I don't have a lot of time to write much because I have an important counterterrorism meeting with Rick. We're going to grab a late bite to eat before we go out and fight terrorism by driving around the city for ten minutes with the lights and sirens wailing at full blast. Nothing like keeping those terrorists on their feet at all times.
Anyway, the media really loves me. The NY Post wrote a wonderful editorial about me. I'm glad they're giving me all the credit for the outstanding crime results I've been singlehandedly achieving. I'd hate to see some lowly precinct-level detective squad member or even some loser frontline cop get any of the credit. I'm especially glad they didn't point out that I'm really just riding Bill Bratton and Jack Maple's coattails with this whole crime fighting strategy stuff. Because I'm totally not.
I'll definitely have to make sure Paul puts this reporter's 2008 press credentials package onto the express checkout line.
Sunday, December 30, 2007
Michael and his animal trophies
So my transportation honcho got a new office. I've been waiting a long time for this moment, because I used the opportunity to make Michael get rid of all those offensive hunting trophies. In all these years at the Puzzle Palace he apparently still hasn't learned that you check your personality at the door before walking into the building. But he just had to stand out and be different. Offices are supposed to be drab and boring. What a schmuck, this guy. I had them send him the bill for carting all this crap out of his old office, too, just to teach him who's boss.
Now some people call this "micromanaging." I call it "hands-on leadership." Isn't this what Bratton did (that little bastard), the "Broken Windows Theory" or something? Addressing the small things?
The nerve of these clowns to bitch about this. I was going to get rid of this hunting trophy garbage anyway, but the fact is, somebody also complained about it. Somebody who has no life outside of this excrement colored building of ours (the way it should be) and was upset that Michael was showing off his own personal hobby at the office. The complainer said it made him "feel like a loser."
Now some people call this "micromanaging." I call it "hands-on leadership." Isn't this what Bratton did (that little bastard), the "Broken Windows Theory" or something? Addressing the small things?
The nerve of these clowns to bitch about this. I was going to get rid of this hunting trophy garbage anyway, but the fact is, somebody also complained about it. Somebody who has no life outside of this excrement colored building of ours (the way it should be) and was upset that Michael was showing off his own personal hobby at the office. The complainer said it made him "feel like a loser."
Friday, December 28, 2007
We screwed the pooch
George just e-mailed me this video of the Transit OmniForm Program. OMFG. This looks like a video from the future. But George said it's really from 1993.
I asked James, my IT guy, if we could implement a similar system. He said they've been working on it ever since MISD sent a bunch of guys to that district after the merge and confiscated all the computers. But James was being suspiciously vague, so I told him to pull all the files on the project and send them to my office.
Well, there wasn't much in the file. Here's the "project log" as I found it in the file:
----
April 2, 1995: Took the MISD "special projects" team down to District 2 to impound all the Transit Police computer systems. We brought them a couple of IBM Selectric typewriters and TELEX terminals and welcomed them heartily to the NYPD. I also called the paperwork printing guys to have them bring over a couple of truckloads of advanced NYPD forms.
April 3, 1995: Started looking into how these Transit guys set up this advanced computer system.
April 4, 1995: Horribly confused. This stuff isn't a TELEX based command line system. I don't understand it.
April 5, 1995: Took an E-Day for psychological reasons.
April 6, 1995: Ordered Tim to get a cart and roll all the Transit computers into a basement storage area. We'll look into this stuff later. Right now we need to fix our TELEX mainframe server. It broke down again and we've already had to assign 496 MISD Log #'s in the past half hour alone. Apparently a bunch of precinct C.O.'s are trying to get ready for CompStat and can't pull up any of their statistics on the computers.
January 10, 2005: Somebody was asking about a Transit OmniForm Program. This entry is here only to document (CYA, of course) that I wasn't in charge in 1996 and I have no idea where the hell these guys put the Transit computers.
March 12, 2006 - morning: Finally relocated the old Transit computers. I had Dave boot up the systems. We spent the day pouring over the code.
March 12, 2006 - evening: We don't understand this stuff. Property vouchering on the computer? WTF? Vouchers are prepared on typewriters. WTF is this confusing crap. Ordered Dave to pack this junk back up again and wheel it back into the basement.
