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Turkey Revenge
The turkeys are pissed this Thanksgiving they are seeking revenge.
Germs Infest 60% of Americas Phones
60% of Americans sleep with their phones, harboring germs. Cleaning regularly with UV sanitizer or alcohol wipes can help keep your phone and bed germ-free.
Smartphone Sanitizing: A Practical Guide
Securely erase personal data from your old smartphone before recycling. Protect your identity from hackers—easy steps to follow.
Why Soft Skills Matter in Today’s Job Market
Boost your career with essential soft skills like communication, teamwork, and emotional intelligence. Learn why they’re crucial for workplace success.
Run Your DC with a Chevy
General Motors (GM) is using Chevy Volt batteries to power a data center. MLive reports that expired lithium-ion batteries retrieved from Chevrolet Volt’s help power the General Motors Enterprise Data Center at the Milford Proving Grounds in Milford, MI.
GM recently announced that five batteries from first-generation Volts are working in parallel with a 74-kilowatt solar array and two 2-kilowatt wind turbines to green up the data center. The batteries have the capacity to provide backup power for four hours in the event of an outage, GM said. According to the article, the set-up has given the Enterprise Data Center a net-zero energy use on an annual basis, and extra power will be sent back to the grid used by the Milford Proving Ground.
First-gen Chevy Volts still have a lot of juice
As it readies to sell its all-new, second-generation Volt, GM said first-gen cars still have a lot of leftover juice in their battery packs for stationary use. Pablo Valencia, GM’s senior manager of battery life cycle management, said in a presser that the batteries still have value after they come out of the car.
Even after the battery has reached the end of its useful life in a Chevrolet Volt, up to 80 percent of its storage capacity remains … This secondary use application extends its life, while delivering waste reduction and economic benefits on an industrial scale.
The first-generation plug-in hybrid Volt went on sale in 2010 for the 2011 model year. It uses battery power to get an electric range of about 35-38 miles, before switching to gasoline.
The 2016 Volt, unveiled last January in Detroit, will have about a 31% greater electric range than its predecessor. The second-gen Volt has about a 50-mile, all-electric range, and a total driving range of about 400 miles when combined with a gasoline engine.
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According to the Detroit News, GM is working with unidentified partners to validate and test systems for other commercial and non-commercial uses.
Elon Musk‘s Tesla (TSLA) is also leveraging its car-based battery systems to develop a line of storage batteries designed for homes and SMB’s called Powerwall. Powerwall is designed to store electricity for home use, to be used during peak consumption times when utilities charge the most. The device comes in several colors including white, charcoal, red, and blue. There are two options — a 7-kilowatt-hour package using nickel-manganese-cobalt batteries and a 10 kilowatt-hour unit with a nickel-cobalt-aluminum battery.
Related articles
- General Motors finds a new use for used Chevy Volt batteries (inhabitat.com)
Ralph Bach has been in IT long enough to know better and has blogged from his Bach Seat about IT, careers, and anything else that catches his attention since 2005. You can follow him on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. Email the Bach Seat here.
Category: Cars |
Tags: 2015, Automobile, Chevy, Data center, Detroit, Elon Musk, General Motors, GM, Green, Michigan, Tesla, TSLA, Volt
Michigan Cell-Phone Spying Legislation Stalled
A warrantless cell-phone spying bill recently introduced in the Michigan House has stalled – for now. MLive is reporting that House Bill 4006 has been pulled from the legislative agenda a second time. The bill would require cell phone companies to disclose call location information when requested by a law enforcement officer. The bill would grant legal immunity to cell phone companies for making the disclosures.
In a flash of rationality, Gideon D’Assandro, a spokesperson for the Republican majority, said new questions about jurisdiction and proposed immunity for wireless providers have popped up. D’Assandro told MLive, “… There are still questions.”
The legislation, sponsored by Republican Rep. Kurt Heise of Plymouth Township, has prompted push back from some conservative lawmakers and other privacy proponents in the state Legislature after advancing out of committee. “It’s been a heated discussion, a passionate discussion, just about the civil liberty issues that are all wrapped up in this,” said Rep. Cindy Gamrat, R-Plainwell. “My concern is … we’re setting precedent authorizing government to access our technology devices, such as phones or computers or GPS in cars. Where do you end up drawing the line?”
