Confession: I got through a 41 year career in IT, mostly in banking and government, without ever compiling or running a COBOL program. I recently saw A very short introduction to COBOL, which describes how to install COBOL on a Mac and how to compile and run a very simple COBOL program. So I tried this on Ubuntu Linux 20.04.
Continue readingTag Archives: work
Monday Night Irish Class, March 7, 2016
Irish Class, March 7, 2016
Rang Gaeilge, 7ú lá mí na Márta 2016
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Seanfhocal
Sháraigh na mná Harry Stottle, is sháraigh Harry Stottle an diabhal | Women were beyond Aristotle, and he was cleverer than the Devil. | |
Harry Stottle | Aristotle | (!) |
sáraigh | overcome, pass a limit, … | |
My job
My title at work is “Principal Database Administrator.” My employer is looking for another one, to be my peer. Here is the job posting. I helped write it, and it did not get too badly garbled by the HR process. If you want the official view of what I do at work, this is it. If you have the relevant background, and are willing to work closely with me, feel free to apply.
Monday Night Irish Class, October 1, 2012
Irish Class, October 1, 2012
Rang Gaeilge, an 1ú lá Mí Dheireadh Fómhair 2012
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Mo scéalta
The Six Most Terrifying Words in Information Technology
“We don’t have the source code.”
I just saw these in an on-line discussion about something at my job that I have been working on since 2 PM (recall that today is Sunday).
Home alone
On Sunday morning mia_mcdavid and our son James left here for a road trip. They drove to Michigan, to see Mia’s mother and other relatives. I have been alone here, except for the cat, who apparently regards me primarily as her servant. So what have I been doing? Continue reading
Oracle for real
More than two years ago I took an introductory class on the Oracle database management system. Oracle is used in my organization, but not nearly as much as SQL Server, which is where I had been spending almost all my time. My supervisor was an experienced Oracle DBA and handled such tasks as came up. However, she just left, to take a job in the private sector. I have inherited the role of Oracle DBA. She gave me a lot of information before she left, but there was only so much she could cover in the available time. So I have a lot to figure out on my own. Oracle is very different.
Oracle here at work runs on Linux (Red Hat and Suse). All the time I have spent working on Linux at home will now pay off. The Linux support team hers is small (three people), but very good. I am looking forward to working with them.
Don’t let vendors take advantage of you
Don’t do anything just because the vendor says it’s a good idea. Here’s why.
Just because your company is paying them thousands of dollars does not mean they are competent. I have seen a quite a few cases like this in my own experience.
No matter how complicated a computer problem is, …
… if IBM is involved it will get even more complicated. That is the story of my weekend.
(Channeling Poul Anderson)