----
Well, apparently our MISD guys can't figure this Transit OmniForm stuff out. I asked James what the problem is. He said "well, boss, I don't really see a reason to rock the boat here." He makes a good point. We have a pretty great system already that works. So it involves a mountain of paperwork and typewriters. Who cares.
I dumped the file in the shredder. We don't need this Transit junk.
I asked James, my IT guy, if we could implement a similar system. He said they've been working on it ever since MISD sent a bunch of guys to that district after the merge and confiscated all the computers. But James was being suspiciously vague, so I told him to pull all the files on the project and send them to my office.
Well, there wasn't much in the file. Here's the "project log" as I found it in the file:
----
April 2, 1995: Took the MISD "special projects" team down to District 2 to impound all the Transit Police computer systems. We brought them a couple of IBM Selectric typewriters and TELEX terminals and welcomed them heartily to the NYPD. I also called the paperwork printing guys to have them bring over a couple of truckloads of advanced NYPD forms.
April 3, 1995: Started looking into how these Transit guys set up this advanced computer system.
April 4, 1995: Horribly confused. This stuff isn't a TELEX based command line system. I don't understand it.
April 5, 1995: Took an E-Day for psychological reasons.
April 6, 1995: Ordered Tim to get a cart and roll all the Transit computers into a basement storage area. We'll look into this stuff later. Right now we need to fix our TELEX mainframe server. It broke down again and we've already had to assign 496 MISD Log #'s in the past half hour alone. Apparently a bunch of precinct C.O.'s are trying to get ready for CompStat and can't pull up any of their statistics on the computers.
January 10, 2005: Somebody was asking about a Transit OmniForm Program. This entry is here only to document (CYA, of course) that I wasn't in charge in 1996 and I have no idea where the hell these guys put the Transit computers.
March 12, 2006 - morning: Finally relocated the old Transit computers. I had Dave boot up the systems. We spent the day pouring over the code.
March 12, 2006 - evening: We don't understand this stuff. Property vouchering on the computer? WTF? Vouchers are prepared on typewriters. WTF is this confusing crap. Ordered Dave to pack this junk back up again and wheel it back into the basement.
----
Well, apparently our MISD guys can't figure this Transit OmniForm stuff out. I asked James what the problem is. He said "well, boss, I don't really see a reason to rock the boat here." He makes a good point. We have a pretty great system already that works. So it involves a mountain of paperwork and typewriters. Who cares.
I dumped the file in the shredder. We don't need this Transit junk.
Daily Snooze article on gun crime
I usually just read The Economist for my weekly news reports, but occasionally I'll peek a look at the Daily News or NY Post. Just a few minutes ago Paul called me up and told me to take a look at this Gunplay plagues two Brooklyn nabes article.
From the piece:
"We don't just need more police around here. We need a goddamn army," said Ruckle, who lives in Bed-Stuy.
I'd be more than happy to oblige. In fact I'm going to go call up Joe right now and see if we can't transfer a few more task force guys with 15-20 years on the job into the 79 and 71 to walk foot posts. I figure we can keep playing the public by just shifting around whatever resources we still have.
Mike once said this is basically the same principle that made him successful in business. He calls it "readjusting opinion and the prospective outlook of your organization through creative accounting of resources." Quite a mouthful. But he's a corporate business type, so I'm sure he knows what he's saying. He also said it was a good call to have the Department pay for the night sights. He figures at the new graduates' pay rate that $60 they'll be saving should cause them to stay on for one more week before quitting, which will give us an extra "productivity boost." He came in with a PowerPoint presentation and everything. Pretty smart guy.
From the piece:
"We don't just need more police around here. We need a goddamn army," said Ruckle, who lives in Bed-Stuy.
I'd be more than happy to oblige. In fact I'm going to go call up Joe right now and see if we can't transfer a few more task force guys with 15-20 years on the job into the 79 and 71 to walk foot posts. I figure we can keep playing the public by just shifting around whatever resources we still have.
Mike once said this is basically the same principle that made him successful in business. He calls it "readjusting opinion and the prospective outlook of your organization through creative accounting of resources." Quite a mouthful. But he's a corporate business type, so I'm sure he knows what he's saying. He also said it was a good call to have the Department pay for the night sights. He figures at the new graduates' pay rate that $60 they'll be saving should cause them to stay on for one more week before quitting, which will give us an extra "productivity boost." He came in with a PowerPoint presentation and everything. Pretty smart guy.
