NoSQL

Here's an interesting introduction to developments in NoSQL Databases. Any company choosing this route would need to investigate carefully before taking the step, chances are it could lead to an instant legacy system with extreme maintenance issues once the enthusiast has left the development cycle.

Keeping humans keeping your Data Centre

I came across this link which lists many aspects of looking after the people who run your data centre. It is well worth a read.

Another business scam

Received through the post this morning was a rather obvious scam "reminder" to renew one of our trademarks. It comes from the "Intellectual Property Agency Ltd" based in the Broadgate Tower in London. It has the typical grey fine print on the back in contractualese which boils down to them wanting to con you into paying an excessive fee for renewing a trademark. Note there are no refunds. Their contract for UK Trademarks is oddly based on Swedish law. Here's their web site. They do not appear on the UK Companies House web site.

Their form look official and has a name similar to the official government body who handle these things. It is clearly designed to fool a dumb clerk or a dumb manager.

Using the proper government agency is a much lower cost to renew the trademark. There is not much use in complaining to any government authorities though; they will just wring their hands and do nothing. This problem won't go away until a law is passed telling the scamsters that they'll go to prison for a minimum of 5 years.

Hooray Techtarget.com comes to its senses

I get regular emails from techtarget.com advertising whitepapers from the marketing departments of the likes of Oracle, Dell etc. Most of these I ignore, but occasionally I get some which are of interest and want to read. When I click through the link in the email I'm inevitably faced with a demand to provide either user name/password or to complete a boring questionnaire about my company and my role.

Personally I find this really annoying and usually abandon the research at that point. Techtarget already have this information and they are the ones who sent me the email. What is the need for user Id/password? We are not exactly accessing deep secrets, it is just a damn marketing whitepaper.

At long last this morning when I tried techtarget there was one simple question "Are you still working for the same company?" This time I followed through and read the marketing whitepaper. 

I wonder how many other business men gave up in frustration with Techtarget's previous policy of lazy link management. 

Update 10th May 2012
 Whoops, it looks like I spoke too soon. Just had an email from kmartin@techtarget.com telling me that due to "inactivity" my account with TechTarget has been suspended. A rap on the knuckles or what?
 

Project control - project creep

Senior managers and directors are generally great in the role of defining the broad strategy of their organisation. However, the same people tend to be not so good in the process of detailed specification for project requirements. A consequence is that when the budget funds for a new project is agreed and authorised it is usual that some features or services will be omitted from the authorised project. This omission  might have happened accidentally or intentionally.

As the the project progresses it is inevitable that senior managers, clients, team members will identify some feature or facility that "should have been included" within the project. It may be the proposed variation in the Project is a reasonable and sensible change. In those cases the changes can be incorporated by the variations route. In the cases where the Project Manager thinks the proposed change is stupid or would cost too much, or cause too much project delay he/she should reject the proposal via the variation process. No doubt the time will arrive when the project scope will have to be "frozen" in order to achieve a delivery date, but it always possible to parcel off some features to be delivered after the main implementation date.

The worst kind of project creep occurs when a senior manager/manager declares a related service feature must be included in the project even when it is nothing to do with the original project. The senior manager will even override the views of the project manager regardless of the impact on spend or the impact on project resources/time table. In those cases the project manager must be careful to document the impact in advance and then ensure the consequences are brought to the attention of the requesting manager/client. If there is no change in the senior manager's/client's demand for inclusion then the origin of the request and consequences should be included in the formal project progress documentation. The worst thing the project manager can do is to attempt to absorb the additional cost and resource time. A similar process should be followed where the senior manager/client instructs that a previously agreed element of the project should be removed.

A recent example I've seen of the latter is on a project to install a software based stock control system in the stock rooms for the consumable clinical equipment used in the operating theatres of a major hospital. Their existing manual systems are frequently out of date and the local operations managers have no idea of what is actually in stock. The project manager is rolling out this new system storage room by room. The project involves training staff in the new techniques and loading inventory details on the stock database. However during the project lifetime there was a major move from one hospital site to a new building. A substantial amount of stock, millions of pounds worth, was disposed of on the grounds of "hygiene", but in the rush of the move the stock disposals were not recorded in the manual records. A couple of months later a sample audit revealed the consequent discrepancies in the manual stock records and spreadsheets. 
A senior hospital manager diverted staff resources from the new stock control project team to undertake a full stock inventory exercise in order to be able to report to the Board the "reasons" for the difference. This "simple" command created an unauthorised extra £35,000 bill for consultancy and delayed the stock control system project by a month. Rather than use in-house clerical administrators to perform the inventory, expensive external software consultants were used to count scalpels. The senior manager subsequently tried to deny that she was the cause of overspend and delay to the project, but the project documentation showed otherwise.

