Quite the week in the greater world of technology. Apple had an event and folks had a meltdown about their new show. GitHub had a rough week, Uber sunk to new lows, and Intel has fired a massive warning shot at the future of computing. A lot of DevOps happened too. Let’s break it all down. Full Stack Fest 2017: Problems of today, wonders from the future. Barcelona, 4–8 Sept. 2017 Are you a curious mind? Full Stack Fest is a week-long conference based in the amazing city of Barcelona that peeks into the web of tomorrow. Serverless, Blockchain, WebVR, Distributed Web, Progressive Web Apps… Come and see! SPONSORED Department of Patent Pedantry Intel took us down memory lane this week with a blog post discussing how X86 is almost forty years old. Remember the 8086? MMX? SSE 1 through 4? VMX? Good times! Oh and remember that Intel has 1,600 patents and they are not afraid to sue the bejesus out of you. Intel is firing a shot across the bow for anyone trying to do X86 emulation without ponying up licensing fees to Intel. “…we fully expect other companies to continue to respect Intel’s intellectual property rights.” Axios points out, “Microsoft and Qualcomm have announced plans for a version of Windows 10 on Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 835 that uses emulation to run older applications designed for x86-based Windows machines.” ...

It was a very busy week for me personally and in the world of DevOps. The news I hinted at last week is my public announcement I’m leaving SolarWinds MSP, moving to Detroit, and taking the role of Manager, Infrastructure & Operations at Bankrate. I am beyond excited about the position and the work I will be doing. If you want the job I’m vacating, apply with SolarWinds. Not to downplay its significance, but, The Open Organization released its latest book, The Open Organization Guide to IT Culture Change this week. The book as a whole is a feat of open source community in and of itself. It is a quality piece of work based off what I read during the open editing process. I’m still trying to read through it between working, packing, staging, and sleeping. I was very fortunate to have been able to contribute to this book. It’s a free download and if you want a physical copy it will be available soon in print! Also, if you want to convert the ODT to an ePub we are accepting pull requests (my eyes will thank you). ...

Memorial Day has many meanings but, this weekend I will remember those we’ve lost in service to freedom around the globe. Take a moment to reflect on the good in the world this weekend. Remember, living our lives to their fullest are the best thing we can do to honor them. The world of DevOps was a little chaotic this week. More and more I realize that people need a shock to the system to realize that they are just layering on more and more technical debt while driving themselves to obsolescence. We as a society have become two things: 1) a disposable society in which we would rather get something new than fixing a broken thing, and 2) an Apple society in which we expect simplistic concepts to have equally simplistic implementations. “It just works” has permeated our consciousness. Not many people care how it works. Department of Choice Concepts Thirty common challenges to DevOps and how to resolve them. ...

Ever have one of those weeks where you feel like more of a consultant than a full-time employee? That was my week. I do not mind it at all. But, sometimes it’s nice to not be bombarded with questions all week long. Also, I hate building VPNs. In other news, I received a request to make the newsletter more responsive and readable. If you are reading this in a mail client then you should be benefitting from the hour or so I put into the new template. Reply to let me know what you think. Department of Choice Concepts Ben Sima shared the first three things he installs on any new server. I’m surprised he doesn’t have this in Ansible for easy deployment. Being agile and working smart are not the same thing (TechBeacon) Matt Micene reminds us all that DevOps isn’t some apparition that appeared out of nowhere. DevOps is the course correction to a culture that is a byproduct of Taylorism and Sloanianism. ...

I have to admit, I am really, really angry this week. For the first time in a long time a worm was unleashed on the web. A little back story. Years ago, the NSA found a vulnerability in Windows. Instead of disclosing the vulnerability responsibility to Microsoft, the NSA decided to keep the vulnerability a secret. Years pass and NSA is happily using this zero-day to exploit the United States’ various enemies. Then, one day, several exploits are found on a server somewhere by The Shadow Brokers. The Shadow Brokers then released the exploits they discovered. Fast forward to this week and the WannaCry exploit is unleashed on the web. The UK’s NHS was the first major victim. Rapidly the WannaCry tidal wave was washing over 99 countries. Meanwhile, back in the UK, a researcher discovers that there is a kill switch in the exploit. Apparently, the NSA put a kill switch is in place in case the worm accidentally went public (WHICH IT DID). The kill switch, was a check to see if a specific domain existed; not responding with a 200, not having a specific payload or string, nothing! Just whether or not a domain was REGISTERED controlled the worm! The NSA didn’t think to spend the $11 to kill the worm. But, a 22-year-old in the UK saved billions of dollars and probably lives with $11 while the NSA maintained its horrific negligence. Unconscionable! ...