Oaksys Tech Update

BT just love sneaking out price increase details. This happened at the foot of an email from BT discussing other services.

The cost of an “out of plan” call rises from 5.4 pence per minute to 5.9 pence per minute (that’s 9% folks) with effect from the appropriate date of  1st April 2010. The call set-up charge for each call increases from 9.3 pence to 9.9 pence. The call set-up charge is particularly iniquitous; if you reach an answerphone you will be charged a minimum of 15.8 pence even if you hang up immediately.

Compare this with Skype which is 1.2 pence per minute and 2.9 pence call set-up, i.e. 4.1 pence minimum for a call (outside of plan).

Those are the domestic tariffs, I’ve yet to track down the business tariff’s, but I have little doubt that the increase will be 3x the rate of inflation there.  If your business is paying the full BT tariff for calls you should be firing the person responsible for negotiating telephone costs. With a little bit of work it is usually a simple job to cut those costs by 30% from the BATEOTM, I can usually get 50% reduction with no loss of service quality.

Guru

BATEOTM - bill at the end of the month

A few year’s ago I bought a Polycom Communicator C100S as a portable speakerphone for my Laptop and my travels. It was great under the Microsoft XP environment, but when I upgraded to Vista I soon found that the device did not work properly. Polycom support promised new driver software by mid-2007 but it never materialised. It was not a cheap microphone, it cost over $100, so you’d expect a reasonable service level from Polycom. However, no  joy, Polycom ignored the complaints from the people who purchased the device. I understand that there is now a new device CX100 that works with Windows 7, but I’m not going to give Polycom the opportunity to screw me again! Their name easily mutates to Polycon.

Guru

Femtocell technology used to extend Cell/Mobile phone reception to dead spots is being put forward as the next great solution for communications. Vodafone already have a system called Vodafone Sure Signal and O2 are trialling their solution. This is however little different from voice over IP, such as the SIP protocol, using local WiFi base stations. Both solutions need a broadband Internet connection, but the solutions by the mobile phone companies is likely to be proprietory to their own networks. Unless standards are introduced it will just promote vendor lock in. All that this provides is the opportunity for the owner of the Femtocell device to pay for rectifying the shortfall of the Mobile Phone Company coverage.

If you need information on deployment of Femocells there is a guide here. Here is an example of the equipment from Airvana.

Guru

“Five fire engines in South Yorkshire and the Humber region have been sitting unused since they were bought in 2007″ in a BBC report. At 26 tonnes they are too heavy to be used on the UK roads. Excluding the purchase expenses such as specification and manufacturer visits these vehicles each cost over £500,000.  The fire service bosses blame the manufacturer, calling it a supplier error.

I know that if I had ever  specified/ordered computer equipment that was too heavy for the containing building, I would be fired and/or sued for negligence. With the mind set of the Fire Chiefs I’m not surprised that no-one has been fired for this negligent purchase. I’d love to buy a Chieftain Tank to park outside of my home, but I know that road regulations would make life very difficult for me and I’d have the councils chasing me for the cost of road repair. The people raising the Fire Engine order were presumed competent to buy such equipment, but they got it wrong. I bet they will still get their full pensions when they retire.

Further waste of Tax Payer’s money and no penalty.

Guru

Many business managers assume that the physical security of their Data Centre and other IT facilities will be the responsibility (and budget) of the Facilities or Building Services Manager. This is not the case. The CTO must take responsibility for this issue even if that simply means that he/she ensures that the Building Services Manager does a proper job.

There are now substantial financial penalties, not just loss of IT assets or loss of business services, if you get this wrong. In the UK the Information Commissioners Office can fine your company up to £500,000 for failure to provide adequate security for your ICT systems if that action then breaches the Data Protection Act.

Your ICT installation should have a good Physical Security Policy and Plan in place. Managers should be made responsible and accountable for the physical security and the proper implementation of the security policy. The effective implementation of physical security should mesh with network and server/PC security. It should be tested and reviewed on a regular basis.

Simple business insurance is not good enough.

Oaksys

Barclays Retail is terminating its desk top PC support contract with Getronics earlier than scheduled. Working through the reported figures each desk top PC is costing in excess of £2000 p.a. in support charges. I wonder if that contracted fee included extra that arise after the original contract was negotiated?

I always have one particular problem with the outsourcing of the support of PC’s to a third party organisation. It is whether the company is outsourcing the real problem?  Quite often the in-house support staff are TUPE’d to the outsource company so it is unlikely that the staff are causing the problem. Should the senior management team be looking more closely at outsourcing the management of the support team rather than the coalface workers?

Guru

Here’s an interesting perpective on Cloud Computing.In the UK will we see Data Centres constructed in the mountain area’s to take advantage of lower temperatures? Will the geeks get to live and work in the highlands and moorlands?Guru