Remote: Yes (Exclusively)

Willing to relocate: No

Technologies: AWS, Go, Python, PHP, JavaScript, HTML/CSS, REST, Linux, etc.

Résumé/CV:

- https://greghines.com/resume/

- https://www.linkedin.com/in/greghines/

Email: work@greghines.com

I'm looking for a role as a software development manager. My background includes building web apps and high-traffic websites as a full-stack dev, so a SaaS company would probably be the best fit. Because of my time spent as an SRE, I have a strong focus in making sure systems are reliable and maintainable, to minimize the time spent putting out fires.

I like solving people's problems, which sometimes means asking "why" to figure out the real problem instead of just fixing symptoms. I'm good at iteratively developing processes, so I would bring a lot to the table in a company that needs help bringing order to chaos.

And no, SSDs aren't worthless without TRIM. But if you're likely to use the majority of the storage space on the drive and do a lot of writes besides, it could be the difference between "fast" and "really damn fast." Either way it'll still beat the pants off most rotational disk drives.

I think the takeaway, though, is that if you've spent potentially-obscene amounts of money on an SSD, wouldn't you prefer that your OS take full advantage of its capabilities to consistently deliver top performance?

(And no, that's not a dig at OS X. I'd recommend that Windows XP users upgrade to Win7 if they're considering upgrading to an SSD simply for the TRIM support. It can make that much of a difference depending on the user.)

If you're only using a small fraction of the total capacity, chances are you won't see much performance degradation for a long while no matter how much you write to the drive because of minimal fragmentation at the block level. But given enough time, you'd still hit that wall at some point.

But if you're using a large fraction of the total capacity, then you're going to have much more fragmentation, which means pages that can't be erased without having to rewrite significant numbers of blocks in those pages. Those ephemeral writes will start taking a real performance hit.

Many newer SSDs now include logic in their controllers to help mitigate this problem, with varying degrees of success. But full TRIM support on the drive and in the OS make a significantly larger difference than anything done by the drive alone. (Even with TRIM, though, the problem doesn't go away completely.)

And this isn't just some kind of spin from Anandtech--TRIM exists for a reason. It's a well-tested property of MLC SSDs. The combination of wear leveling and write combining can cause serious performance issues without TRIM. This article describes it pretty well: http://www.pcper.com/article.php?aid=669&type=expert&...

http://ark.intel.com/ProductCollection.aspx?familyID=43483

In fact, there are only two Core i* processors that don't have HyperThreading support, and they're both variants of the same quad-core Core i5 desktop processor (Core i5 750 and Core i5 750S):

http://ark.intel.com/ProductCollection.aspx?familyID=42912

XP Mode is limited to Professional and Ultimate/Enterprise versions of Windows 7. These aren't going to be the versions that consumers (and small businesses) are going to get when they buy a computer from Best Buy or Dell. When those people replace their aging computers, they'll get Windows 7 with IE8. And unlike when XP first came out, most new computers are configured to automatically download and install critical Windows updates (which includes new versions of IE)--so IE8 won't be the albatross is that IE6 has become. Most Windows 7 users will be upgraded to IE9 without even thinking about it. (In this sense, IE8 may be the shortest-lived version of IE to date.)

That means this is really only a concern for corporate users, where policies are dictated by budgets and IT departments, not a lack of basic computing knowledge.

One reason that many such companies force their employees to use IE6 is because long ago they developed custom intranets or other internal web-based applications targeting IE6 and they're not willing to spend the money to upgrade or replace them. And because no other browser comes packaged as an MSI (meaning they can't be centrally managed and deployed), their IT departments won't let them install Firefox, Opera, Safari, or Chrome. That only leaves IE--specifically, IE6. (Want to see an uptick in Firefox usage? Lobby to have Mozilla release Firefox as an MSI.)

Now, because of XP Mode, corporations can upgrade their users to Windows 7 without fear that they'll have to spend money upgrading or replacing their intranets/apps. And because Windows 7 comes with IE8 (which can't be downgraded), those companies are going to have to put policies in place to secure it to their liking. Their employees will then be able to use IE8 for the web at large and IE6 for their intranets/apps.

For that reason, many companies will be more likely to upgrade to Windows 7 sooner than they would have done so if XP Mode wasn't available.

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(Disclosure: I'm under contract with Ars Technica, working on a projected unrelated to any of this.)