Technical Debt: Financial Disaster
December 25, 2015
Adoption of cloud-based services provides the enterprise with I read “Treat Technical Debt Like a Bad Relationship.” Googlers called attention to technical debt. I wrote about that Google paper earlier in 2015. The idea is not a new one. The idea is that today’s technology requires on-going investment.
That investment is necessary if the product is to be kept working and in step with what competitors offer. What happens if one ignores the technical debt, the local bean counter points out that the amount of dough required to keep a product is greater than its revenue. End of story. Some products can chug along for years. I don’t think too much about my refrigerator unless it stops working. I don’t repair it if it is 11 years old. I get a new one. That’s what happens with search and content processing. A recent example is GoDaddy. The company bought Enterprise (yes, I know that your friendly mid tier consultant does not know about this system. But GoDaddy decided after 11 years to get a new one.
In the write up, the notion of a bad relationship speaks more about the author than about how the finances of a technology work out over time. Perhaps an expensive divorce would be more apt. Plenty of organizations license a search and content processing technology and then figure out that a new one is needed. Expensive? Yep.
The write up points out:
Adoption of cloud-based services provides the enterprise with the ability to minimize technical debt by striking a balance between continuously delivered cloud solutions and existing controls necessary to remain compliant with security requirements. Experienced technical personnel must assess those requirements against available cloud offerings. Increased cloud adoption will free technical security personnel from managing software, empowering them to spend more time on assessments and adoption of technology to stay ahead of evolving threats.
What happens if the cloud solution delivers the same cost burdens as any other enterprise application?
The answer is, “Get a new one.”
That’s what IBM itself does. The company coded up STAIRS III, converted it, and still sells the technology today. IBM bought iPhrase, bought Vivisimo, invested in home brew content processing initiatives like Web Fountain. Now IBM has wrapped scripts around a basket of technologies.
If one buys into the IBM solution, will the technical debt become a tiny part of the information technology budget? I don’t think so. The customer pays for its decisions. The vendor loses a client. A technology failure can impair or cause a business failure.
Technological debt is very different from having a bad friend. The divorce metaphor works well: Pain, lawyers, and brutal costs.
How does one deal with technical debt? Well, buy cloud services from IBM, after you, gentle reader, query Watson for guidance.
Stephen E Arnold, December 25, 2015
Alphabet Google Makes Cheerful Robot Reindeer
December 24, 2015
Short honk: I love reindeer. Brown creatures. Nice eyes. Well, Alphabet Google has a different take on these Santa friendly mammals. Remember, gentle reader, the Googlers like robots. What could be better than combining a mammal loved by children and a robot? Here’s a snap of the Googler’s improvement on Mother Nature.
Would this frighten a three year old? No. Look at the blade runner legs, the red decorations, and the absence of a head. I wonder if the reindeer robots have a red LED for a nose. Ho ho ho.
I think these robots would be useful in third world countries to help deal with poverty, disease, a shortage of troops, and what not.
Stephen E Arnold, December 24, 2015
Google Clamps down on Surprise Costs in BigQuery
December 23, 2015
The article titled Google Promises to Rein in Runaway Query Costs on Fortune discusses the obstacles facing Google’s BigQuery data tool. Google hopes to make BigQuery a major resource for big companies considering cloud technology, but unpredictable costs are getting in the way of the “low-cost big data analytics option” marketing that Google has deployed. Hence, the introduction of “custom quota” and Query Explain,
“Google is now offering potential inquisitors a way to set a “custom quota” to ensure that the number crunching on a specified project does not exceed a pre-set daily limit. In addition, a Query Explain feature promises to lay out, how BigQuery will go about processing the question on the table in advance. That way, in theory, you can see if your questions will be “write, read, or compute heavy” and better anticipate where performance bottlenecks could lurk…”
One might fairly ask why there was any delay in these services, since customers are not known for their fondness of mobile phone type billing surprises. Amazon is also standing next to Google waving at RedShift, a BigQuery competitor in the air. But the simpler pricing and efficiency of BigQuery might be more appealing to many companies, especially with the more controlled processes now available.
Chelsea Kerwin, December 23, 2015
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Top Trends for Cyber Security and Analytics in 2016
December 23, 2015
With the end of the year approaching, people try to predict what will happen in the New Year. The New Year brings on a sort of fortunetelling, because if companies are able to correctly predict what will happen in 2016 then it serves for positive profit margins and a healthier customer base. The IT industry has its own share of New Year soothsayers and the Executive Biz blog shares that “Booz Allen Cites Top Cyber, Analytics Trends In 2016; Bill Stewart Comments” with possible trends in cyber security and data analytics for the coming year.
