Well it finally happened.
After having a year's worth of
positively useful and enriching classes, I've got a complete and
utter DUD this term.
Six chapters into the book and we're
still discussing network architecture theory
(it's a network architecture class, in case you haven't guessed....),
and how bad it sucks when management isn't on board with security
base-lining.
Here's an original thought!
….we can keep on whining and complaining that security is such an
under appreciated field....OR we can learn some methods to help make
the case to management. Or learn breathing exercises.
But the theories - oh God... all the
endless theories about the best ways to ask questions
about the system you're going to build. I got it, really....you need
to fully understand the business' objective and know exactly what
they want in order to deliver the best product.
I totally get it - this is an area of
development that is so full of FAIL. I've experienced first hand how
bad it is when developers and architects design something so
completely different than what the client wanted.
But we have devoted six (very long)
chapters thus far on how to ask questions. I fully
appreciate that I have a short attention span, but really?
Can we get into the meat of actually designing something? It's only a
12 week course. At this rate we might design something, oh, I don’t'
know.....maybe around 2016?
So far every weekly assignment has been
a five page term paper discussing some scholarly article that MAY or
MAY NOT have ANYTHING
to do with architecture. Esoteric topics like, “Do hackers
prefer the color blue, and what does that say about the best way to
prevent a breach to your system?”.
For serious.
There has yet to be any assignment on
the material being covered in the book or lectures. And that makes
total sense, riiiight?
The content of my papers has typically
been me regurgitating things I learned either on the job, or from my
other classes. While I can see the benefit of that (ten points to
Gryffindor for applying existing knowledge!) it would be nice to
actually learn something for the obscene amount of
money being paid for this class.
I am currently preparing for my midterm
and know fuckall of what to actually study.
For all I know, the exam will cover the
sexual habits of lemurs and require us to design a secure VPN network
around it.
