Management

Everything has been working just fine for this small business's IT, with e-mail and the Web site managed by a third-party vendor on the vendor's servers. But then the Web site vendor moves e-mail and Web sites to the servers of a large hosting company.

This pilot fish has watched his IT shop grow from a single IBM minicomputer to dozens of servers connected to hundreds of PCs over the past 20 years, and these days he only occasionally sits in on a department meeting. But sometimes, that's a good thing.

The rumors were true: Microsoft confirms more layoffs. A futher 800 employees have been told their jobs are redundant. In IT Blogwatch, bloggers wonder who, why, and where. Not to mention laughable comping...
(MSFT)

The sign off is sometimes pursued and valued as though it were some kind of ancient idol. It's taken for granted that it's a necessary part of the processes we use to produce product. But what does the sign off really mean?

Lone on-site IT engineer at a small military base in the desert in Iraq is very gung-ho about doing his part, and he wants to be able to brag about his time ‘outside the wire' -- so he comes up with a novel excuse.

In today's podcast: Ruiz steps down as GlobalFoundries chairman; Intel chipset causes problems for iPhone; and PC makers look to rural China for growth.

Pilot fish gets a call from a client with a week-old PC -- and he's in a panic. The newbie user tells fish that he can't plug in the mouse and keyboard, and he needs to answer an important e-mail that has just arrived.

This government agency wants a digital photo of an employee in a remote office, and the local administrative assistant dutifully e-mails it. But that's not the way the folks in D.C. want it.

Programmer pilot fish uses a big-name software package to write quick and simple reports for some users. But when it's time to upgrade the hardware for the report server, things get complicated.

This manufacturer needs to set up a remote office just to support the management of its inventory with a certain huge retailer. But after DSL is installed there, the staff calls the help desk because they can't reach the Internet.

In today's podcast: SAP results; Jive 4; and IBM sells sales team to Dassault Systemes.

Pilot fish gets a call from a department manager on the other side of the building, who's complaining that all the network printers in his area have stopped working.

The City of Los Angeles has had it with GroupWise, and will replace it with Google Apps. It's a big win for la GOOG, especially as it beat Microsoft to the deal. In IT Blogwatch, bloggers count how many angels can dance on a cloud.
(GOOG) (MSFT) Not to mention iPhone costumes...

This nationwide retailer's help desk staff spend a lot of their time resetting users' passwords. And they try to be nice about it -- but sometimes it just doesn't help.

Linux isn't for fanboys anymore -- it's for IT.