Author Archives: joel

About joel

Retired Higher Ed administrator, flyfisherman and geek

At NCREN Community Day

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I’m at NCREN Community Day today. This annual event brings together the NCREN stakeholders and network users, which now includes the entire K20 community in North Carolina. It’s encouraging to see participation from the K12 community and the emphasis on bringing value to K12, leveraging the information resources of the traditional University community community to holistically improve education in the state.

One of the biggest values is the human networking, and the opportunity to talk with colleagues across the state. While we have a similar event for the University of NC system (UNC CAUSE), Community Day brings in representation from the K12, Community College and state government sectors. National research networks such as Internet2 are also represented. The opportunity to talk and synchronize with this extended community is a key to the importance of this event. Already I’ve had several productive conversations and have another scheduled for lunch.

Of course I did have a chance to also talk with my colleagues about boating and fishing 😉

Now, back to the meeting…

Great Thanksgiving holiday…

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This Thanksgiving holiday was a very nice respite. No travels, other than to Durham and Raleigh. I did drive to Asheville Tuesday to pick up Jeff from UNCA; Jason drove from Raleigh to Blacksburg on Friday night after dinner so he could be back for the VT-UVA football game. That game came out the right way, with VT winning and now going to the ACC championship. Carolina redeemed itself after the NCSU debacle by beating Duke and should be in a bowl game. I didn’t have to drive Jeff back to Asheville, as the carpool took him back this morning. Slept in until almost 8AM today; rain on the roof, the dogs and cat even seeming to be finally on holiday schedule. Three lattes with the newspapers (N&O and NYTimes). Bought a Christmas tree this afternoon — very nice Fraser Fir for only $65; seems that prices are down this year. Headed to the Carolina basketball game this evening.

Now, that ol’ alarm clock will be ringing at 5:15AM Monday. Three weeks until winter break, then two weeks off! Woohoo!

Google video chat

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I am totally enthusiastic about Google’s new video chat feature. It’s browser-based, with no install other than the CODEC browser plugin. The audio and video quality is outstanding. I’m thinking that this may finally be the catalyst to bring videoconferencing to the masses. I’ve been a proponent of ad hoc video for a long while, but H.323 and SIP clients have a heavy footprint, have issues with NAT/firewall traversal, and have often had a high price point. Apple’s iChat brought great video chat to the Mac community in 2005, but that was not cross platform. Sure, Skype, etc. have offered interoperable video, but not at the quality of the Google offering. Great job, Google!

Planning a conference is hard work!

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Well, my wife has been successful in passing along her cold to me…fortunately, I waited until this afternoon until UNC CAUSE 2008 was over to crash! UNC CAUSE is:

“… an organization composed of the management and staff of the information technology based unity of the 16 campuses of the University of North Carolina. The organization exists for the purpose of promoting and facilitating cooperation, information exchange and technology leverage between the campuses of the UNC System in all areas related to information technology. The activities of this group are recognized, supported and participated in by the UNC General Administration.”

This year it was the turn of 5 schools in the UNC System “central region” to host the conference. I was asked to chair the planning team. We booked the site a year ago. I recruited staff, and we started meeting in the late winter of 2008, planning logistics, program, social events, etc. This year’s event went very well; we had ~350 attendees, plus over 30 vendor corporations as sponsors, with over 100 staff attending as well. Kudos to my great planning team, including representatives from NCCU, NCA&T, UNC-Pembroke, UNC-Chapel Hill, and my institution, UNC-Greensboro.

We had 18 vendor presentations, about 60 campus presentations and numerous Birds-of-a-Feather sessions.

Whew! Now, back to the office tomorrow and try to catch up (assuming I can stop hacking and sneezing).

Sliding across the sea…

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This weekend was another of those perfect fall weekends on the Crystal Coast of North Carolina, lows in the 40’s and highs about 70. I had a chance to get out of town with my friend and fishing buddy Sam. I picked Sam up about 9AM Saturday and we drove to Emerald Isle NC. Late start, as I’d been out of town at a conference, and got home just in time for neighborhood Halloween festivities ;-). Got to Emerald Isle about noon, and met my dad at the beach house. Threw some fishing gear in the boat and headed to the marina with Sam & my dad. We weren’t very optimistic about the fishing, as the tide was falling, but it was a nice day. Motored to the Bear Inlet channel and gave it a go. My dad managed one speckled trout, I had a pinfish, and Sam was skunked. “Should have been here in the morning,” was the word. However, we decided to take the boat up the back channel from the inlet to the ferry dock. An interesting trip…though the tide was dead low, still had 3 to 6 feet of water in many spots — one stretch only had a foot. Had to lift the motor up and pole across the shoal. Saw several spots that ought to hold speckled trout, though, and as an exploratory trip was quite successful. Headed back to the marina as it was getting late, and a dinner of steamed oysters.

