Time for a little re-org.

Today while I was right in the middle of sending out a cover letter and resume one of the computers in my SOHO network started to growl.

It turns out that the fan in the power supply was dying, fortunately for me I had a spare power supply from another Dell GX 200.

While things turned out OK, it did get me thinking that I need to STILL simplify my SOHO network, and set up a more robust back up and recovery plan that what I currently have. So over the next few weekends, I will be retooling my systems.

Other than the growling GX200 everything else has been plugging along. I have given up watching the news because I cannot afford letting it get to me and get me down. To be honest I have been pretty positive about my my job search and progress in other areas.

It would be nice if I could get out of the house more, but I have to keep costs down and stay focused.

Hopefully if you are a regular reader of this blog you have checked out the Geeks Who Care Blog. It's a little side project of mine that I created to help other computer geeks out there find volunteer opportunities. If you do check it out and have some thoughts or suggestions, drop me a line and let me know.

Cheers ~ Jim

Touching base - 01/25/09

Other than the same old stuff I really haven't had much to post about here lately. Besides looking for work, and reading my web design books, I've also been surfing through some interesting articles, a few of which I have listed below:

• Slashdot | US CTO Choice Down To a Two-Horse Race: I just hope the person who is picked for this position will push for a major IT/Data Infrastructure stimulus package, and then make sure that it actually get's implemented!

• 'Digital Dark Age' may doom some data: Given my background in storage and in vintage computing, I found this to be a very thought provoking article. This issue is not just about archiving the data and insuring it stands the test of time, but also making certain that the technology to retrieve the data doesn't itself become lost.

• Can Solar Energy Power a Data Center?: Basically the article concludes that solar power can contribute to the power needs of data centers, but will never be the sole source of power.

• Do Nice Engineers Finish Last In Tough Times?: This is so sad, but unfortunately so true. Nice guys do make good targets for back stabbers.

• Slashdot | Tech-Related Volunteer Gigs: After reading this article I decided to start up a new blog called "Geeks Who Care", as well as a group on Linkedin.com. I later found out that someone else had created a similarly named group on Facebook, and it seems we both have a the same goal. Hopefully we can work together in promoting geek volunteerism. Feel free to check out the Geeks Who Care Blog: http://geekswhocare.blogspot.com/

I am hoping that the Geeks Who Care blog and groups will help other geeks like me in networking with other geeks, and finding volunteer gigs. Hopefully by helping others we geeks can help ourselves.