Colin Charles Agenda

SCALE14x was held at Pasadena, Los Angeles this year from January 21-24 2016. I think its important to note that the venue changed from the Hilton LAX — this is a much bigger space, as the event is much bigger, and you’ll also notice that the expo hall has grown tremendously.

I had a talk in the MySQL track, and that was just one of over 180 talks. There were over 3,600 people attending, and it showed by the number of people coming by the MariaDB Corporation booth. I spent sometime there with Rod Allen, Max Mether, and Kurt Pastore, and the qualified leads we received were pretty high. Of course it didn’t hurt that we were also giving away a Sphero BB-8 Droid.

The MySQL track room was generally always full. We learned some interesting tidbits like Percona Server 5.7 would be GA in February 2016 (true!), the strong crowd at the MariaDB booth and quite a bit more. People are definitely interested in MySQL 5.7’s JSON functionality.

The highlight of my talk, The MySQL Server Ecosystem in 2016 was that it brought along quite a good discussion on Twitter. Its clear people are very interested in this and there is much opportunity for writing about this!

The Mark Shuttleworth keynote

But there were other SCALE14x highlights, like the keynote by Mark Shuttleworth. It was generally a very moving keynote, and here are a few bits that I took as notes:

• Technology changes lives
• Society evolves because it becomes possible to live differently
• New software moves too fast for distributions (6 months is too long). Look at Github. Speed vs. integration/trust/maintenance (the work of a distro)
• snapcraft 2.0 (learn more about your first snap): reduce the amount of work to package software. Install software together transactionally.

An overview of a next-gen filesystem

Another talk I found interesting was the talk about bitrot, and filesystems like btrfs and ZFS. Best to read the presentation, and the article that was referenced.

Scaling GlusterFS at Facebook

A talk by Facebook is usually quite full, and I was interested in how they were using GlusterFS and if anyone has managed to successfully run a database over it yet (no). This was a talk given by Richard Wareing who’s been at Facebook for over 5 years:

• GB’s to many PBs, 100’s of millions of files. QPS (FOPs) is 10s of billions per day, namespace (volume), TBs to PBs and Bricks: 1000’s. Version 3.3.x is when they started and now they use 3.6.x (trail mainline closely)
• Use cases: archival, backing data store for large scale applications, anything that doesn’t fit into other DBs
• RAID6, controller is enterprise grade, storage is more consumer grade
• Primarily using XFS, and are starting to use btrfs (about 20% of the fleet run on it)
• closed source AntFarm, JD, and their IPv6 support (they removed IPv4 support). They have JSON Statistic dumps which they contributed upstream.
• a good mantra, pragmatism over correctness

Some expo hall chatter

There was plenty to followup post-SCALE14x with many having questions about MariaDB Server, or wanting to buy services around it from MariaDB Corporation. I learned for example that Rackspace maintains their own IUS repository of packages they think their customers will find important to use. The idea behind it is that its Inline with Upstream Stable. Naturally you will find MariaDB Server as well as packages for all the engines like CONNECT.

I also learned that Stacki uses MariaDB Server for provisioning, as was evidenced by their github issue.

Its incredibly rewarding to note that pretty much everyone knew what MariaDB Server was. Its been a long journey (six years!) but it sure feels sweet. Ilan and his team put on a great SCALE so I can’t wait to be back again next year.

I was really impressed by cancelling my Basecamp account – they have an interesting refunds page. Keep in mind that it wasn’t Basecamp that I didn’t enjoy using (I love the entire suite); projects that I had used it for were pretty much over, so I just wanted to export the data, verify it was good, and then stop using it. Most of what I do can be done quite easily in OmniFocus, OmniOutliner, and Evernote (and there is Google Drive for collaboration). Chat has mostly been outsourced to Slack.

Anyway, long story short, I opted to cancel my account recently. I was pointed to the refunds page. I learned this:

If you forgot to cancel Basecamp a couple months ago, and you haven’t used Basecamp since then, we’ll give you a full refund for a few back months. No problem.

Wow. So I emailed their support, and it turns out they can provide refunds for up to six months if you didn’t use Basecamp much (yes, they also do partial refunds). This is amazing. I’m not sure how confident any other SaaS company is when it comes to refunds, but this puts the customer first, and Basecamp gets it right.