State Rep. Todd Courser, R-Lapeer, said he understands the value that location information could provide in some emergencies. However, made clear this week that he could not vote for the bill in its current form. He told MLive, “I think we also need to make sure we’re giving people the constitutional protections that are supposed to be afforded by our founding fathers.”
In typical goobermental double-speak, Republican Heise told MLive that allowing warrantless access to private citizens’ phones could actually strengthen civil liberty protections. Heise told MLive said he does not necessarily think that a 48-hour notification for cell phone owners is warranted.
Of course, law enforcement groups and Verizon Communications indicated support for the proposal. Of course they do, they get even more access to citizens’ private information. MLive states that as now written, the snooping does not require a warrant. All a police officer needs to access a private citizen’s phone records, is to have a note signed by a supervisor.
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Well, maybe they don’t need to bother with any legislation to spy on us. Recent reports are that the goobermint has new ways to collect our personal data without a warrant. Stingray? FBI Spy planes? So much for the Constitution.
Related articles
- Fed-up science teacher jams students’ smartphones, gets suspended (news.yahoo.com)
Ralph Bach has been in IT long enough to know better and has blogged from his Bach Seat about IT, careers, and anything else that catches his attention since 2005. You can follow him on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. Email the Bach Seat here.
Category: Uncategorized |
Tags: 2015, Constitution, Michigan, Mobile device, Security, Spying, Stingray, Warrantless
IT Pro Relationships Suffer From Stress
GFI Software released the results of their fourth annual IT Admin Stress Survey. The GFI Presser says IT professionals are increasingly feeling job-related stress. The IT Pros want to quit their current job due to stress. The study found that 78% of those surveyed experienced workplace stress. Almost 82% of respondents are actively considering leaving their current IT job due to workplace stress and dissatisfaction with working conditions.
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he new survey revealed a new four-year high in the number of relationships that have been impacted by work commitments intruding on personal life. More than 25% experienced this in the last year, up from 23% last year. Sergio Galindo, general manager of GFI Software observed;
… this year’s IT Stress Survey makes for worrying reading. The 2015 survey results clearly show a substantial deterioration of the work/life balance and job satisfaction among the US IT workforce
Key findings from the GFI survey
78% of all U.S. IT staff surveyed consider their job stressful – up 1% from 2014.- 45% have missed social functions due to overrunning issues and tight deadlines at work, up from 38% in 2014.
- 40% report missing time with their children due to work demands imposing on their personal time.
- 38% of IT staff regularly lose sleep due to work pressures.
- The number of respondents experiencing stress-related illnesses increased slightly, to 27% from 25% in 2014.
- 19% continue to report feeling in poor physical condition due to work demands, up 25% from last year.
Management and users cause stress
Pressure and unreasonable demands from management clearly emerged as the biggest contributing factor to workplace stress in 2015.
28% of those surveyed singled out management as their biggest point of stress, down from over 36% last year.- Stress caused by the users that IT staff look after jumped from 16% to 23%.
Unpaid overtime
This year’s survey revealed continuing high amount of unpaid overtime required by IT staff to meet deadlines and deployments.
- 48% of those surveyed work up to eight unpaid hours of overtime a week, with a mean average of 8.1 hours a week of unpaid overtime worked.
- 47% of those surveyed work eight hours or more overtime, unpaid, every week.
GFI GM Galindo observed:
Realistic IT budgets and staffing headcounts make a huge difference in both workplace happiness and productivity, for example, as does automating mundane and time-intensive tasks such as resetting passwords, patching computers and servers and looking for network vulnerabilities
The GFI presser concludes that for the fourth year running, high workplace stress levels for IT professionals is an issue. The stress is dramatically impacting both employees and employers. These impacts are illustrated by increases in staff looking to find another job. Staff working increasing amounts of unpaid overtime to cope with workloads. A growing number of IT staff are also experiencing substantial disruption to their personal lives as a result of work demands.
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GFI has conducted this poll year after year and the results have not changed. Stress, stress, and more stress.
Related articles
- Happiness is a job in the charity sector (reed.co.uk)
Ralph Bach has been in IT long enough to know better and has blogged from his Bach Seat about IT, careers, and anything else that catches his attention since 2005. You can follow him on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. Email the Bach Seat here.
