Pryor Takes Another Byte...

[Rogers64]

Forum Friends,

Word on the street is that the famous Google server farm here in Pryor Creek is being delayed a year, perhaps longer, before going on-line.

After several local plant closings, including Georgia-Pacific and the pending loss of French-owned Labinal with 480 jobs, and the doo-dah at Gatoraide, it is getting difficult for Mayor Tramel to keep his smiley face.

Regards,
Mike

[inteller]

quote:Originally posted by Rogers64

Forum Friends,

Word on the street is that the famous Google server farm here in Pryor Creek is being delayed a year, perhaps longer, before going on-line.

After several local plant closings, including Georgia-Pacific and the pending loss of French-owned Labinal with 480 jobs, and the doo-dah at Gatoraide, it is getting difficult for Mayor Tramel to keep his smiley face.

Regards,
Mike

rumor I hear is they can't find the right people to man it.  they are very picky about who they hire...almost too picky.  And I guess they can't convince people in harder hit parts of the country to move here.

[sgrizzle]

I would bet they will have an easier time in the coming months.

I heard 2nd hand that the Gatorade closing wasn't unexpected, the employees were told when they were hired that the plant closes annually around this time.

[Red Arrow]

Really high gas prices probably limited their recruitment area.  I used to work in the same industrial park.  It was about 100 mi/day round trip from north Bixby.  Bad enough at $2/gallon.

[MsProudSooner]

There are a lot of 'soon to be' former EDS employees who will be available to work at Google in the next few months.

[nathanm]

quote:Originally posted by Red Arrow

Really high gas prices probably limited their recruitment area.  I used to work in the same industrial park.  It was about 100 mi/day round trip from north Bixby.  Bad enough at $2/gallon.

Indeed. I thought of applying there but then realized that it's halfway to Arkansas. My current job has me driving to Fayetteville a couple of times a month. That's a lot better than a third of that distance every freakin' day.

[dbacks fan]

I have to say that inteller has a valid point on Googles hiring. They opend an office in Tempe in 2006, saying that the area had a large cluster of very smart people. I know two people that applied and were very qualified for the job. One left after the 20th interview in one day, and the other after 25 interviews in one day was told that his education and background were what they were looking for, he did not fit their hiring matrix. They employed 50 people for a year and a half, and closed the facility this year saying there was not enough intelligent people in the valley to keep the facility open.

Google Opens

Google Closes

[Conan71]

quote:Originally posted by dbacks fan

I have to say that inteller has a valid point on Googles hiring. They opend an office in Tempe in 2006, saying that the area had a large cluster of very smart people. I know two people that applied and were very qualified for the job. One left after the 20th interview in one day, and the other after 25 interviews in one day was told that his education and background were what they were looking for, he did not fit their hiring matrix. They employed 50 people for a year and a half, and closed the facility this year saying there was not enough intelligent people in the valley to keep the facility open.

Google Opens

Google Closes

If the Phoenix area doesn't have the talent pool, I can't imagine how short NE OK would be.  They are calling it "construction delays" in the news this morning.

[inteller]

quote:Originally posted by Conan71

quote:Originally posted by dbacks fan

I have to say that inteller has a valid point on Googles hiring. They opend an office in Tempe in 2006, saying that the area had a large cluster of very smart people. I know two people that applied and were very qualified for the job. One left after the 20th interview in one day, and the other after 25 interviews in one day was told that his education and background were what they were looking for, he did not fit their hiring matrix. They employed 50 people for a year and a half, and closed the facility this year saying there was not enough intelligent people in the valley to keep the facility open.

Google Opens

Google Closes

If the Phoenix area doesn't have the talent pool, I can't imagine how short NE OK would be.  They are calling it "construction delays" in the news this morning.

i think their HR has a jilted view that they are going to find a bunch of silicon valley hipsters to run their data center.  One has to wonder if they offer any incentive of workers in CA to move to OK and run the center.  In reality these centers should mostly run themselves.  All they really need are a bunch of monkeys to slam servers into a rack and make sure nothing is on fire.  Everything else will be managed remotely from CA for the most part.  I guess they can't find anyone liberal enough for them.  I had a friend who was more than qualified for the linux sys admin position they needed and they said he just missed it.  The even flew him out to interview.  Last I checked they were still hiring for that position.  This really makes me think they are being way too picky.

[cannon_fodder]

Picky is good.  Unless it is to such an extent that the job simply doesn't get done.

[inteller]

quote:Originally posted by cannon_fodder

Picky is good.  Unless it is to such an extent that the job simply doesn't get done.

i agree.  I always said they'd have a hard time finding qualified people to work out there.  but to an extent I think they are making it too hard.

[dbacks fan]

quote:Originally posted by inteller

quote:Originally posted by cannon_fodder

Picky is good.  Unless it is to such an extent that the job simply doesn't get done.

i agree.  I always said they'd have a hard time finding qualified people to work out there.  but to an extent I think they are making it too hard.

As an example, TGen is using ASU's super computer facility for it's research, there can't be a shortage of people to work for the research facility that Google was planning. From the people that I have spoken with, that have extensive backgrounds in the computer science field, and all age ranges, and work for Motorola, Intel, ON Semiconductors, and Honeywell, you would think that they could easily find people to fill the rolls that they needed.

A server farm requires highly skilled people to do the work to build and maintain the equipment. Inteller is partially right in his statement that alot of it can be maintained remotely, but you still have to have the people with the education and the know how to maintain the facility, especially in a 24/7/365 enviroment that a server facitlity is. Yes I know there are RAID servers and backups and redundency, but you still have to have people with the expertise on site to work with the people looking at it remotely.

[izmophonik]

The problem with google which isn't much of a problem in other higher density cities is that their data center in Pryor is just a data center (no real office) and it is 100% Linux servers.  Google is not a Windows based company and therefore they are having a tough time in little ol' Pryor, OK trying to find smart and capable IT staff that have multiple years of Linux administration, data center facilities admins etc..  Hardware is one thing but it's the OS support they need that is their bottle neck besides the fact that it is in Pryor.  That knocks out some good candidates in Tulsa or OKC.

[nathanm]

quote:Originally posted by izmophonik

The problem with google which isn't much of a problem in other higher density cities is that their data center in Pryor is just a data center (no real office) and it is 100% Linux servers.  Google is not a Windows based company and therefore they are having a tough time in little ol' Pryor, OK trying to find smart and capable IT staff that have multiple years of Linux administration, data center facilities admins etc..  Hardware is one thing but it's the OS support they need that is their bottle neck besides the fact that it is in Pryor.  That knocks out some good candidates in Tulsa or OKC.

There are plenty of people well qualified for that position. Linux experience isn't exactly hard to come by. (If it was, I'd be making a lot more money, since we'd be like AS/400 guys..few and far between) The problem is finding well qualified people willing to drive to Pryor. And apparently their pickiness regarding 'culture,' or something.

Of course, they don't really even need Linux admins in every data center. Just as I administrate servers in far flung places remotely, so can they. I don't even have the benefit of people who are technically qualified to work on the hardware (although anybody who can use a screwdriver can do that with telephone assistance)

I'd be much more concerned with having someone who knew what they were doing with the network infrastructure than the servers themselves. When your network blows up, you can't get in remotely to fix it.

[izmophonik]

Let me rephrase that.  The linux admins they need are not abundant around here.  There a lots of people who work with linux but not at the caliber they want.  If you build your network correctly you can recover it remotely.  That is unless you just simply lose power. :-)