As you may have noticed, I’ve been a little inactive lately.  If you are even more observant, you may have noticed a few references to the fact that I was very busy in August and September.  After all, CMIS was finally released last month and I haven’t even posted an analysis on how it measures up from a technical standpoint.

The answer is a little more complex than too much going on a daily basis.  It boils down to one thing, borderline burnout.  I’ve not only not been doing anything on my commute even remotely work-related, I’ve sometimes been going home and night and not even using a computer!  I think my wife hasn’t said anything because I think she is happy about that behavior, even if it is a warning sign.

Burning the Candle from Both Ends

As any experienced IT person will tell you, burnout is a very real danger.  A good manager will watch his people and make sure that they aren’t pushing themselves too hard.  What is the point of making an intermediate deadline if you miss the next deadline because your resources have burned out?  I always keep an eye on my staff and my Managing Director has been keeping an eye on me as well.

Even with that existing insight, I started to get there.  Luckily, my brain kicked some protective measures to force downtime, as outlined above.  Without making a conscious decision, I reduced my blogging, technical reading, and participation in online communities (sorry Alan).

I also took more time to enjoy college football.  As some of you know, I am fanatical about Auburn Football.  My wife is a fan now because when Auburn wins, I am very happy and energetic, which makes me easier to live with during the ensuing week.  Without getting into too much detail, let’s just say that the media’s high expectations, and my more realistic expectations, have completely failed to have a positive impact on reality.  At least I can say is that I am glad that I’m not a Michigan or Tennessee graduate.  Then I would probably be in therapy.

Ctrl-Alt-Delete

Things are getting better and I am going to get back on the blogging wagon, slowly.  I’ve learned a lot of things in the last few months, and I’ve got a lot of things to share.  For instance:

• Documentum Multi-Node indexes are both easier and harder to implement than you would think.
• eRoom is hindering the ability of long-time customers to move to new versions of Content Server.
• Documentum DQL becomes a little limited when creating a Case Management system with millions of cases, and FAST isn’t to blame.
• Those guys at the EMC Developer Network have done a great job with the great sight, but it is under-utilized.
• Gartner’s Magic Quadrant did a great job reflecting the changes in the past year, but it is already obsolete in one very important measurement.
• If you are an IT consultant in the United States, you better be aware of the possible applicability of export laws, even if you think they are hindrances to progress.
• I’ve been looking at DFS all wrong.  It is useful and has an important spot in the current architecture of an enterprise Documentum solution, but it is being over-used out in the field.

A lot of this will show up in blog entries in the next few months.  I also have a backlog of comments that call for separate posts, but I just haven’t had the spare processing power to give adequate responses.  If you wrote one of those comments, please be patient.