July 29, 2024 at 12:00 am
Comments posted to this topic are about the item A Quick Turnaround
July 29, 2024 at 5:19 pm
One of my eight various IT jobs was years ago going as IT manager to a company that had no IT at all. Our first project was an entirely custom order entry/invoicing system using the old CRT terminals. Immediately following that was implementing an online inventory/purchasing system, followed shortly by computerizing the billing/accounts receivable system that had for 50 years been on the old yellow ledger cards and manual posting machines. I and a couple various programmers managed to pull this off in a fairly short timeframe while moving through three sets of hardware from two different vendors, two programming languages, and moving from flat files to a full database platform
As a bonus for the 'quick turnaround', one of the co-owners/vice president of the company gave me two weeks paid time off and round-trip tickets for my wife and myself from Chicago to Hawaii for a 'recovery' period.
Rick
Disaster Recovery = Backup ( Backup ( Your Backup ) )
July 29, 2024 at 10:57 pm
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As a bonus for the 'quick turnaround', one of the co-owners/vice president of the company gave me two weeks paid time off and round-trip tickets for my wife and myself from Chicago to Hawaii for a 'recovery' period.
I'd like that, but I'd aim for Alaska 😉
July 30, 2024 at 8:32 am
Years ago, deployments to production had to be done out-of-hours. We planned and rehearsed these meticulously and for the majority went well, maybe minor hiccups. We were given a start time though the end time was when the deployment (or rollback) was successfully completed. Depending on the nature of the hiccup we sometimes had to forward fix rather than rollback. The urgency of the fix depended on what was needed. A senior developer and/or DBA had to think fast to determine the feasibility and timescales.
The start time could be 02:00. Strangely, I used to enjoy it. The 45 miles to work on empty motorways with no speed cameras, a small group of people working closely together without distractions. Problems found and solved together without the need for meetings, being masters of our own destiny etc.
We did get time off in lieu. In the early days, the project manager went into the local village and came back with freshly made bacon and egg sandwiches for the team. Sadly this practise was squeezed out by the upper echelons, and to some extent the amount of time off in lieu was squeezed too.
Personally, I've always accepted that there would be a need for extra hours. Render unto Caesar etc and Caesar never had reason to feel short changed. However, there were some times when Caesar was an ungrateful b*****d. The powers that be sometimes forget that an awful lot of what goes on in any company relies on good will. If we worked to the letter of our contracts a lot less would be done.
July 31, 2024 at 9:46 pm
Years ago, deployments to production had to be done out-of-hours. We planned and rehearsed these meticulously and for the majority went well, maybe minor hiccups. We were given a start time though the end time was when the deployment (or rollback) was successfully completed. Depending on the nature of the hiccup we sometimes had to forward fix rather than rollback. The urgency of the fix depended on what was needed. A senior developer and/or DBA had to think fast to determine the feasibility and timescales.
The start time could be 02:00. Strangely, I used to enjoy it. The 45 miles to work on empty motorways with no speed cameras, a small group of people working closely together without distractions. Problems found and solved together without the need for meetings, being masters of our own destiny etc.
David, that reminds me of my days as manager of a small shop which ran around the clock, Sunday 9:00 pm through Friday midnight. Then system had to be available due to Saturday morning meetings of salesforce. My deployment time thus began at Friday midnight and if that wasn't enough, I got Saturday afternoon to Sunday 9:00 PM, my choice! My sons were accustomed to sleeping on the floor in our 'computer room' at my employer.
Rick
Disaster Recovery = Backup ( Backup ( Your Backup ) )
August 26, 2024 at 4:45 pm
I've almost always received comp time for overtime work, and with one employer, comp time and a half. I once worked on a consulting gig where I was paid time and a half in my pay, but that was the only time I had that. I did have at least one job where there was no compensation for overtime, but it never got abusive so I didn't mind.
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