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*clueless IT folks*

B

Bedawyn

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jul 17, 2003
161
0
Asheville, NC
I'm not running any apps on my Macs yet because I read (probably here) that it could heat older machines up too much, and mine struggle as it is. I'll wait till I get a properly air-conditioned apartment. *g* But I did e-mail our Windows IT folks at work to ask whether we were allowed to use distributed computing apps there. Since we are a scientific nonprofit, it seems rather a no-brainer that distributed computing is something we should support, provided it really won't interfere with the system. So the guy tells me today that he doesn't know what distributed computing is. *bangs head against wall*

I understand not being fully up to date on all the details. I don't pretend to understand how it might affect a Windows network. But how can someone be hired, at a major _scientific_ organization like this, who doesn't even know what distributed computing _is_?
 
Why should the network manager (or whatever he is) know about distributed computing? Its not essential to his job nor is it something most people learn in school. As a CompSci major, I cannot remember even once hearing about it in a classroom setting.
 
I have gotten an email from our IT department at work, also a nonprofit scientific company. In the email they asked me if I had a license for a program on my pc, called folding@home :D, just had to share this story!
 
grapes911 said:
Why should the network manager (or whatever he is) know about distributed computing? Its not essential to his job nor is it something most people learn in school. As a CompSci major, I cannot remember even once hearing about it in a classroom setting.
Click to expand...

Scalable supercomputing and virtual scalable supercomputing (distributed computing) are both things that a network man should indeed know about, and things that colleges should be teaching anyone in a computer-science related field. Dude, we learned this stuff in high school, half a decade ago. To not know, one would need to be inept in the field. I'm sorry if the IT field moves too fast for some of the 30- and 40-year-olds out there, but that's the way it is-- if you don't understand a revolutionary concept that has immense importance to science and computing, years after it's been made widely publicized, you're not up to par.

paul
 
Er, what Paul just said.

Like I said, I wouldn't require that they be knowledgeable on all of its ins and outs. But knowing that it exists and having a general sense of its nature, that's just being up to date in your field. _Especially_ when you work in scientific IT. And ... being able to answer questions from the non-IT staff (like me) _is_ essential to their job.

I suppose these guys are just being hired for their looks, though. Both of the IT guys I've met made very nice eye-candy.
 
Bedawyn said:
Er, what Paul just said.

Like I said, I wouldn't require that they be knowledgeable on all of its ins and outs. But knowing that it exists and having a general sense of its nature, that's just being up to date in your field. _Especially_ when you work in scientific IT. And ... being able to answer questions from the non-IT staff (like me) _is_ essential to their job.

I suppose these guys are just being hired for their looks, though. Both of the IT guys I've met made very nice eye-candy.
Click to expand...

you get good-looking IT guys? you rancid bitch :p ;) :D

You should convince them that they can win cash prizes for folding... get them to install it on all your machines... or just tell them it's the latest virus patch from MS, that seems to work...

paul
 
Another funny story on my end...

We were installing some new PCs in a couple classrooms on our floor and had installed F@H to check them out - stress test, etc. The next day, the department in charge of classroom equipment was supposed to come through and physically secure the towers. Well, I got a frantic knock on my office door the next day from one of their IT people asking if I had heard about the security breach.

Turns out, they saw FAH console running and assumed it was sending information to some hacker somewhere and were talking about calling the FBI to investigate! :eek: :rolleyes:

I told them what it was and calmed them down, but it was still pretty funny.
 
paulwhannel said:
I'm sorry if the IT field moves too fast for some of the 30- and 40-year-olds out there, but that's the way it is-- if you don't understand a revolutionary concept that has immense importance to science and computing, years after it's been made widely publicized, you're not up to par.
Click to expand...

I'm in my 40's and work in IT for San Diego City Schools and I've known what distributed computing is for years. Of course, maybe my years hanging out at MacRumors helps. :p


bedawyn said:
I suppose these guys are just being hired for their looks, though. Both of the IT guys I've met made very nice eye-candy.
Click to expand...

On good days, I look a LOT like my avatar. :cool:
 
paulwhannel said:
you get good-looking IT guys? you rancid bitch :p ;) :D

You should convince them that they can win cash prizes for folding... get them to install it on all your machines... or just tell them it's the latest virus patch from MS, that seems to work...

paul
Click to expand...

*snerk* When I first started working for orgs big enough to have IT departments (as opposed to nonprofits where I was the IT as well as the receptionist, secretary, desktop publisher, bookkeeper, and conference planner), I always went in eager to meet the IT department, expecting it to be the perfect place to meet Date-able types (as well as folks whose brains I could pick when I was learning myself). Then I learned, over time, that the larger the IT department, the less likely they were to be what I consider competent, much less geeky. And they're much less likely to know anything I don't, about anything that doesn't have Novell in front of it. And since I'm still very far from competently geeky, that's not a recommendation.

I want to like my current IT department, I really do. At least two of the guys _are_ really cute, and well, we use Groupwise, which is such a horrible application I can only assume we're using it to avoid Microsoft, so that's a point in their favor. But they call our graphics computers MACs, so....

And actually, seeding the idea of installing distributed computing system-wide was part of my Evil Plan. We have a lot of computers that sit idle much of the day, and really, I don't want to mention the org name in public when I'm not Officially Representing them, but really, it's almost a dereliction of duty for us _not_ to be involved in the scientific distributed computing projects. Heaven knows I've edited enough protein folding papers in the last couple of years. Given the lack of response so far, I don't have much hope for it, though. But maybe they're just researching the idea and shuffling it along the chain of command. It's possible. I'll cross my fingers.
 
Rower_CPU said:
Turns out, they saw FAH console running and assumed it was sending information to some hacker somewhere and were talking about calling the FBI to investigate! :eek: :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

I find that sadly believable. I first learned about distributed computing years ago, when I visited my mom and saw SETI running on her computer. She'd told me she'd had problems with her system being hijacked in the past, and I knew little about Windows... I have a vague memory of thinking it was a hacker or something, until I identified it as something connected to SETI.

On the other hand... talking about the FBI _before_ talking to the folks who set the computer up? That's bad.
 
paulwhannel said:
Scalable supercomputing and virtual scalable supercomputing (distributed computing) are both things that a network man should indeed know about, and things that colleges should be teaching anyone in a computer-science related field. Dude, we learned this stuff in high school, half a decade ago. To not know, one would need to be inept in the field. I'm sorry if the IT field moves too fast for some of the 30- and 40-year-olds out there, but that's the way it is-- if you don't understand a revolutionary concept that has immense importance to science and computing, years after it's been made widely publicized, you're not up to par.

paul
Click to expand...

the computer field changes so fast...whew

as a grad student, in the computer business, and having taken certification classes also, i have never heard it mentioned once either

one thing i am interested in is quantum computing...lots of info on it just a few years ago but like a lot of new things, the big surprise goes away and most never hear much of it again, but it could still be viable in research even when the media tires of it
 
...but having said that, i like that this field is so young and so innovative...i am 40 and i admit i am neither young nor innovative ;)

sometimes us college educated people and older people don't make the inroads...especially in computers/tech/ecommerce

look at fanning, jobs, woz, gates, allen, and ellison...all very young *most not old enough to drink, and all with just hs educations when they did the big things they did to change the field

and oh yeah, dell, too ;)
 
paulwhannel said:
You should convince them that they can win cash prizes for folding... get them to install it on all your machines... or just tell them it's the latest virus patch from MS, that seems to work...
Click to expand...

just don't forget to set all those machine's group # to 3446 , :p
 
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