Slacking

Wow, I've really been slacking off on the 'ol weblog lately. this is partly due to being outside more, now that the spring thaw has come to Iowa, and partly due to being busy with equipment requests at work. At least I got to take my bike out for a spin this weekend... Equipment requests are a funny business. Departments request a bunch of money from the Dean to buy the equipment they want/need. Much of this is quite technical, so I am asked to pick it out, and quote it by the departments. Then I'm asked my opinion of what they want to use it for, by the Dean's office. To add a third complication, I've got some requests of my own in there, so that gives me some incentive to downplay the importance of other people's requests, so that mine have a better chance of being funded. I'm really in the middle of it all, and doing my best to remain unbiased, yet trying to be skeptical about every request and whether or not it's really necessary in the grand scheme of things.

Slowdown

It's pretty sad that I haven't written anything on this weblog for several days, considering I haven't been busy at all. I'm in the slow part of the semester right now, but things will pick up in a couple of weeks, I'm sure. This week, we were essentially told that we had nothing to fear but fear itself by our university president. The state legislature and the governor are going to cut our budget, how much remains to be seen. If it becomes a 10% cut, I may be looking for a new job, as I'm a recent hire, and thus the first to be laid off. Anyone looking to hire a tech support guy?

A hiring freeze has already been implemented, so if you were looking for a job at UNI, you're going to be waiting a while. A hiring freeze means that we may not have the faculty we need to teach courses next fall, which in turn means that we may not be able to offer as many classes, which means that some students won't graduate on time. Add the almost-certain increases in tuition that will be coming this fall (think at least 10%) and you've got an unhappy student body to deal with as well.

What to do

I'm posting this from within Internet Explorer 6.0, which apparently breaks the WYSIWYG editor and the fancy little formatting bar in Manila. Hopefully, Userland will get this fixed soon...

Macintouch linked to this list of things that Apple should do to reclaim the education market.  I don't agree with all of them, especially the large number of requests for lower pricing on several items.  To me, the most important things for Apple to take from that list are:

• Assume that the IT person is a Windows person, and you've got to sell them on Macs.
• Make Mac Certification easy and cheap to obtain.
• Provide a special software package with the utilities for IT departments.
• Offer better education channel warranties that 1 year. (this is the most important one for me)
• Give school districts more advance notice of product developments, even if they have to sign NDAs.  (This is also ridiculous on Apple's part.  Our Dell rep handed me their roadmap, showing me when each of the new models would be introduced for the next year.  Try getting that from Apple.)
• Encourage hardware loaners to schools. (This is especially important for places that don't have an installed Mac base.  Loan out some PowerBook G4s to some of the Administrators, and see how quickly they order more)

Dell introduced their Optiplex GX150 mini-tower today, just as the roadmap I saw last month told me they would.  This is the machine that I plan to standardize on for faculty and staff for all of our spring/summer purchases.  By next fall, I imagine that a Pentium 4 chipset that uses SDRAM will be available, as I'm not keen on the expensive RDRAM memory.

Standards

It's hard to be motivated at work, when it's 50° outside for the first time in four months.  Maybe I can ride by bike to work tomorrow...

I'm glad to see that Intel has abandoned the HomeRF standard in favor of 802.11b.  It's ludicrous to have two standards, one geared at home users, and the other at corporations.  It makes no sense, since the primary use of wireless is for laptops and other mobile devices, which you would use both at work, and at home.  Why would you want incompatible systems, requiring two cards to access them? 

Long Day

Want to buy something that really sucks?  Amazon is having a sale on many of their vacuum cleaners.  Since I don't own one (I've been borrowing a friend's) I decided it was a good time to order.  I'd wanted one that didn't have a bag, so I chose this model.  Since it's over $99 (by 99 cents) there's free shipping, and by using the code "AMZNTENPRCNT" you save another ten bucks.  That makes it quite reasonable, considering the bag-less variety usually sell for much more than the 89.99 this will cost me.

Tuesday is always a long day for me, because I have class for three hours after work.  I wind up being in this building from 8:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m. only to find myself back here Wednesday morning again at 8:00.  Maybe I should just install a cot in my office.  I could probaby sleep under my desk if I brought in a sleeping bag and pillow...

I spent much of this morning buying hardware (not computers, think drill bits and gaskets) only to realize that one of the pieces won't fit the drill I borrowed.  I guess I'll be going back to Ace hardware tomorrow to exchange that.

My root-canaled tooth has been bothering me all day, despite my frequent doses of Acetaminophen.  I think it's time to upgrade to morphine.

On a positive note, I've got at least one person interested in the internship position we're going to have next year.  The Cooperative Education office is handling all the administrative work with the applications, all I have to do is choose those I'd like to interview from the resumes they send me, and then select the one I'd like to hire.  That makes it much easier...