227 Volts

If you’re in IT you *probably* know that RAID 1 = mirroring.  Mirroring helps in the case of a faulty drive, however it does not prevent catastropic data failure.  It seems the people over at Journal Space didn’t realise this, or so they claim.  They set up their systems with a RAID 1 configuration in hopes that should a drive fail, they had a “backup”.  All well and good, if a drive fails, but what if someone accidentally does

delete from <table name(s) go here>

Yep, you guessed it, the table(s) get(s) deleted from drive 0 and soon after (quick as you can snap your fingers) it gets deleted from drive 1, just like a mirror.  You punch yourself in the face whilst standing in front of a mirror and guess what, it will show you the same thing.

What’s the lesson here?  Backup and keep it somewhere if you want to be able to restore it.  Mirroring = High (better) availability, Backup = High Reliability … as long as you’ve tested it and have a plan in store in such a case you “break your mirror”

Texting, SMSing, what ever you refer to it as, we all do it and multiple times each day… We seem to rely heavily on it and the networks tell us the reliability isn’t supposed to be instantaneous, and could take up to 24 hours. Do we question it? No. Do we question the price? No. Interestingly enough, it has been brought to light by a professor that maybe we should…

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Interesting and unexpected facts can emerge from the daily news stories and here are some of the best of last year.

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Happy 2009 to everyone!

How do the Swede’s celebrate Christmas? They build a festive goat. How do they get through the season? They find ways to burn the goat down. In Gavle, lives a goat with a murky past:

1966: The first goat is burned down - beginning the tradition
1970: It is set on fire six hours after being erected
1971: Tired of arson, the project is abandoned. Schoolchildren build a miniature. It is smashed to pieces.
1976: A car crashes into the goat
1979: The goat is burned down before it is finished
1987: The goat is treated with fireproofing - but still goes up in smoke
…..
2008: Burnt down

This year marks the 23rd time the goat has gone up in smoke. What a festive tradition!

Read more on the goat:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7801156.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6225869.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6205744.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4497408.stm

Do you remember the old Nintendo games. Do you like to use Firefox? Have a look then at FireNES. Its an NES Emulator which runs in Java and Firefox. Shoot over and see if you like it…I do
http://www.firenes.com.ar/

Distribution Video Audio, the last major supplier of VHS movies, has announced that they’re exiting the VHS business at the end of this year.

According to the company, up until recently they were still supplying bargain stores, outlet malls, truck stops, and mom-and-pop operations, but now the company is saying that anything that’s left in their inventory they’ll just give away or throw away…

Last week some under sea cables were cut and they’re now being fixed. Naming conventions are great, aren’t they? The cables seem to be named SEA-ME-WE and if you break it down…sea=sea cable…me=middle east and we=western europe…wow, fancy naming eh Here’s what’s being fixed:

The US Government has temporarily put the brakes on new plans to expand the gTLD’s on the internet. Currently there are 21 gTLDs (.com, .net…) and plans were to expand this exponentially, but the US Government doesn’t like the idea and has offered great criticism. They’ve sent two letters to the bodies in charge stating their thoughts..watch this space if you were interested in buying .yournamehere