Operation Impact getting a boost
We had 900+ recruits graduate from the academy yesterday. I was worried about keeping Operation Impact going a few weeks ago, but Mike called me up on Tuesday and said we need to turn this negativity around. He said, rather cryptically, that it probably wouldn't be so great for my prospective mayoral run if I keep making him look bad. Whatever that means. I doubt that's a veiled threat, he's probably just trying to help me out with this sinking ship of mine.
Anyway, these 900+ new guys and gals will be a real boost. I figure we can get a good bunch of C summonses in the first two days before the first dozen or so freshly minted rookies start resigning for greener pastures. We'll be able to reduce crime for a couple of days at least. So Mike said we'll line up the press for a couple of feel-good "wow we're really fighting crime" types of interviews with the DCPI and a few of the new-jacks. But I told him it's critical this all happens within the first week or so. Because by week three we're definitely going to start losing people. And some of these rooks might figure out by then that we aren't quite as "advanced" as we like to claim at the academy.
I sure am good at this smoke and mirrors stuff...
Anyway, these 900+ new guys and gals will be a real boost. I figure we can get a good bunch of C summonses in the first two days before the first dozen or so freshly minted rookies start resigning for greener pastures. We'll be able to reduce crime for a couple of days at least. So Mike said we'll line up the press for a couple of feel-good "wow we're really fighting crime" types of interviews with the DCPI and a few of the new-jacks. But I told him it's critical this all happens within the first week or so. Because by week three we're definitely going to start losing people. And some of these rooks might figure out by then that we aren't quite as "advanced" as we like to claim at the academy.
I sure am good at this smoke and mirrors stuff...
Touring MISD
I took my special commissioner's elevator downstairs today and toured the MISD facilities. I must say we're really doing quite a bang-up job with computer technology. I walked by an impressive array of IBM Selectric typewriters that were being maintained by our resident technical geniuses. Wow. I couldn't imagine figuring out how to even work these modern-day, complicated devices, let alone repair them.
As I walked past a couple of guys refilling their coffee cups, no doubt after a long day hunched over the complex computer code that powers some of our most advanced systems, I headed for the nearest available TELEX terminal. I'm a hands-on type of commissioner, so I wanted to just sit down and see what it must be like for some poor sap working at a precinct to pull up accident report data in preparation for TrafficStat.
I was looking for the mouse for about five minutes before I realized this thing doesn't have one. "What the hell?!?" I thought. Must be some type of new invention, this TELEX thing here. Since I clearly didn't know what I was doing, I summoned over one of the guys who was still standing around the coffee machine (I guess he must have been on a 62P or something, because people who work in big bureaucracies like ours would never just waste time doing nothing).
The first thing this guy told me was that we've actually upgraded many precincts to new Dells sporting those fancy flat screens and all. So we headed over to one of those. I sat down again. Ah, the familiar mouse. Still, I couldn't find where the "accidents" program is. The helpful MISD guy, Bob, told me to open the "MSWS" application. Hmm. Four letter acronyms. "What does MSWS mean," I asked. "I have no clue, commish." A blank window with a green cursor on a black background popped up. "This looks just like the TELEX, Bob. How is this different?" Bob answered that basically "it isn't any different" and this was "essentially the same thing." Computer guys and their vague answers. Maybe there's a position in VIPER open for this clown. "So how do I pull up the accidents?"
What followed was an astonishingly complicated process of typing in more three and four letter acronyms, which Bob dubbed "commands." Eventually we got to some kind of login screen. So I typed in my special commissioner's tax number and the password some minion rushed over to me. The login failed. "Uh, commish, I think you need to call the MISD ICO to get your password approved for this system."
Wow. We're really good at securing these systems. Keeping out pretty much everybody, even our own personnel. Pretty impressive. Well, eventually they resolved it and I was able to login. Another four letter acronym later and I was presented with the accident reporting screen. More green text on a black background. Incredibly complex and advanced looking. I wanted to do a simple search of all accidents that occurred in December in a specific precinct. Bob told me to type another sequence of commands to get to the search screen. Ah, now we're talking. I tried to click the mouse on the "start date" field so I could type something in. "Uh, yeah, uh, commish, you can't use the mouse with this program." I was starting to become annoyed. "So why do we even have a mouse on this thing?" "I really wouldn't know, commish."
