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Author Archives: Michael E Kelley
Kelley’s Software Installation & Upgrade Rules
Recently a site was performing a software upgrade over the weekend. No big deal, everyone thought, because this happens thousands of times across the world every day.
Yours truly was on call to support the site if any issues arose.
Needless to say they called Sunday afternoon after message traffic had gotten stuck in their queues for several hours and queue refreshes had not made a difference.
What I learned about the site was amazing. They had performed not one, not two, but three software upgrades all at once. They only backed up the system at the beginning. They were the first site to go to this release.
Well, this prompted me to draft the following list of rules.
- Never install release 1.0 of anything.
- Never be the first site for any release.
- Always read the release notes and review the installation instructions.
- Always hold a readiness review meeting to answer questions.
- Never start an installation or upgrade without a backup of both your database and your system.
- Never install or upgrade more than two releases at a time.
- Always backup your databases before your second upgrade.
- Optionally backup your system before your second upgrade.
- Always backup both your database and your system after the last release.
- Always test the functionality mentioned in the release notes.
- Always examine all the log files for errors.
- Always hold a party when the smoke clears aka the system is stable.
Now I feel a whole lot better. Creating this list was quite a catharsis.
Let me know if you agree or have something to add.
Cardinal Conclave’s Concise Conciliatory Conclusion
They did it. After a day of discussions, arguing and farmisht, they did it.
Yes They decided that the new Pope will be a man!
At the end of the second day they agreed on a new pope. Argentina’s Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio will be the new pope to represent the world’s Catholics.
Compared to the conclave, Bergoglio took very little time to decide to be known as Pope Francis.
Rumor has it he chose Francis because of Francis Bacon and “he always liked bacon.”
North Korea Cuts Off Pizza Hotline
South Korea was in shock today when they learned they could no longer order pizza over the phone.
This action has increased the tensions between the two Korean countries which are already heightened due to recent launches of test missiles by both.
President Obama, when asked about his thoughts of the cutoff, remarked, “What a shame. I really like pizza.”
Oh, my. We have just received word that the hotline was not a pizza hotline but a Red Cross hotline. Well what do you know. There are two kinds of hotlines.
As Gilda Radner famously said, “Never mind.”
Obama Predicts Star Trek and Star Wars Mega-Merger
President Obama recently let the cat out of the bag when he used the phrase “Jedi mind meld” when referring to his inability to get Congress to resolve the sequestration dilemma. See video.
http://www.nowthisnews.com/news/obama-jedi-mind-meld-wont-solve-budget-crisis/
With the Dow Jones industrial average flirting with a new high there has been a rash of mega-merger mania. http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2013-02-20/business/37190427_1_antitrust-enforcement-antitrust-professor-antitrust-officials
Among the mergers are: 1. American Airlines and US Airways 2. Office Depot and OfficeMax 3. Heinz and Berkshire Hathaway and 4. Disney and Lucasfilm including Star Wars.
Now we have a new mega-merger to add to the list.
Star Wars and Star Trek (Disney and Viacom)
Recent actions by the Obama Administration point to such a merger.
1. The White House declared the Death Star to be Dead. See https://michaelekelley.com/2013/01/29/death-to-the-death-star/
2. The Obama Administration is supporting drones everywhere instead of an army of battle droids. http://www.technovelgy.com/graphics/content08/droid-army.jpg
I am sure we will be seeing more of the following:
May the force be with you.
This Is Gonna Take A While – Amazing
Ever have one of those days when you have a lot of energy and then when you go to start the next task, you realize it won’t take a few minutes? You know, more like a day or two?
And worse yet, you can’t call for backup.
New Obama Dollar Coin Announced
WASHINGTON D.C. – The Treasury Department announced today that they are pressing forward with the minting of a new dollar coin with the silhouette of President Barack Obama.
The President was “thrilled” to hear about the new coin, a White House source confirmed. He had been “totally furious” that he had spent time the precious week posing for a trillion-dollar platinum coin that would never be minted. See http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/borowitzreport/2013/01/obama-furious-he-wasted-week-posing-for-coin.html
Treasury officials reversed course and decided to commemorate the historical second inauguration. They will be using funds budgeted before sequestration.
After the overwhelming success of adding color to paper money, the Treasury Department decided to start coloring coins as well. When asked why the color orange was chosen, Robert Steel of the Treasury Department replied, “The coin is only 10 percent silver and 20 percent nickel so it does not really matter.”
Mr. Steel also announced that the coin would be available in 60 days assuming it passes testing to see if any teeth marks could be detected.
Both Treasury and White House officials collaborated on the coin’s design. In acknowledgement of all the various religions found in the U.S., the coin will not have the words “In God We Trust.”
The coin fiasco behind him, Mr. Obama has now apparently turned his attention to balancing the budget within the next 100 years.
Spoiling babies
Do we have to buy a different colored tablet to match every baby outfit?
I ask you. Will this kid think this picture is funny in 20 years?
Who let this kid play in Mom’s and Dad’s bed?
Captain Kirk Saves Oscars
Trekkies had a lot to celebrate during the Academy Awards.
Captain Kirk went back in time to 2013 to help Seth McFarlane clean up his act.
The Captain spent 20 minutes giving Seth tips for the show which included several classic song and dance numbers with Seth and other stars.
A special tribute to James Bond movies was well received.
By the end of the night, the big winners were “Life of Pi”, “Argo”, Daniel Day-Lewis and Jennifer Lawrence.
So Trekkies and Engineers everywhere were celebrating what they have known all along: the importance of Pi.
A special appearance by Michelle Obama and her bangs to announce the Best Picture, “Argo”, was also smashing.
Engineers Make Lousy Husbands
An engineer is trained to think about all the possibilities for a system problem. Whether it is a hardware or software system, all the reasons for a hiccup or failure must be identified in order to resolve the problem. This results in several hypotheses and explanations.
While engineers may be great problem solvers, they fail to get a grip on how to communicate.
When an engineer tackles one of life’s problems, many possible solutions are examined. Like which do you do first – pay the bills, buy groceries or fix the garden? And in what order do you perform the rest of these tasks? An engineer would give several action plans and reasons for each.
But a wife thinks a lot differently than an engineer. In fact a woman will want one and only one answer to a question or issue or she will begin to distrust the husband.
So try to imagine being an engineer AND a husband. What a conundrum.
She gets upset when he gives her more than one answer and then he gets frustrated when he realizes he should have stuck with the first answer. Talk about being up the creek without a paddle. Oy vey!
Michael E Kelley 
