On 10/3/2015 7:14 AM, Roger Blake wrote:
On 2015-10-03, Don Y wrote:
This split keeps flipping back and forth every few years
as technology and personnel costs change. Wait until
some "cloud" is seriously breached: I can see the adverts,
now: "It's 6PM -- do you know where your DATA is??"

I'm not in favor of "cloud" computing myself, both because you lose
control of your data (you don't know who will have access to it under
what conditions, or even if you will be able to access it in the future),

It's not just the "data" that you can lose control of (icky grammar)
but the applications that access/process it, as well. I don't let
any of my computers install updates automatically. (in fact,
I've been downloading MS's updates for "offline" installation for
the past few days). I don't want to "wonder" why my machines
*appear* to be behaving differently (for better or worse). I want
to *know* that I am directly responsible for any changes and not
"wonder" WTF someone else decided to do *to* my machine (in the
name of "improving my user experience")

and because it represents a big step backwards 40-50 years or more to
the days of the old computer service bureaus. The "cloud" is just the
latest marketing-speak for a very old concept.

OTOH, I genuinely *love* running X windows terminals so to cut
my maintenance efforts significantly! I don't have to run around to
each machine (terminal) changing configuration options, installing
the latest applications/versions, etc.

But, again, *I* have control over them, not some "cloud provider"
making the changes that *they* want to make on *their* servers!

There have already been breeches and losses of course, for example:

http://www.pcworld.com/article/21477...of_future.html

People are still flocking to the cloud though, running off the cliff
like lemmings, because Ken Olsen was right! ;-)

I can understand the desire to get away from the sea of techs that
seems essential to keep any organization's IT up and running. I
spend a couple of days a week, on average, on equipment related stuff
(and I'm just a one-man shop -- though with a large number and variety
of machines, OS's, applications and data)

My "solution" is to just know what I *have* (good and bad) and control
how often (rarely!) I make changes. Just because some OS/applicaation
vendor thinks its time for a new roll-out, doesn't mean *I* want to
partake of that -- even if it is "free" (the *time* to install it
and learn it is NEVER free! And, the alleged benefits rarely prove
to be worth the effort)

I maintain a small "computer lab" for a local non-profit (for
disadvantaged kids). The updates mentioned above are intended to
be deployed, there. It will take me a couple of days just to get
a dozen machines "checked out", upgraded and debugged -- and I
doubt any of the students will notice or *care* that they've
been "upgraded". If I had to *pay* someone to perform such
an (apparently) useless task for dozens/hundreds/thousands of "seats"
at an organization, I'd be looking real hard for a way to NOT
need that person/department! :