Turns out I have to hit the TAB key to get to the appropriate fields because "it's all text based, command line stuff," as Bob pointed out. I see. So I typed in my date range, 20071201 to 20071231. I hit the enter key. And waited for the results. And kept waiting. "Would you like some coffee, sir, while we wait?" "No thanks, it shouldn't take that long."
Turns out that searching for a month worth of accidents actually is a very complex process for our modern 1970s database technology. These advanced IBM System/370 number crunching mainframe servers apparently get very overloaded when everybody is querying them to get ready for TrafficStat. Twenty minutes and 2 cups of coffee later my search "timed out" with an error. Bob said we'd have to go through the whole process all over again.
I cursed at one of my protective detail detectives, got up, and left. This stuff is too complicated. I'd rather forget about the whole thing. We're doing fine with technology. After all, we're the most advanced police department in the world. Who wouldn't be impressed after seeing the IBM System/370 in the "server room"?
No wonder it's so difficult to use and keeps "timing out" and/or "crashing." Look at that thing. Only a genius could figure it out.
As I walked past a couple of guys refilling their coffee cups, no doubt after a long day hunched over the complex computer code that powers some of our most advanced systems, I headed for the nearest available TELEX terminal. I'm a hands-on type of commissioner, so I wanted to just sit down and see what it must be like for some poor sap working at a precinct to pull up accident report data in preparation for TrafficStat.
I was looking for the mouse for about five minutes before I realized this thing doesn't have one. "What the hell?!?" I thought. Must be some type of new invention, this TELEX thing here. Since I clearly didn't know what I was doing, I summoned over one of the guys who was still standing around the coffee machine (I guess he must have been on a 62P or something, because people who work in big bureaucracies like ours would never just waste time doing nothing).
The first thing this guy told me was that we've actually upgraded many precincts to new Dells sporting those fancy flat screens and all. So we headed over to one of those. I sat down again. Ah, the familiar mouse. Still, I couldn't find where the "accidents" program is. The helpful MISD guy, Bob, told me to open the "MSWS" application. Hmm. Four letter acronyms. "What does MSWS mean," I asked. "I have no clue, commish." A blank window with a green cursor on a black background popped up. "This looks just like the TELEX, Bob. How is this different?" Bob answered that basically "it isn't any different" and this was "essentially the same thing." Computer guys and their vague answers. Maybe there's a position in VIPER open for this clown. "So how do I pull up the accidents?"
What followed was an astonishingly complicated process of typing in more three and four letter acronyms, which Bob dubbed "commands." Eventually we got to some kind of login screen. So I typed in my special commissioner's tax number and the password some minion rushed over to me. The login failed. "Uh, commish, I think you need to call the MISD ICO to get your password approved for this system."
Wow. We're really good at securing these systems. Keeping out pretty much everybody, even our own personnel. Pretty impressive. Well, eventually they resolved it and I was able to login. Another four letter acronym later and I was presented with the accident reporting screen. More green text on a black background. Incredibly complex and advanced looking. I wanted to do a simple search of all accidents that occurred in December in a specific precinct. Bob told me to type another sequence of commands to get to the search screen. Ah, now we're talking. I tried to click the mouse on the "start date" field so I could type something in. "Uh, yeah, uh, commish, you can't use the mouse with this program." I was starting to become annoyed. "So why do we even have a mouse on this thing?" "I really wouldn't know, commish."
Turns out I have to hit the TAB key to get to the appropriate fields because "it's all text based, command line stuff," as Bob pointed out. I see. So I typed in my date range, 20071201 to 20071231. I hit the enter key. And waited for the results. And kept waiting. "Would you like some coffee, sir, while we wait?" "No thanks, it shouldn't take that long."
Turns out that searching for a month worth of accidents actually is a very complex process for our modern 1970s database technology. These advanced IBM System/370 number crunching mainframe servers apparently get very overloaded when everybody is querying them to get ready for TrafficStat. Twenty minutes and 2 cups of coffee later my search "timed out" with an error. Bob said we'd have to go through the whole process all over again.
I cursed at one of my protective detail detectives, got up, and left. This stuff is too complicated. I'd rather forget about the whole thing. We're doing fine with technology. After all, we're the most advanced police department in the world. Who wouldn't be impressed after seeing the IBM System/370 in the "server room"?
No wonder it's so difficult to use and keeps "timing out" and/or "crashing." Look at that thing. Only a genius could figure it out.
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