Project Control - Variances

A major part of the work of my company (Oaksys Tech Ltd) is project control. The process of fit out of a trading floor or data centre often involves close contact with a Main Contractor from a constructions firm. The Main Contractors have long experience in the project control of variances. It is inevitable that during the course of a project there will be changes to the original plan requested by the project team or the client management. Such changes will normally involve additional expenditure and/or a variation in the project time scale. There's nothing wrong in having variances provided the change to the project plan is properly authorised and agreed with the business or the part of the organisation who is ultimately paying for the project. The provision of funds for variations does not appear as if by magic, the agreement to pay should be documented. Similarly the acceptance of a variation in project time scale, if any, some be documented. Be sure if there are changes in a construction project the Main Contractor will document those and expect additional payment for those variations.

The project manager should track variances as an ongoing part of the project management process. He/she should avoid being surprised at the end of the project with a large list of project variances and a demand for supplemental payment. It is all too easy for the person requesting the original change to disappear from the project team prior to the end of the project leaving little evidence of why the change was requested and who agreed to fund the change/variance. Uncertainty over the reason for the change can lead to heated arguments and even expensive arbitration or legal fees.

The Main Contractor will sub-contract work to other contractors. The process is loaded with opportunity for mistakes, miscommunication and the use of out of date project specifications. In effect the project hasn't changed but the mistakes will have caused delay and additional expenditure. Delay or mistakes by one sub-contractor can affect other sub-contractors, leading to variations claims by them. The management team of the Main Contractor will have to explain to their owners why the cost of those mistakes will be deducted from the expected profits. In other cases the Main Contractor may not have delivered parts or all of their project on time leading to their client expecting compensation or withholding payments. Sometimes the Main Contractor will report those variations as having been caused by the client in an attempt to extract further payment from the client or to avoid paying compensation. It is important that the project manager challenges and rejects any such false claims of variation. Such challenges should occur as an ongoing process during the life of the project. Variations on the part of the contractor should be documented in an agreed process between the client project management team and the Main Contractor.

Ultimately the business rule of  "no payment without purchase order" should apply. In the case of a trading floor/ data centre project the Purchase Order might be substituted by a variation document. As with purchase orders, there must be agreement from the funds holder/owner that the variation in expenditure is permitted.  The big challenge to the Project Manager is ensuring there are no project delays caused by waiting for variation approval.

Hidden security

A normal security provision in a data centre and trading floor is some form of CCTV monitoring and recording of key areas within and around the organisation's building. A visit to IFSEC at the  National Exhibition Centre in Birmingham UK will quickly convince you there are thousands of different CCTV security solutions. The art of placing the cameras is a balance between risk/cost. The costs involve installation, power, cabling, capital cost for equipment, operational cost for use and long term image storage. The more cameras you have the greater the capital cost and the greater the operational cost. 

These systems can have great deterrence effect and can help in the detection of offenders intent on crime.  However if the cameras are poor quality and not well placed they can be a waste of money. If the criminals are aware of the camera locations they can avoid their faces being recorded. Simple techniques such as looking away and "hoodie" type clothing can destroy the effectiveness of the CCTV systems. The careful positioning of some hidden or covert cameras as part of the overall security system can help to detect the faces of criminals who would otherwise attempt to defeat the visible or overt cameras. Hidden cameras can be positioned at eye level to record facial images whereas overt cameras may have to be positioned at a high level to prevent damage by criminals. 

I'll relate a true life example which happened in a major international bank. The bank in question had a good CCTV security system protecting access to its data centres. The visible camera systems were of high quality, were well positioned, and the CCTV recording system provided good quality playback. One of the Bank's data centres was subjected to a raid by well organised thieves during the evening after the day time computer operators had left. The entrance to the building was protected by 24 hour security guards. A thief "tailgated" one of the operations staff during the day to gain access to the main technology area and hid somewhere in the room. This was a suspected, but never proved "inside job".  Later in the evening the hidden man opened the door to the data centre to allow access to other thieves who were disguised as cleaners. They wheeled in a large high sided trolley into the technology area and set to work pulling Sun servers from the computer racks/cabinets and loading them into the trolley. It was a crude process as they were pulling live operational servers from the cabinet without first powering down the machines. In less than five minutes they'd filled the trolley with expensive Sun servers. They covered the trolley and wheeled it out of the building under the watchful(!) gaze of the security guard who assumed they were departing cleaners. The stolen equipment value was in excess of £200,000 but the greater cost was the recovery of the systems the following day.

Throughout the whole process the gang of thieves kept their faces shrouded and hidden from the from the visible CCTV security cameras. The police believe that they'd been told of the position of the cameras by their "inside" accomplice.  However unknown to the gang of thieves there were also a set of covert/hidden security cameras which provided evidence quality video of the faces of the thieves. They were apprehended within a few days and are now serving time in prison. The covert cameras had been positioned to catch the faces of people hiding from the visible cameras.