Project Jacquard Puts a Touchpanel In Your Pants
At the recent Google I/O 2015 conference, they unwrapped Project Jacquard. With Project Jacquard (named for a kind of weaving that requires a special loom) Google (GOOG) is creating a sort of conductive yarn that can embed right into fabrics. The plan is to weave those threads into meshes, to create interactive clothing patches that can sense your touch, how hard you’re pressing on them, and even your hand’s position in space before it even makes contact with the fabric.
Project Jacquard teams with Levi’s
Engadget reports that during the Google ATAP address, Technical Program Lead Ivan Poupyrev confirmed that the search giant is teaming up with Levi’s to bring Jacquard’s technically complex fabrics to the world of fashion. He told the gathered Google groupies that the new tech is important to the Google future; “We want digital to be just the same thing as quality of yarn or colors used.
One video demo showed a person swiping across the length of their forearm to initiate a phone call on a nearby Nexus 6. Engadget’s Chris Velazco says it is the seamlessness of behavior that’s got companies like Levi’s so worked up. Proponents of the tech claim it will reduce digital distractions caused by smartphones and smartwatches.
Improved safety claims
Levi Straus’s head of product innovation Paul Dillinger said that notion is what really caught the clothier’s imagination. Levi’s believes they can help reduce digital distractions through, “the clothes we love to interface with the digital world while maintaining eye with the people we’re having dinner with.”
According to Engadget’s Roberto Baldwin, the conductive surface uses low-power Wi-Fi to communicate with devices. While the demo was on a flat surface, the other electronics needed to power and connect the fabric to a device are not quite ready to be sewn into your pants. The team is still working on shrinking those components down to integrate with its loom. But once they do, you might be swiping your next jacket to control your smartphone.
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Levi’s expects to release a pair of jeans with a touch panel in early 2016.
Fast Company cites predictions from Gartner that “smart garments” will become a regular part of our wardrobes. By 2016, smart garments should make up 26 million of the 91 million units shipped for wearables, vs. 19 million for wristbands. And it’s only going to get bigger from there.
Related articles
- Google working with Levi’s to make smart clothes (msn.com)
Ralph Bach has been in IT long enough to know better and has blogged from his Bach Seat about IT, careers, and anything else that catches his attention since 2005. You can follow him on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. Email the Bach Seat here.
Category: Uncategorized |
Tags: 2015, Clothing, conductive yarn, GOOG, Google, Levis, Mobile, Smartphone, Smartwatch, Wearable computer, Wi-Fi
Millennials Riskiest With Your Data
Around half of the workforce will be millennials by 2020, but today they represent a bigger threat to your data. A recent report by endpoint security and management products producer Absolute Software (ABT) concludes that millennials take the most risks with your data. The report says they pose a greater risk to corporate data security than other user demographics.
The findings between generational mobile security behaviors are likely to be counter-intuitive to many who assume younger generations to be more knowledgeable and more aware of security threats in mobile tech use than older generations according to FierceBigData. Stephen Midgley, VP of Global Marketing at Absolute Software said;
We conducted this survey with the intention of helping enterprises better understand the current attitudes that employees have towards data security and privacy.
The presser from Absolute Software says that:
- 64% of millennials use their employer-owned device for personal use, as opposed to 37% of baby boomers
50% of respondents believe that security is not their responsibility- 35% of millennials change their default settings, compared to 8% of baby boomers
- 27% of millennials access “Not Safe For Work“ content, compared with only 5% of baby boomers
- 25% of millennials believe they compromise IT security, compared with only 5% of baby boomers
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The author concludes that these findings underscore why data trumps instinct or gut feeling given its counter-intuitive results. Corporate hiring and training programs and policies often focus on w
hat companies think of different worker demographics rather than on how those workers actually work. Armed with useful data such as this, hiring and training practices can be better aligned with the realities.
Related articles
- Millennial’s are most vulnerable to hacks and cyber attacks, research suggests (businessinsider.com)
Ralph Bach has been in IT long enough to know better and has blogged from his Bach Seat about IT, careers, and anything else that catches his attention since 2005. You can follow him on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. Email the Bach Seat here.
Category: Uncategorized |
Tags: 2015, Absolute Software, Baby boomer, BYOD, Computer security, Data Security, Endpoint security, Generation Y, Security, Social media