Booz Allen Hamilton says that companies will want to merge analytical programs with security programs to receive data sets that show network vulnerabilities; they have been dubbed “fusion centers.”
“ ‘As cyber risk and advanced analytics demand increasing attention from the C-suite, we are about to enter a fundamentally different period,’ said Bill Stewart, executive vice president and leader of commercial cyber business at Booz Allen. ‘The dynamics will change… Skilled leaders will factor these changing dynamics into their planning, investments and operations.’”
The will also be increased risks coming from the Dark Web and risks that are associated with connected systems, such as cloud storage. Booz Allen also hints that companies will need skilled professionals who know how to harness cyber security risks and analytics. That suggestion is not new, as it has been discussed since 2014. While the threat from the Internet and vulnerabilities within systems has increased, the need for experts in these areas as well as better programs to handle them has always been needed. Booz Allen is restating the obvious, the biggest problem is that companies are not aware of these risks and they usually lack the budget to implement preemptive measures.
Whitney Grace, December 23, 2015
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
The Importance of Google AI
December 23, 2015
According to Business Insider, we’ve all been overlooking something crucial about Google. Writer Lucinda Shen reports, “Top Internet Analyst: There Is One Thing About Google that Everyone Is Missing.” Shen cites an observation by prominent equity analyst Carlos Kirjner. She writes:
“Kirjner, that thing [that everyone else is missing] is AI at Google. ’Nobody is paying attention to that because it is not an issue that will play out in the next few quarters, but longer term it is a big, big opportunity for them,’ he said. ‘Google’s investments in artificial intelligence, above and beyond the use of machine learning to improve character, photo, video and sound classification, could be so revolutionary and transformational to the point of raising ethical questions.’
“Even if investors and analysts haven’t been closely monitoring Google’s developments in AI, the internet giant is devoted to the project. During the company’s third-quarter earnings call, CEO Sundar Pichai told investors the company planned to integrate AI more deeply within its core business.”
Google must be confident in its AI if it is deploying it across all its products, as reported. Shen recalls that the company made waves back in November, when it released the open-source AI platform TensorFlow. Is Google’s AI research about to take the world by storm?
Cynthia Murrell, December 23, 2015
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Microsoft Drops Bing from Pulse, Adds Azure Media Services
December 22, 2015
The article on VentureBeat titled Microsoft Rebrands Bing Pulse to Microsoft Pulse, extends Snapshot API ushers in the question: is Bing a dead-end brand? The article states that the rebranding is meant to emphasize that the resource integrates with MS technologies like Power BI, OneNote, and Azure Media Services. It has only been about year since the original self-service tool was released for broadcast TV and media companies. The article states,
“The launch comes a year after Bing Pulse hit version 2.0 with the introduction of a cloud-based self-service option. Microsoft is today showing a few improvements to the tool, including a greatly enhanced Snapshot application programming interface (API) that allows developers to pull data from Microsoft Pulse into Microsoft’s own Power BI tool or other business intelligence software. Previously it was only possible to use the API with broadcast-specific technologies.”
The news isn’t good for Bing, with Pulse gaining popularity as a crowdsourcing resource among such organizations as CNN, CNBC, the Aspen Institute, and the Clinton Global Initiative. It is meant to be versatile and targeted for broadcast, events, market research, and classroom use. Dropping Bing from the name may indicate that Pulse is moving forward, and leaving Bing in the dust.
Chelsea Kerwin, December 22, 2015
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
How Multitasking Alters Our Brains
December 22, 2015
An article at Forbes, “Is Technology Making Us Dumb and Numb?” brings neuroscience to bear on the topic, and the conclusion is not pretty. Contributor Christine Comaford, who regularly writes about neuroscience in relation to leadership, tells us:
“Multitasking reduces gray matter density in the area of the brain called the Anterior Cingulate Cortex (ACC)…. The ACC is involved in a number of cognitive and emotional functions including reward anticipation, decision-making, empathy, impulse control, and emotion. It acts like a hub for processing and assigning control to other areas of the brain, based on whether the messages are cognitive (dorsal) or emotional (ventral). So when we have reduced gray matter density in the ACC due to high media multitasking, over time we see reduced ability to make sound decisions, to modulate our emotions, to have empathy and to connect emotionally to others.”
Hmm, is that why our national discourse has become so uncivil in recent years? See the article for a more detailed description of the ACC and the functionality of its parts. Maybe if we all kick the multitasking habit, the world will be a slightly kinder place.