Today (Sunday) dawned clear and absolutely calm, headed for a temperature of 71F, Indian Summer for sure. My dad decided to stay around the house, and Sam and I headed out after breakfast. Got on the water about 8:45AM and headed to a likely trout hole. Sam and I each quickly caught a trout (he on his flyrod, and me, heretically, on a spinning rig). Thought our luck might be changing, but not so…churned the water for a while with flyrods and spinners. None of the boats nearby was doing any better, so we headed over to Bear Island (Bouge Inlet end) and tried flyrods in the surf a while, but nothing doing. Water is still a bit warm for the specks to move out of the estuaries toward the ocean. Since we weren’t catching fish, and since it was such a calm day, we got in back in the boat and headed out the inlet into the ocean. Just low rolling swells, and absolutely beautiful — not a cloud in the sky (but no seabirds working schools of blues, either). Saw several pods of bottlenose dolphins, all told, must have been 100 of them, rhythmically working a school of fish…they were everywhere around the boat, some leaping out of the water, some slowly rolling, some slapping their tails as they dove into 30 feet of water. We tried casting and plugging, but no strikes. Oh well…

As Jimmy Buffet sang in Brahma Fear,

“Yes, I own a whaler boat

It slides across the sea

Some folks say I’m part of it

And I know it’s part of me”

Well, mine’s a Carolina Skiff, not a whaler, but this is what I was humming as we ran outside Bear Island toward Bear Inlet. Some other skiffs were working the shoal just west of Bear Inlet, but started moving away as we approach; missed that bite. Headed across the Bear Inlet bar on a couple of rollers and into the channel…banked around the shoals and found a hole to try a few more casts. A sea robin and lizard fish were it. Down the channel toward the ICW. Stopped in a bend right before the waterway. Saw a fellow catch a trout, and decided to make a few more casts. No hookups, but several short strikes, so fish were there. We didn’t catch any more, and decided to head on back so we could get back to central NC by supper. Sped down the waterway thru Swansboro and back to the marina.

What a day! Perfect fishing, and though the catching could have been better, still was one of the best days I’ve had on the water in a long while.

The Obamercial was magnificent…

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What else can you say? I’m 51 years old, and I’ve never volunteered for a candidate before. We’ve canvassed voters two weekends, my wife will work be working the polls on election day, we contributed to Obama’s campaign fund. He has the skills, the message, and importantly can restore the hope and faith of this country. I’m out of town at a conference, and I missed the broadcast version of the Obamercial, but I just watched it on YouTube. It just makes you want to run out and do whatever you can to help actualize the vision…

My token political post…

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In this blog, I generally try to avoid talking about controversial things, things were I don’t feel that I can effectively contribute, and things that that just feed the 24×7 news cycle. However, as this political season marches on, I feel that I need to make a statement (to all two or three folks who might stumble across things here). I make no secret that I’m a lifelong democrat, albeit one who’s a believer in globalization, capitalism and the free market ;-). Friedman’s “The World is Flat” should be required reading for every high school student. Heck, I subscribe to The Economist and the Wall Street Journal. I try to be an informed citizen, and try to spend my time reading things that help me understand the political and economic landscape. One of my recent favorites is Alan Greenspan’s biography.

I am discouraged by the tendency of people to want things to be simplified to a short sound bite, to be told what to think without critically examining what and why, and favoring style over substance. Today’s world is an exceedingly complicated place. While it may be satisfying to think that our leaders are just like us, frankly, I want them to be wiser, more reasoned, more thoughtful, more insightful and willing to reevaluate their beliefs when confronted with new information. What’s wrong with waffling? I’ll change my mind if someone presents me with compelling countervailing facts. If I don’t, I’m foolish. Staying with a bad decision because you don’t want to change is not a sound way to run your life or to run the country. Remember what they teach in business school, the concept of “sunk costs?” It doesn’t matter how much money you’ve put into a solution, you have to look forward at revenues and expenses and not be hung up on the financial and emotional capital you’ve put into a project. Running the government is like that, only much bigger and more complicated.

So, here’s my “virtual yard sign” — I unabashedly, enthusiastically and fully support Barack Obama for President and Joe Biden for Vice President. I’m cautiously optimistic about their chances. I think that they can restore the faith in our government and restore the confidence in our country. They are the Change we Need!

PS: Did I mention that I’m a gun-loving liberal? I grew up in Eastern NC, and hunting is a way of life there. I’ve belonged to the NRA for a while now, but I’ve decided that I can’t enjoy the firearms articles in the American Rifleman due to the incredibly myopic, single-issue litmus test politics of the NRA, and I won’t be renewing my membership. The current issue was the final straw.