Next time I have a project, I will signup at Basecamp, with confidence.

Remember Trying Audible Gets You Two Free Audiobooks. Listened to Trust Agents: Using the Web to Build Influence, Improve Reputation, and Earn Trust and had a few takeaways:

• Make us want a product. Make us trust a person. 
• Trust agents plant seeds that bloom into evangelism on their own. Simply to create a positive impression of the brand. 
• Acknowledge. Apologize. Act. 
• Always be connecting. 
• Mastermind groups – likeminded people to call your own. Connect with others. This is an idea from Napoleon Hill’s Think & Grow Rich. 
• Ronin – masterless samurai. I had no idea about this before, but I have certainly read up on the Ronin since.
• Have a wide network and you will never be in need of work.

Again, like most books on social media, this probably made a lot of sense to read in 2010, but listening to it now is also just as good. Even if you’re adept at social media, you will still learn something new which is a good thing. 

I’ve been an Audible subscriber for many years, but it’s only been in recent times that I’m listening to audiobooks a lot more diligently (cutting out many podcasts in favour of this; good production quality and it’s not conversational, means you kind of win in terms of knowledge and time). Why not try Audible and Get Two Free Audiobooks?

Today I’ll talk about two Gary Vaynerchuk books: Crush It!: Why NOW Is the Time to Cash In on Your Passion and The Thank You Economy. These were both very easy listens, and Gary is known as a social media maven with his WineLibrary.tv and now his agency. I didn’t quite enjoy that he went off-script a lot, which made these books very podcast like.

As for the positives? Learn how to build your personal brand, why great content matters, the importance of authenticity in your messaging, and how to monetise your passion and create a new life for yourself. I know social media (or at least I think I do; I was an early adopter of Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, etc.) so it may be useful for some but not necessarily all folk.

The Thank You Economy had a bit more for me:

• B2B buyers are really also individual customers – there is a human behind the purchasing decision. This is where social and a good relationship makes sense
• When you spend money, do you spend it back on your customers (i.e. Throw a party) versus spending it thru an intermediary (i.e. Run a billboard ad). This could be interesting from the standpoint of booth vs party
• Word of mouse (you click nowadays!)
• JDV Hotels took to social media very well and they have a program to wow guests (and they have empowered their employees). They comb your social media profiles and listen to you. Was very impressed by the authenticity.
• Handling a public customer complaint is better than praise. Handling criticism > praise. Social media is public. This is important.
• Business is personal. B2B too.
• Don’t be afraid to say what you think. But don’t forget to listen
• The humanisation of business is what social media is doing

There were a few other interesting case studies as well, so I can highly recommend listening or reading The Thank You Economy.

I also found the idea of having a Chief Culture Officer as an interesting idea. His bet on virtual goods, for me at least, wasn’t true (so I tweeted him) – the idea that we’ll all be buying lots of them pretty quickly.

Incidentally, this isn’t the first time I’ve written about him: An Entrepreneur’s Life Video had some notes too.

Many of these tips are timeless, and can be applied even if social media isn’t hot any longer. If you had to pick between the two, I’d go for the Thank You Economy. But why pick, when you can Try Audible and Get Two Free Audiobooks?

Apparently I’ve always thought that donating to opensource software that you use would be a good idea – I found this about Firefox add-ons. I suggested that the MariaDB Foundation do this for downloads to the MariaDB Server, and it looks like most people seem to think that it is an OK thing to do.

I see it being done with Ubuntu, LibreOffice, and more recently: elementary OS. The reasoning seems sound, though there was some controversy before they changed the language of the post. Though I’m not sure that I’d force the $0 figure. 

For something like MariaDB Server, this is mostly going to probably hit Microsoft Windows users; Linux users have repositories configured or use it from their distribution of choice! 

How a Vietnamese Refugee Is Rethinking Food Delivery in America – Bloomberg Business:

“Tran says his experience as a refugee has stayed with him. He hates wasted food. Obstacles make him think creatively. The need to prove himself in a foreign country makes him work harder. And there’s the enormity of his parents’ sacrifice, which he feels he must validate.”

I have always said that migrants generally do better because they have more to prove. They’re not in their comfort zone and that usually provides need to have creative solutions.