Cynthia Murrell, December 22, 2015
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Getting Smart About Cutting the Cable Cord
December 21, 2015
A few years ago, I read an article about someone who was fed up with streaming content because he wanted new shows and access to all the channels so they resubscribed to cable. I have to admit the easiest thing to do would be to pay a monthly cable bill and shell out additional fees for the premiere channels. The only problem is that cable and extra channels are quite expensive. It has since become easier to cut the cord.
One of the biggest problems viewers face is finding specific and new content. Netflix, Hulu, iTunes, and Amazon Prime are limited with licenses and their individual content and having to search each one is time consuming. Even worse is trying to type out a series name using a remote control instead of a keyboard. Technology to the rescue!
The Verge talks about “Yahoo’s New App Is A TV Guide For Cord Cutters” called Yahoo Video Guide that allows viewers to search by a name and instantly watch it.
“Whenever users find what they want to watch, they can click a button to “Stream Now,” and the app will automatically launch a subscription service that hosts the film. If the program isn’t available online, users can buy it, instead.”
The coolest feature is that if viewers want to channel surf all they do so with GIFs. The viewer picks a GIF that fits their mood and the app will sort out content from there.
Finally, all those moving images have a different function than entertaining reddit users.
Whitney Grace, December 21, 2015
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Plentiful, Presaging Prognostications
December 19, 2015
I read a roll up type article. “Industry Speaks: Top 33 Big Data Predictions for 2016” presents a fulsome suite of forecasts about 2016’s technology trends. If you are a fan of the race track tout approach to winners, you will want to print out this article and keep it with you.
I would love to comment on each prediction, but that, gentle reader, is a lot of work. I would prefer to return to my analysis of Palantir.
I did circle three of the predictions which I found somewhat intriguing. My hope is that you will want to dig deeply into the other 30 future forward conjectures. Here we go:
- Big Data will die. My hunch is that one would have to kill off the PR spouting spawn of marketing and sales departments before the monster of Big Data is tamed. Nice effort, bold prediction. My view is that it is pretty loco given the present environment.
- Companies will hire chief insight officers. Wow. My view is that folks struggling to deliver revenues will change their titles. I am not sure that human resources will work hand in glove with senior executives to hire a new person to be in charge of “insight.” I thought business intelligence software delivered this insight stuff.
- Spark will kill Hadoop. Interesting. I assume I was incorrect in thinking that Hadoop could be thought of as a variant of Google’s really old MapReduce technology. Hadoop is a bit of a challenge, but “killing” seems a bit of a stretch.
For the other 30 previsons, check out the original. Amazing stuff. Most of the horoscopes are like newspaper horoscopes; that is, data free.
Stephen E Arnold, December 19, 2015
Old School Mainframes Still Key to Big Data
December 17, 2015
According to ZDNet, “The Ultimate Answer to the Handling of Big Data: The Mainframe.” Believe it or not, a recent survey of 187 IT pros from Syncsort found the mainframe to be the important to their big data strategy. IBM has even created a Hadoop-capable mainframe. Reporter Ken Hess lists some of the survey’s findings:
*More than two-thirds of respondents (69 percent) ranked the use of the mainframe for performing large-scale transaction processing as very important
*More than two-thirds (67.4 percent) of respondents also pointed to integration with other standalone computing platforms such as Linux, UNIX, or Windows as a key strength of mainframe
*While the majority (79 percent) analyze real-time transactional data from the mainframe with a tool that resides directly on the mainframe, respondents are also turning to platforms such as Splunk (11.8 percent), Hadoop (8.6 percent), and Spark (1.6 percent) to supplement their real-time data analysis […]
*82.9 percent and 83.4 percent of respondents cited security and availability as key strengths of the mainframe, respectively
*In a weighted calculation, respondents ranked security and compliance as their top areas to improve over the next 12 months, followed by CPU usage and related costs and meeting Service Level Agreements (SLAs)
*A separate weighted calculation showed that respondents felt their CIOs would rank all of the same areas in their top three to improve
Hess goes on to note that most of us probably utilize mainframes without thinking about it; whenever we pull cash out of an ATM, for example. The mainframe’s security and scalability remain unequaled, he writes, by any other platform or platform cluster yet devised. He links to a couple of resources besides the Syncsort survey that support this position: a white paper from IBM’s Big Data & Analytics Hub and a report from research firm Forrester.
Cynthia Murrell, December 17, 2015
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
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