another day
Another Day - Today we had the first “bug bash” for the program I’m working on. A bug bash is where everyone on the team sets aside their normal activities and starts hammering away on the code trying to be the person to file the most bugs. It was fun; the first bug I filed was already fixed before 5PM, but there are still plenty of other bugs to keep the devs busy for a few days.
Today, Brian Valentine called a meeting about our response to Gartner’s negative comments on IIS security. Many people think that Microsoft is an ivory tower where we ignore our customers. These people might be surprised to know that literally thousands of e-mails have been flying around on internal mailing lists about what we can do about the problem. Of course, there was already a lot of soul-searching starting around the time of Melissa and SirCam, but the Gartner report was a major wake-up-call (in my opinion). BrianV is the guy who made Windows 2000 ship, and if anyone can make a major impact on IIS security situation, he’s the guy. He gave lots of details about the things we will be announcing (and delivering) soon. He points out that, while we are not the worst in terms of security, we are not the best either. He is dead-set on changing things here until we are the undisputed best. He’s also going to start working with competitors and others to set up cooperative solutions where it makes sense.
Responding to yesterday’s theme on Journalistic conflicts of interest, Ramaswamy pointed me to an amusing jab at CNN journalists in a Pakistan weekly: “Top Ten Ways to Look Like a CNN Journalist”.