland! (and US team, I hope you can beat Italy!)

Technorati Tags: World Cup Network Participation Age

Kevin Chu has written a very comprehensive review of Google Calc. I encourage you to check it out! Thanks for the pointer Kevin.

Google introduced a new web-based spreadsheet that allows for easy sharing of data a couple of days ago. I love to see network services innovation, and this has the look of a good one. I encourage you to visit Google Labs and check it out.

And, don't forget to visit the "Fresh Tools" tab on My Sun Connection, you'll see another new goodie there soon.....

Technorati Tags: Network Services Spreadsheet Google

As promised, some new features have been introduced in the My Sun Connection portal. Chief among them, performance and tuning enhancements, many small requests for enhancement, as well as the new "Community" tab.

If you haven't dropped in to see what we're doing, now is a good time. This week we should have a new thing or two on "Fresh Tools" as well.

A simple equation to be sure. If you've got to manage patches and configurations on Linux or Solaris machines, you should pay attention to this post.

Here's what to consider:

• Baselines - Create groups of changes to be applied
  
• Automated application - Apply a single change, group of changes, and/or baseline to one or more systems
  
• Simulation - Model proposed changes to your environment before commiting to them
  
• Rollback - The "oops" protection, remove changes automatically
  
• Auditing - Know who made which changes when to aid in compliance
  
• Aggregation - Pull bits from many different places to a staging ground, mix and match the content in automated change tasks
  
• Introspection - Don't trust what the description says, active comparison of symbols in changes vs. claims in descriptions (metadata)
  
• Provisioning - Deploy configurations to bare metal as workloads and demands change
  
• Management - Be it a data center, an application service, or a grid, actively manage the assets for workload, performance, cost, and availability.
  
• Realtime - Always up, always up-to-date. Continuous real-time content.
  
• Electronic Prognostics - Telemetry-based prediction of what will happen based on statistical models of what has happened across a broad population segment.
  
• Risk Quantification - Availability Risk Index (ARI) determins not only the severity negative consequence for any known risk, but also the probability of occurance in time period X.
  

Here are some hints:

+ Sun Grid
+ N1 System Manager
+ Aduva OnStage
+ Sun Update Connection
+ Sun Preventive Services
+ N1 Service Provisioning Server

Technorati Tags: Patching System Administration Systems Management Grid Software as a Service

My monthly Onstar email arrived again, great to see. The above image is a snip from that report, you can see that I need to schedule a service appointment. My oil needs changed and tires should be inspected and rotated. OK, that's great to know, in fact, it was a similar situation to my last Onstar Update. So, if any GM or Onstar folks happen to read this, here are some suggestions that might help your customers and your business:

• Since I'm a subscriber, you know who I am and how to contact me. Why not offer me service appointments at a geographically convenient location with multiple time options? I would welcome this helpful contact until/unless I asked you not to do so. This would bias me toward your service, provide convenience value for me, and make my vehicle last longer.
  
• How about sending reminder messages as engine oil life heads toward 0? (where it is now. Oh, and, why is it 4% in your report and 0% in my vehicle? Why lag in reporting?)
  
• What if you asked me about service opportunities when I used other Onstar services or asked questions?
  
• OK, since you have location information for me (yes, I know you know where I travel) how about using that to arrange a rendezvous with a loaner vehicle to enhance the convenience and increase the probability I would use your service.
  
• Since you're collecting data, I'd hope Onstar is analyzing it and preparing to use it. Otherwise, really, what's the point?
  

Technorati Tags: Network Services Onstar System Administrator

Scientists have a working theory that would create an area of invisibility for those who wear the material. Sounds pretty far out, but I'd like one if the theory pans out....

Jon Greaves provides a brief summary of his experience using our Knowledge Connection pilot. Thanks for trying it Jon, we'll get more relevant knowledge added soon! Everyone else, please take Jon's example and give it a whirl. We want to hear what you discover, the good, the bad, and the ugly.

Also, please don't forget to check out Eco Connection also on the Fresh Tools tab. Stay tuned, more to come shortly both in terms of new capabilities as well as new features, functions, and content to the things posted now.

Also, Martin Hardee posted an entry on SKC, thanks Martin!

How many times have you been looking to solve a problem and been forced to poke around looking for the answer on Sun's myriad web properties? Have you given up? Used a third party search engine? Well, we're hoping to give you a better experience than that. Something that makes it fast, easy, and convenient to get not only the answer to your question, but also to aggregate ALL of Sun's resources related to that topic presented with the answer, in context.

When you access the Knowledge Connection (select "Fresh Tools" tab, select Knowledge Base Pilot,) you can use it like a regular search engine by typing in terms or you can simply ask a question like "how do i configure Solaris zones?"

You can see from the results that some useful content has been returned. The document titled "How-to create Solaris zones" in the first position is absolutely relevant to the question that has been asked. Indeed, if we open that document:

You see that it is a step by step guide demonstrating how to create a zone. Rather than taking a SunSolve approach where volume is king in placing content into this system, we've done the opposite; looking for the high value, high relevance information that results in answered questions vs. simply stocking a pond for fishing (so to speak.)

This is the first step. Next, more product segments will be loaded into the Knowledge Connection. Next, more features will be enabled, chatbots, links to expert marketplaces, and links to live help. We hope you find this useful and will come back often to use this facility. Tell us what you think, all feedback welcome, positive or improvement suggestions.

Technorati Tags: Web-Design System
Administration
Solaris

Watch this space Monday for an in-depth entry on Knowledge Base Pilot available from our Fresh Tools tab of My Sun Connection portal.

If any of you have ever used SunSolve and felt a little frustrated about finding real-time, relevant content. Sun Knowledge Connection will help ease your pain. In trial mode at the moment, Solaris 10 content is the current content base.

More to follow Monday.....

Those of you who know me at all, know I'm something of a tinkerer. I like to dream things up and make them, for example, all terrain rollerblades in 1994. I've picked up a few wood and metal working skills through the years, but I'm by no means a professional.

So what do you do when you find you'd like to create a 1mm diameter stainless steel fan for a micro-turbine you've been dreaming up? I could try to fabricate a component like this forever and never quite get it right.

Tada! eMachineShop.com comes to the rescue. The first network enabled fabrication shop. Simply download their software. From there, you design your widget and submit it to them over the net for pricing. If you accept their bid, they'll fabricate the widget and ship it to you. Way cool. And a very clever business model using the power of the network and sharing software to bring in customers world-wide.

Widget from eMachineShop.com

If there's one thing I'd change about this service, I'd make the software run on any platfom, perhaps we can convince them to release the next version in Java. Right now it's limited to various Windows versions. Other than that, it's a simple and nifty little CAD program.