As I often do, let me tell you a story to illustrate this opinion:

When I started with IBM I chose the Motorola Droid Maxx over other Android phones and Apple iPhones.

My choice wasn’t arbitrary. I did my research.

The decision of iOS versus Android wasn’t a fair fight. KitKat made it easier to be effective. Sharing data between apps was not just easier, it was POSSIBLE on Android. iOS could copy and paste, but not much else.

The Maxx offered excellent battery life (I easily get through a full day on a single charge), a decent screen, an adequate amount of storage, and a rugged build according to my research. Two other major reasons I went with it was that Motorola was a part of Google (at the time) and they listed it as on the upgrade path to Android Lollipop.

14 months later and the only thing still true is the battery life. The screen cracked easily and repeatedly with regular use, the 16GB storage barely keeps up with my minimal workload, and it quickly becomes sluggish unless I close apps and/or reboot.

As for the upgrade to Lollipop, Motorola changed tack yesterday:

We apologize that we will not be upgrading DROID Ultra/Mini/Maxx to Android Lollipop, as we had hoped. We know how important software upgrades are to our customers, and we’re very sorry that we are unable to provide the upgrade.

The Maxx is still on 4.4.2 while Marshmallow (version 6) is the release du jour on Nexus. Verizon released few updates (and they’re complicit in the upgrade mess) but not at the cadence required. I’m sure my Maxx is vulnerable to many issues long since fixed on other platforms. Corporate mandates and enforces robust mobile security, yet I only use my corporate issued phone for email, calendar, tasks, and internal instant messaging. I don’t trust the phone to do much more. I’ve removed almost all non-stock applications.

My personal phone, the older OnePlus One with the Cyanogen Android flavor at 5.1.1, sees vastly more attention than the Motorola. On the 1+1 I do my social media and podcasts and RSS feeds and whatnot, much of which is work related or adjacent.

The funny thing: I used to carry a second phone to protect me from my benevolent corporate overlords. Now my personal phone protects my clients.

iPhones receive regular updates – some better than others, but Apple updates viable phones for a long time (the iPhone 4S, anyone?). Apps have to keep up, for better or worse. Newer iOS versions addressed the data sharing issue, making Apple  devices more useful to me as productivity tools.

The moral of my story is that I’m going through the process to replace the Maxx with an iPhone, but it’s a bureaucratic mess that takes time. Now that Motorola came clean, the upgrade path theoretically eases.

What about you? What are your experiences in this space? Have you standardized on iOS or Android or Windows? Or do you struggle with the mercurial nature of the vendors and your users? What about when vendors pull the rug out from under you? Are you considering alternate platforms like Microsoft Windows Mobile and Ubuntu?

Full Disclosure: I work for IBM. IBM and Apple are partners (who would have thought that in the 80’s?). My opinions are mine alone.

Clearly, the wisdom of the ages speaks to us in modernity.

My first “real” job out of college was at a large engineering company, and the most annoying part (for me) was packing a lunch. I became convinced that mediocre brown bag lunches were just part of the deal of adulthood, but this was woefully incorrect. With just a few condiments and spices hidden in my drawer, I could have taken my sad little lunches from “woefully bland” to “hey, this is actually edible.”

Source: Stock Your Office Drawer with Everything You Need for Tastier Work Lunches

Over on the PVC Security Podcast, the boys and I extol the virtues of finding your energy and focus. Making the most out of your lunch (or dinner), especially when you can’t break away for real down time, makes a difference.

Back in the day I kept soy sauce, hot sauce, sardine tins, spices, and whatever utensils I might need the office couldn’t supply. If the sun shined directly in my office, herbs instead of Ficus would populated my work place.

I used my culinary supplies so often and sang their praises, co-workers and colleagues would drive by my desk if they need a “little something”.

Sometimes the little things make all the difference.

Share your stories.

It is a journey that has been in the works for more than two years and was spearheaded by an independent group of volunteers within Microsoft​ and a long list of external volunteers whom have forked our beloved Windows Live Writer to Open Live Writer (OLW).

