Cliffs at bottom.
I'm presently working on a project at to basically tear down our entire organization and rebuild it, documenting all the technologies, techniques, and processes that we're employing in a massive library of massive tomes tentatively titled "Look how many trees we just killed to save more!" (we're somewhat of an environmental organization involved in computer recycling and refurbishment).
Anyway, we're about 25% of the way through writing this library, and proceeding along at a brisk pace. A lot of our documentation is in how-to format, and for clarity's sake, involves screenshots. For cleanliness, and because text-mode screens are involved, we're taking all our screenshots with VMWare. A lot of these guides start off with "on a fresh install of Ubuntu Linux" - so we need a fresh install of Ubuntu. We already have an automated Ubuntu install in use in our refurbishment operation. We use Microsoft RIS to handle Windows installations in our office, which is where this documentation is being written. Installing a Windows OS to a virtual machine is a simple matter of network booting it, entering your login, and choosing which version. Why not make that possible with our Linux installs, as well? As it turns out, it's a fairly straightforward hack to launch pxelinux from within RIS, and pxelinux forms the foundation of our existing automated Linux installation. It's literally just a matter of copying all the files, and changing a few lines in a few files. A max of 15m of work. And as an added bonus, I'm already working on cleaning up the RIS server, and documenting it's various facets. This would only add about 2 pages of documentation to that.
Naturally, the cost/benefit ratio is tiny. 15m of my time, and 2 pages of documentation now, vs. hour-long pockets of EVERY PROJECT MEMBER'S TIME as often as several times a day. So I went ahead and pitched this at the project manager via AIM (note that it's not uncommon for us to discuss our work after-hours).
Apparently, he has sand in his panties, or something. His arguments included, but were not limited to:
"We're not licensed for that" (We are)
"We have better things to be doing."
"What does this do to improve our customer service? NOTHING!" (This project isn't about improving customer service. It's about improving internal efficiency and disaster recovery)
"We need majority approval before you do that." (I was going to bring it up at the meeting Monday morning, get the majority to agree with me because the mere idea of making them have to do less work makes them all horny)
"It provides no benefit."
Chances are, this is just another episode in his personal vendetta against me (He used to have a thing for my girlfriend, and recently he turned into a bitter asshole who hates her, and now, by extension, is coming after me) - nothing at all related to anything grounded in reality.
Aaaaand just now a meeting has been called on Ventrilo at 11PM. wtf.
Cliffs:
- I come up with an idea that will save everyone INSANE amounts of time and effort, but only cost 15 minutes of time to implement
- I pitch it to the project manager
- Project manager talks out his ass trying to make it seem like a bad idea
- Project manager has recently been after me for stealing his crush
- Douchebag just called a meeting for 4 minutes from now
I'm presently working on a project at to basically tear down our entire organization and rebuild it, documenting all the technologies, techniques, and processes that we're employing in a massive library of massive tomes tentatively titled "Look how many trees we just killed to save more!" (we're somewhat of an environmental organization involved in computer recycling and refurbishment).
Anyway, we're about 25% of the way through writing this library, and proceeding along at a brisk pace. A lot of our documentation is in how-to format, and for clarity's sake, involves screenshots. For cleanliness, and because text-mode screens are involved, we're taking all our screenshots with VMWare. A lot of these guides start off with "on a fresh install of Ubuntu Linux" - so we need a fresh install of Ubuntu. We already have an automated Ubuntu install in use in our refurbishment operation. We use Microsoft RIS to handle Windows installations in our office, which is where this documentation is being written. Installing a Windows OS to a virtual machine is a simple matter of network booting it, entering your login, and choosing which version. Why not make that possible with our Linux installs, as well? As it turns out, it's a fairly straightforward hack to launch pxelinux from within RIS, and pxelinux forms the foundation of our existing automated Linux installation. It's literally just a matter of copying all the files, and changing a few lines in a few files. A max of 15m of work. And as an added bonus, I'm already working on cleaning up the RIS server, and documenting it's various facets. This would only add about 2 pages of documentation to that.
Naturally, the cost/benefit ratio is tiny. 15m of my time, and 2 pages of documentation now, vs. hour-long pockets of EVERY PROJECT MEMBER'S TIME as often as several times a day. So I went ahead and pitched this at the project manager via AIM (note that it's not uncommon for us to discuss our work after-hours).
Apparently, he has sand in his panties, or something. His arguments included, but were not limited to:
"We're not licensed for that" (We are)
"We have better things to be doing."
"What does this do to improve our customer service? NOTHING!" (This project isn't about improving customer service. It's about improving internal efficiency and disaster recovery)
"We need majority approval before you do that." (I was going to bring it up at the meeting Monday morning, get the majority to agree with me because the mere idea of making them have to do less work makes them all horny)
"It provides no benefit."
Chances are, this is just another episode in his personal vendetta against me (He used to have a thing for my girlfriend, and recently he turned into a bitter asshole who hates her, and now, by extension, is coming after me) - nothing at all related to anything grounded in reality.
Aaaaand just now a meeting has been called on Ventrilo at 11PM. wtf.
Cliffs:
- I come up with an idea that will save everyone INSANE amounts of time and effort, but only cost 15 minutes of time to implement
- I pitch it to the project manager
- Project manager talks out his ass trying to make it seem like a bad idea
- Project manager has recently been after me for stealing his crush
- Douchebag just called a meeting for 4 minutes from now
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