Subj : A TCP/IP variation of -N
To : David Noon
From : Mike Luther
Date : Tue Aug 28 2001 03:54 am
Boy, David, when I make errors, do I ever!
DN> Hi Mike,
DN> Replying to a message of Mike Luther to David Noon:
DN> I don't understand this. ftp shifts entire files
DN> around. Did you mean http?
Yes, of course. Wrong term. Stupidity has it's own reward...
DN> Now EA's *do* present a problem.
Yep.
DN> What you are asking for is a form of journalling and
DN> recovery using ftp, or some moral equivalent.
DN> Moreover, you need this processing to be so water-
DN> tight that it will keep the FDA [and other government
DN> departments around the world] happy as to its
DN> accuracy. This is a job for which ftp is not really
DN> suited.
I'm drifting toward the same conclusion. We all become children in our old
age, and I keep going back to childhood and hearing old man Wilson in the
Missouri Pacific railroad switch tower at about seven years of age for me. He
was teaching me how to switch through all the trains with the big steel levers
on Sunday's as a kid when I'd discovered the tower! As we'd haul back the
levers to signal and switch the Sunbeam and the freights, he'd be listening to
gospel on the cathedral radio up there and he'd be echoing with the singer,
"Through out the Lifeline, through out the Lifeline, someone is drifting away
........"
;)
Funny how accuracy in progamming logic and the results needed are so similar to
even the mechanical equivalence of the same sort of things....
DN> Data recovery from journals is a task that is best handled by a program
DN> that makes the recovery as automatic as possible. This
DN> program could use TCP/IP sockets for its "network tape
DN> silo" instead of conventional tape [or other backup]
DN> media. But its real smarts have to be in the way the
DN> files to be recovered are identified. This should
DN> require as little human interaction as possible. The
DN> upshot is that some script wrapping an ftp client is
DN> like using chewing gum and string where high tensile
DN> steel is required.
"May the circle, be unbroken, be unbroken, in the sky .."
DN> The reason for this is that the DASD farm of the system to be recovered
DN> should not be trusted. Any client system that has been
DN> compromised is really untrustworthy. This includes the
DN> accuracy of file timestamps. The definitive source of
DN> such information should be the journals on the
DN> recovery server. This means that the recovery server
DN> drives the entire operation.
But, per the FDA, *ONLY* on request! No Evangelism is allowed!
DN> Data propagation can be handled using the same tools.
DN> The journalling activity can be used to propagate
DN> files automatically as they change. The recovery
DN> utility can be used to rebuild one system on another
DN> machine by making the recovery parametric: change the
DN> parameter that identifies the "lost" system, rather
DN> than run with the current system's id.
FDA don't 'llow no faith-based systems! "Momma don' 'llow no guitar pickers
in here!" To which Microsoft (And others.. ) have refrained,"I don't care
what Momma don't 'llow, we'll pick that guitar anyhow, since Momma don't 'llow
no guitar pickers in here."
DN> For none of this is ftp a really suitable tool.
Of which, "Ridin on the City of New Orleans .. ", is now playing in my mind as
I read this.
DN> And that's one reason why Lotus Notes costs an arm and a leg!
A long, long time ago, I bought my ticket at the station on the Rock Island
Lines to ride it from North Zulch to Dallas, Texas, one weekend. As a kid,who
didn't really know much about such things, I ambled back to the observation car
and opened the door to walk in and have a look. There were,indeed, a few folks
playing cards at the tables, penny a point and, for real, paper sacks on the
floor. But the Porter came up to me and said, "Can I see your ticket son? It
costs extra to ride in here."
Having none, I had to leave.
On the way home, an old man got on in Dallas with my ex-wife and I, but he was
carrying a double barrel 12 gauge shotgun and a fiddle case plus a little bag.
Nobody said a word, nor did the conductor. We wound up in the same car, and as
the train pulled out of Dallas, this bearded old man took out that fiddle and
started playing .. no mind to anyone in the coach.
All the old fiddle tunes, you know, Turkey in The Straw ..
You know, he was DARNED good. But more important, that was no fiddle, it was a
violin and a VERY good one. My mother was a concert level pianist, I can tell
the difference. A number of us wandered up to listen. When he got tired, I
mentioned, "That's a garned good violin!" He said, "Would you like to hold it,
son?" I said, "Yes!" He handed it to me.
I looked, held it just right to the light and looked inside. Strad ... ;)
I thanked him and carefully handed it back to him. He wiped it off and put it
back in the case, then turned away and put his hand on the twelve gauge.
Not to long after that, the Conductor came through punching tickets. I
quipped, "But the shotgun?" Conductor said, "Oh he's from Jewette. That
shotgun's for protection. We all know him and don't care."
Indeed. Yes, he got off the train in Jewette.
Red Glover who used to work for us and had reached about sixth or so in the
fiddle contests in Texas was in the shop that next Monday. I asked Red,"Say,
you know .. ", and told him the story. Red smiled, said, "Well you've just met
Pat Foley, the fiddle champion of Texas, Mike." That's Red Foley's cousin,
Mike."
Indeed.
DN> And that's one reason why Lotus Notes costs an arm and a leg!
DN> Regards
DN> Dave
DN> <Team PL/I>
I think I understand what you've just said.
But one more thing ..
However, as I also recall, when Lotus Notes was rolled out to the USA it was
rolled out at the Houston Area League of PC Users, (HAL-PC). I went up and
asked the architect after the show, if it should be used for exactly what we
are talking about? In that automatic synchronization across a project was what
was being hawked, I thought even then that it was a solution, perhaps.
What I was told was, "No, it is not!" Lotus Notes is designed to be used for
collaborative work to develop a project, with this synchronized data need
solution. But then it is designed to put that project away and never look at
it again over and over as well. It will not support what you want to do, Sir.
Don't try it for a generalized solution for millions of bitty pieces to a
puzzle and expect it to work. It can't handle that."
The average X-Ray, to our research, for example, only is requested to be
recovered out of archive, after six months, about 10% of the time. But any
X-Ray taken of, for example a breast exam for a woman, must be available for
life! As another example, an X-Ray of an undescended testicle taken of a small
boy, must be available until that child reaches at least the legal age of
adulthood, whatever that means.
Conversely, the X-ray's of a certain star which might prove murder by overdose
of a sedative in an unusual location, are wholely improper if they are pushed
into every medical record file in the tabloids, even years later,if they even
exist! Momma don't 'llow no push technology round here...
Now, when I got the thrill of hearing Pat Foley, the song, "The Devil Went Down
to Georgia!", hadn't ever been written yet!
But Dave .. the Devil *IS* in the details. If I'm absolutely entitled to know
and have proved without a doubt that I am what I am, and querry this database
for one of literally billions of transaction piecoids, to coin a term, is Lotus
Notes really what is needed. Not only is it necessary to know that you do have
a Scarlet Letter on your forehead, but how you got it,every blessed detail ..
every transactio, every transaction!
;)
So is it really Lotus, or is it DB2, or not even written ... yet ...
Forgive the literature . It's a fatal flaw in Mikey.
--> Sleep well; OS/2's still awake! ;)
Mike @ 1:117/3001
--- Maximus/2 3.01
* Origin: Ziplog Public Port (1:117/3001)