Source: Microsoft’s popular blogging tool Windows Live Writer is now open source | Microsoft content from SuperSite for Windows

Outside of Emacs (and maybe VI) this was the best blogging tool. I’m happy it’s going OSS.

I find the data escrow concept an interesting development:

Microsoft officials previously said that they will be operating in the second half of 2016 two new German datacenters, located in Magdeburg and Frankfurt. These datacenters, which will offer users Azure, Office 365 and Dynamics CRM Online, will offer users the option to have their data-access controlled by a trusted third party, not Microsoft. Officials said that access to customer data stored in these new datacenters would be under the control of T-Systems, a Deutsche Telekom subsidiary, that would act as a data trustee.

Source: Microsoft details more on its German datacenter data-access lockdown plan | ZDNet

Let me know your thoughts in the comments!

Billionaire entrepreneur Mark Cuban has criticized the Securities and Exchange Commission for holding up efforts to reform decades-old email privacy laws.
In a letter to members of Congress’ judiciary committees, the startup investor accused the SEC of “bad public policy” by “continuing to lead the charge in objecting to legislation” that would reform existing legislation.
The Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA), signed into law in 1986, currently allows federal agents in the majority of cases to read emails that are older than six months, without needing a warrant signed by a judge.

Source: Mark Cuban slams SEC for blocking email privacy reform effort | ZDNet

That the SEC can impact something with such broad roach outside of their jurisdiction is a topic for debate elsewhere. That Congress keeps trying to change what is arguably a bad law is encouraging.

I don’t know if Mark Cuban should be the flag bearer on this, but I’m happy for the press.

She expressed concern for my travel and I deflected with the above. Granted, the original wording wasn’t as good and a bit misogynistic. By the way, “good rationalization” means effective and not any kind of moralistic judgement.

This modified version is a truer sentiment, and I like it. The most cursory DuckDuckGo doesn’t find an exact match, so I’ll coin it.

Enjoy!

Optimism is the cornerstone of any good rationalization by Paul R. Jorgensen is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Based on a work at http://www.prjorgensen.com/?p=495.

My answer is this: it depends.

It’s not the cop-out you think. The organization and history of the enterprise impacts the decision.

My preference, in order:

1. Member of the Board of Directors
2. Reports to the CEO
3. Reports to the CFO
4. Reports to the CSO
5. Reports to the CIO

Fundamentally, InfoSec should not report to an operational entity. The CIO is operational.

Ed and & talked about this on the PVC Security Podcast. What are your thoughts?

Note: This languished in my site’s Drafts folder for a long time (2013)

Tabbar

Vertical Tabs

The only way I can manage my many tabs is to have them in a vertical stack on the left of my display. The tool that works the best for me is Vertical Tabs. I resize the tab stack so I only see the tab/site icon. I turn off any additional items like the close button.

Tab Management

Tab Mix Plus (TMP)

TMP provides a high degree of tab management.

Tab Memory

RAM Back

RAM Back is an ancient Firefox add-on extension. Frankly I’m not sure if it’s doing anything. Someone I know and trust advised its installation, so here we are. It doesn’t seem to cause a problem, but I’ll say it is optional.

BarTab Lite

BarTab Lite provides a mechanism for unloading a tab from memory, especially at start-up. The tab is still there an visible, but it keeps Firefox from loading the tab until you click on it. Right clicking on a tab will give you an ‘Unload Tab’ option.

Tab Session Management

Session Manager keeps track of your tabs. It goes several steps beyond what Firefox offers by default and a bit more than what TMP provides.

Wishlist

• Automatically unload unvisited tabs after a specific time
• Identify memory hogging tabs
• Automatically unload memory hogging tabs
• Pause and mute video on background tabs

Nearly two dozen cybersecutity experts from Georgia Tech, business, government and defense, share their observations about emerging trends in a more connected world — where cyberattacks grow more persistent and sophisticated by the day. While some threats and response mechanisms continue unchanged year over year, other conflicts and challenges are becoming dramatically more intense. Academia, industry and government must work together in bold new ways to solve the grand challenges of cybersecurity

.

I haven’t read it yet but it’s going in my queue for my plane ride this week.

What are your thoughts?