Episode 131: How to eat (Hill Country) BBQ, plus, PE in systems management

It’s hard to be a medium sized systems management (“monitoring”) company: you either have to niche it out and exit early, or go big. With some recent funding and PE activity in that area, Brandon and Coté discuss that. Also, a detailed HOWTO on eating Texas BBQ.

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Housekeeping

• Listen to Brandon and Satish talk about product management on Software Defined Interviews.
• Make sure to subscribe to the CashedOut.coffee podcast if you like Coté shit.

Week’s wunderkammer New MacBook Pro:

• The touchbar is pretty cool. I do keep hitting “back” because I’m used to resting my fingers on that part of the keyboard. Whatever.
• The speakers are very nice too, like the iPad Pro.
• Migrate Utility is either easy to screw up or not fully baked.
• Dropbox gets a little confused with how long something will take.
• USB-C: I’m just here so I don’t get fined.

How to eat (Hill Country) BBQ

• Order a plate - two meats (always brisket if it's your first time, then lady's choice), beans, Cole slaw. I’d skip the bread, but load up on onions, and pickles if they’re you’re thing
• Eat all the BBQ.
• Eat with your fingers.
• Don't put sugar on your meat.
• Don’t tell people how to eat BBQ, or argue about dry rubs and sauce. Just eat.

Relevant to your interests

• HCL buys into hybrid data management with majority stake in Actian:
  • 451: “Actian is being acquired in an all-cash deal valued at $330m by a JV in which HCL Technologies owns 80% and Sumeru Equity Partners the remaining 20%”
  • 451: “Actian told us in March [of 2018?] that revenue was back up to more than $100m while headcount totaled approximately 300." They also own Pervasive (including Data Junction for ETL/integration soup-to-nuts), y’all: “In 2013, Pervasive Software was acquired by Actian Corporation for $161.9 million. Actian had initially made offers in August 2012 starting at $154 million 30% higher than its shares traded at the time.”
• Vista buys Logic Monitor from Providence. Meanwhile, AppDynamics seems fine.
• Sensu raises $10M to build a robust monitoring system for all your different operations.
• Microsoft’s Linux Distro, for Azure Sphere - IoT, edge device stuff: an edge device in every home, office, street corner, etc. More from El Reg.
• Announcing Docker Enterprise Edition 2.0.
• Changing the calculus of containers in the cloud.
• Database decisions: AWS has changed the game for IT.
• The Platform Matters More Than Ever, The Operating System Less So
• For the first time ever, Microsoft will distribute its own version of Linux.
• OLPC’s $100 laptop was going to change the world — then it all went wrong.
• After Months of Development, B3i's Blockchain Prototype Is Ready for Testing.

Nonsense

• KITECH Dual Arm Robot: using scissors.
• A sea of Mark Zuckerberg cutouts has taken over the Capitol lawn.

Conferences, et. al.

• April 26-27, DevOpsDays Jakarta - Matt is keynoting, and Coté will be speaking too.
• May 15th to 18th, 2018 - Coté talking EA at Continuous Lifecycle London.
• May 16-17, Matt presenting at Cloud Expo Hong Kong
• May 22-25, ChefConf 2018, in Chicago.

SDT news & hype

• Check out Software Defined Interviews, our new podcast. Pretty self-descriptive, plus the #exegesis podcast we’ve been doing, all in one, for free.
• Keep up with the weekly newsletter.
• Join us in Slack.
• Buy some t-shirts! DISCOUNT CODE: SDTFSG (20% off)
• Send your name and address to stickers@softwaredefinedtalk.com and we will send you a sticker. If you run into Matt he’ll give you one too!

Listener Feedback

• Jonathan from Denver says we are the best and we sent him a sticker
• Jody was binging the Software Defined Talk backlog and asked for a sticker

Recommendations

• Brandon: Killers of the Flower Moon and Travis Country Texas Online Property Tax Appeal.
• Coté: The Grand barbershop, Austin - they got all the whatnots. Also, Stiles Switch: this is how a beef rib is supposed to be.