I'm so sad. You know.. we're working on spec'ing out equipment.. again. For this application that parses quite a bit of XML on the server side. Our goal is pretty much to handle around 200 concurrent users during our peak times with the typical acceptable response time of about 3 seconds. Keep in mind this application is total horse shit from the software perspective.. i've ranted about it before. It is a hybrid perl / java application in some sort of transition period where most of it's fast functionality is slowly being ported to something slower.. ;).. It's really an unsupportable mess right now and I hope they iron their crap out soon.
Anyway, so we come up with a nice solution.. cheap.. does a much better job than the solaris / sparc junk we have now. Linux on amd64.. which has proven itself to be the fastest, most cost effective platform on which to deploy web applications (especially cpu-intensive ones that parse a lot of XML) was the platform I chose to deploy with. It came in under a quarter mil and it seemed it would be enough hardware to last us quite a while.
You would think that management in the education sector would have half a clue about emerging technologies and industry standards. You would think that the idea that linux is for hobbyists that was popular in the mid to late 90's would have gone away by now. You'd think that the "Sun is 'enterprise'" mentality, where everyone could afford to buy SPARC based boxes with their tens of millions in VC would have gone away by now too. And it has from most places, but not here. Here you'd think you were sitting around the table in a board room with a bunch of blue haired con artists with their checks in hand wanting to buy in to the hype that Sun so masterfully mustered up in the late 90's. And damn was that equipment good in the late 90's. I've seen Sun when they're good.. and they're good. Their galaxy stuff is amazing. Finally applying those hardware people to a worthy platform. Not that SPARC isn't worthy. It is. It is just not cost effective. Just like Alpha.. Just like Transmeta.. Just like PowerPC (everywhere but video game consoles).. I mean good platforms just die sometimes. Nothing against their creators. They've helped push hardware further. It's just that it doesn't make sense to buy these slower processors at a premium. And it's "not about clock speed". I know. But I want to parse XML here, using Java no less... So I need raw cycles. And I have a benchmark here to prove that Opteron kicks the everliving shit out of SPARC at parsing XML.
Anyway.. that won't be good enough.. because where I work, we're "enterprise". I mean we're not small potatoes like Google, Ford, or Time Warner. Those guys don't have shit on a university in the middle of the ghetto. We .. we're enterprise. We have the best leadership in the industry. Hell we should be called the Silicon Ghettos of Detroit we're so far along in innovation. You should see how quickly we can cut a purchase req to a company we've already established a relationship with. You can see how quickly we'll buy stuff that was probably headed for their dumpster without an implementation plan or even the slightest thought about any long term costs associated with it.
Oh wait a minute.. that's called shopping.. er no.. that's IMPULSE BUYING.. wow.. any half wit with a credit card can "innovate" like we do. Just truck on down to best buy and pick up a copy of Roxio EZ CD Creator and you've done a better job than the leadership has done almost the entire time I've been here.
I guess what it must boil down to is experience. I just don't have it. I haven't been around the block like these guys. I mean.. It makes sense to be a technology department that's 8 years behind the times. It makes sense to form long term senseless partnerships that bear no fruit. It absolutely does.. because the technology market is so static .. it never changes. Sorry for the sarcasm.. it's just so damn hard to not be cynical / sarcastic.
Not only do they not have a clue, they think they DO have a clue, which is even worse. Anyway, if you read this, and you're one of them.. you know who you are. I know your reasons are probably really petty, and I know there is probably some degree of corruption involved.. because honestly there aren't TECHNICAL or LOGICAL reasons why things are they way they are. I don't mind corruption.. it's something that just happens. What I do mind though is constantly being second guessed and undercut. I try to explain myself and I try to be a "team player" but for the most part all I get / see is more incompetence.. Maybe that means management classes for a few of you, or even a subscription so some modern periodical pertaining to the current happenings in the industry? Maybe even some electric shock therapy.. I donno.
And to the sales people: enjoy your money tree while it lasts. Some of you guys have done a really good job selling us products that we renew licenses for that we don't even use. Wow! At least someone's winning here. Too bad it's not us!
Okay.. that was a long rant, I don't expect anyone to read this far. We don't have any "enterprise" anything here. I guess thats my point. It feels like Fischer Price's 'my first datacenter'. Complete with Cisco Certified "little people". There's more to being "enterprise" than a brand name, a weighted 'report', and a sales pitch. It takes effort, vision, and expertise at the top, and if you don't have it, then you aren't "enterprise" at all.
Someone beam these morons up to the only "enterprise" they'll ever know.
--_-