On the 6th of June, McLaren Applied Technologies (MAT) and IO announced a technology partnership focussing on energy efficiency in the next generation of data centres. At current estimates, data centres consume two percent of the worldwide electricity supply – a figure that is equivalent to the output of roughly 30 nuclear power stations. With […]
Category: Information Technology
Data Backup – It’s Like Insurance
Most of us are aware of the need to backup our data, whether it’s our office computer, home computer, web site or one of the many gadgets that now occupy our homes, however just knowing we should be doing it does not always translate into actually doing it – and even if you are backing […]
Thinking Outside The Box
I owe the inspiration to this one to the BOFH (Bastard Operator From Hell) – you can read the current episode here – worth going through the archives if you haven’t come across this before. Anyway, if you bother to read the comments, the wondrous phrase “Thinking outside the box” comes up, largely with respect […]
N+1 Redundancy – How Not To Do It
This morning, as I got up, I noticed that our server monitoring system (Nagios – if you don’t know it, give it a look) was erroring for a set of customers servers. They’d been rebooted a couple of times over the last few weeks, so I decided a visit to the DC was in order […]
ownCloud – Store Your Data, Your Way
Most people out there are familiar with DropBox and other similar services provided by the likes of Microsoft and Google. The convenience of being able to easily synchronise data between multiple devices, with a copy stored “in the cloud” (that’s on the Internet for our older readers!). However, using a service such as this has […]
Knowledge – (Sometimes) Considered Dangerous
Working as I do in a technical capacity, one of the things that often strikes me is that there is a level of knowledge that is often more dangerous than others. This level seems to be simultaneously both too much knowledge and not enough knowledge, and usually consists of someone knowing enough about a subject […]
CentOS 6 load balancer performance
Everyone knows that sheep like to flock together, so it should be no surprise that here at the internet sheep we have occasional requirements to use a load balancer to ensure that individual sheep servers are not overwhelmed with requests. Our usual weapon of choice to date has been CentOS 5, but we have been […]
Memories of the ZX81
The ZX81 is 30 years old, and there are a number of retrospective articles, including this one from the BBC. Many of us have very fond memories of Sinclair Research’s early machines, and the ZX81 was my introduction to the world of computing. Back then, computers were strange, mysterious devices. Indeed, my brother and I […]
SpamCheck 0.6.11
SpamCheck, the Open Source email spam and virus filter has been updated to version 0.6.11 This version fixes the email format, in particular adding a non-HTML section to the MIME formated emails.
iPad 2 – does it meet expectations
Apple has launched the second generation of their iPad product with “a faster processor, improved graphics, and front and rear cameras”. Is this enough to keep the growing competition at bay? This year promises a whole range of Android tablets, including the Motorola Xoom and HTC Flyer, and whilst Apple has had the high-end (and […]