{"id":3010,"date":"2002-08-22T12:38:29","date_gmt":"2002-08-22T17:38:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/?p=3010"},"modified":"2002-08-22T12:38:29","modified_gmt":"2002-08-22T17:38:29","slug":"words_mean_thin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2002\/08\/22\/words_mean_thin.html","title":{"rendered":"Words mean things"},"content":{"rendered":"

I am now (since the re-org, mentioned a while back), the IT Manager in charge of Documentation Services. Which means I’m the guy who gets talked to about global annoucements, web sites, and intra- and extramural communiques from IT. Woo-hoo and all that.<\/p>\n

So one of the things we’re doing is rolling out a new consolidated web site regarding IT Procurement — how IT folks can purchase hardware and software for their sites. There are standards lists, contact lists for the Purchasing group, forms, and instructions. <\/p>\n

Somebody mentioned, a week or two back, that while we’re at it, we should include some information about a directive that the CIO put out at the beginning of the year about how IT folks should go about purchasing Microsoft software. This particular directive will require a lot of extra effort on the part of IT staff and the business ops folks they interface with, but will also provide a much more solid set of data on how much we’re actually spending with Microsoft (long story there), which would indeed be a Good Thing.<\/p>\n

The folks who think it would be a good idea think so because nobody’s following the directive.<\/p>\n

Well, that’s cool. I can certainly help with that. One of the things I’m here for, eh? Just forward me a copy —<\/i><\/p>\n

Oh. It was a verbal <\/i>directive, to the CIO’s direct reports. Which may explain the current problem.<\/p>\n

Okay, can anyone describe what exactly the directive said?<\/i> <\/p>\n

[Cue Peanuts <\/i>Grown-Up Voice]<\/p>\n

Uh-huh. Well, that’s interesting. Speaking as a guy who used to have to do that sort of ordering and requisitioning, here are two very common questions that will occur to anyone who has to do this, with what I understand the answers to be. Am I correct in those answers?<\/i><\/p>\n

Silence. Shrugs. Scuffing feet. Looking at each other.<\/p>\n

Well, yeah, I do kinda need to know, because if I communicate this info out there, then if there are any questions, they will come back to <\/i>me with them.<\/i> <\/p>\n

Silence. Shrugs. Scuffing feet. Looking at each other.<\/p>\n

Okay. Can someone touch bases with the CIO to get clarification, or perhaps get something in writing?<\/i><\/p>\n

Silence. Shrugs. Scuffing feet. Looking at each other.<\/p>\n

I don’t know if the problem is (a) nobody thinks these are important questions, (b) nobody wants to ask the CIO because he thinks this has all been settled since January, or (c) nobody wants to ask the CIO because they think it’s an idiotic question, or (d) nobody wants to make a statement about it because then they’ll get all the heat for it. <\/p>\n

*sigh*<\/p>\n

So. Let me see if I <\/i>can get some answers. Including, if need be, contacting the CIO.<\/p>\n

Before it gets published under my name, either I can answer questions about it, or I should know who can.<\/p>\n

(title with apologies to Adam<\/a>)<\/small><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I am now (since the re-org, mentioned a while back), the IT Manager in charge of Documentation Services. Which means I’m the guy who gets talked to about global annoucements,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3010","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-job-jollies"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":2246,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2002\/07\/19\/no_accounting.html","url_meta":{"origin":3010,"position":0},"title":"No accounting","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 19-Jul-02 9:02pm","format":false,"excerpt":"So over the past week or two, I've been making a concerted effort to hit the link lists of folks that I link to. Under the theory that, hey, if...","rel":"","context":"In "Blogging & Internet"","block_context":{"text":"Blogging & Internet","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":15258,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2009\/07\/20\/shilling-willingly-for-my-host.html","url_meta":{"origin":3010,"position":1},"title":"Shilling (willingly) for my host","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 20-Jul-09 11:16am","format":false,"excerpt":"I have been a happy customer of Hosting Matters for years as my web site host. They are not the cheapest host (nor the most expensive), but I've always been impressed by their support. Whenever I've had problems, it's been quick and effective and often beyond what I'd expected. They\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Blogging - Technical"","block_context":{"text":"Blogging - Technical","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/blogging-technical"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":14145,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2009\/03\/12\/blogrolls-are-frelled.html","url_meta":{"origin":3010,"position":2},"title":"Blogrolls are frelled","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 12-Mar-09 11:16pm","format":false,"excerpt":"The automatic generation of blogrolls via Google Reader (Settings > Folders and Tags > add a blogroll to your site) isn't working.\u00a0 The problem is not in WP or this blog -- the lists show up empty in Google Reader's sample, too. The underlying subscriptions are still there -- and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Blogging - Technical"","block_context":{"text":"Blogging - Technical","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/blogging-technical"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":7841,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2005\/08\/06\/bt05_cruising_t.html","url_meta":{"origin":3010,"position":3},"title":"BT05 – Cruising the Blogathon again","author":"***Dave","date":"Sat 6-Aug-05 3:56pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Hey, isn't it time to start noodging folks for more donations? After all, we're so close to $250 -- wouldn't that be a nice round number to aspire to? I...","rel":"","context":"In "Blogathon"","block_context":{"text":"Blogathon","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/blogathon"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3132,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2002\/08\/05\/rings_on_his_fi.html","url_meta":{"origin":3010,"position":4},"title":"Rings on his fingers, and bells up his nose","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 5-Aug-02 6:32pm","format":false,"excerpt":"I have a love-hate relationship with webrings. I think they are a cool concept. A group of sites with a common theme, easily browsed through via a shared set of...","rel":"","context":"In "Blogging & Internet"","block_context":{"text":"Blogging & Internet","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1841,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2002\/04\/22\/promotion_throu.html","url_meta":{"origin":3010,"position":5},"title":"Promotion through Inconvenience","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 22-Apr-02 9:10am","format":false,"excerpt":"Lots of folks are signing up for Micro$oft's Passport service, which, as part of its .NET strategy, allows one-screen sign-in and check-out at web sites. Of course, the reason a...","rel":"","context":"In "Hi-Tech"","block_context":{"text":"Hi-Tech","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/hi-tech"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3010","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3010"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3010\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3010"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3010"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3010"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}