The Life of a Silicon Valley Rockstar

My varied life… in a nutshell

Who wears pants anymore?

I found Daisy’s twitter stream which led me to her blog. She’s got a great commentary on the best venn diagram ever.

Hmm, I would have never thought of leggings… Though I can honestly say I’m often truly happy sans pants.

April 30, 2008 Posted by Alex | Life | | 1 Comment

Is Traditional Voice Dead in the Enterprise?

This this a cross-post from my hyperconnectivity blog but I thought the group here might have some interesting thoughts as well…

Our friends over at NoJitter seem to be on quite the anti-TDM rampage lately. Maybe they have a point. If I were making a greenfield voice recommendation, and I often do, I’d be hard pressed to justify a traditional TDM system over a VoIP or UC-integrated solution. Does that mean there’s no place for the traditional PBX?

One problem lies in the lack of availability of SIP trunks from service providers as not by Eric Krapf. That means, somewhere you’re bringing in a traditional line. Even if it’s pure PSTN or a PRI into a media gateway, the world of all-SIP all-the-time is still a fantasy. Al Baker mentioned, in the same article, that service providers may be protecting their current revenue stream by limited SIP trunks. I’m sure that’s partially to blame. However I think there’s also a general lack of understanding of SIP trunking both in the marketplace and at the carrier. Try calling your provider and trying to order a SIP trunk. You might as well be asking for a Tribble.

Nortel’s Tony Rybczynski mentioned at Interop2008 this morning that most of us have probably written our last telephony RFP. I think that may be true, however as I mentioned above I don’t see the world going all SIP yet. As Jason Alley adds any current voice strategy must include a provision for unified communications. In fact I see many companies using UC as a compelling business case to upgrade their legacy TDM systems. Low cost solutions like Asterisk and the commercial Nortel SCS500 make for an interesting counterpoint legacy systems like the Avaya Dimension and Alcatel Omni PCX.

April 30, 2008 Posted by Alex | Technology | , | No Comments Yet

My RSS feeds

As a follow up to my last post here’s a list of RSS feeds for various places I’m involved with.

All links go directly to the RSS feed:
Alex Lewis at the NetworkWorld Microsoft Subnet
Hyperconnectivity.com
Alex’s Twitter Stream

April 30, 2008 Posted by Alex | Technology | , , , | No Comments Yet

Tech Blogs I Write and more about me

This is my first stab at a personal blog, but I’m not new to blogging. I’ve written a few for various sources over the years. Here’s a list of ones I’m writing currently and some other general info.

  • Network World
    My NetworkWorld Microsoft Subnet Blog: Mainly Unified Communications focused, but I cover the general Microsoft landscape as well.

  • My Twitter stream: Regularly updated with what I’m doing and random thoughts.
  • HYPERCONNECTIVITY.COM: I write for this site on global unified communications and telepresence strategy and news.

  • I work as a principal consultant for Convergent Computing. CCO specializes in design and implementation of Microsoft technologies. I lead CCO’s Unified Communications practice.

  • Windows Server 2003 R2 Unleashed: My first book as a named (front cover) author. I’m currently working on an OCS Unleashed title, also from SAMS publishing.

April 30, 2008 Posted by Alex | Technology | , , , | No Comments Yet

Random thoughts on volleyball

If you know me from elsewhere you know I’m passionate about volleyball. I play 4-5 times a week, a mix of indoor, grass and beach. It’s been a bit of a roller coaster ride lately. Some really good experiences, some not so much.

Monday night my indoor team, which plays IVL Mens A, kicked ass the first two games. Granted we had picked up two decent players to sit in. The two guys that were actually one our team showed up and it all went to hell. Without naming names we have one player who really isn’t contributing and it’s starting to piss me off. He’s the first to run his mouth off, first to make excuses, and first to fuck up. The good news is there are only two weeks left this season and he won’t be joining us next season.

A buddy, Matt, and I played in the first Santa Cruz CBVA “A” tournament of the season last weekend. Actually, we played a little volleyball as a warmup to consuming mass quantities of margaritas at The Acapulco in downtown SC. We played really stiff. In spite of almost beating the best team in our pool, and one of the better teams in the tourney I wouldn’t say we played well overall.

I just got a txt from Caroline that she sprained her wrist and has to drop out from the rev coed grass tourney on the 11th. Not too big a deal as I really need to reorg the office anyway. Here’s my favorite grass picture from a season or two ago.

 

 

 

 I swear, I really love the game. It’s just been trying lately and I needed to vent…

April 30, 2008 Posted by Alex | Life | | 1 Comment

Of all the things I’ve lost I miss my mind the most…

Just another late night, working as usual. I jumped in on a major OCS 2007 Voice project, finished the table of contents and page count for the OCS book I’m working on, and am pondering a post for one of my other blogs.

April 30, 2008 Posted by Alex | Life, Technology | , | No Comments Yet