Is an environmentally sustainable data center possible?
One of the biggest concerns for IT facility managers is monitoring the temperature in data centers and server rooms to make sure that the excessive heat produced by hardware is not accumulating to dangerous levels that can overheat the servers. This is an important task for the obvious reason that overheated equipment can lead to expensive hardware damage and loss of data. However, conventional HVAC systems that use chilled forced air to cool data centers are highly inefficient with regards to energy consumption and therefore indirectly effect CO2 emissions. Being a bit of a green building geek, I looked up some examples of data centers that are using new (and old) technology for lower impact cooling. Read more
~JessicaFollow Me on Twitter
Setting up voice/SMS notifications with Skype
One of the great things about a web-based environmental monitoring system is the ability to set-up notifications in a wide variety of ways to make sure that emergency situations do not go un-noticed. This saves on the response time that can easily be the difference between averting a disaster and having to face substantial losses of data or property. The SecurityProbe’s user friendly web-interface provides a number of options for setting up notifications for every sensor available in the Ravica line. One of the newest features is the ability to set up voice and SMS text notifications using Skype.
~Jessica
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Security solutions for car dealership lots
Continuing on my recent security kick—it is an unfortunate side effect of being both a news junkie and obsessed with TV detective shows—today, I dive headlong into the problem of securing dealership lots. This problem came to my attention as I was researching motion detectors for last week’s post on data center security.
Most car dealerships have the unique problem of needing to store very expensive inventory in outdoor lots, therefore theft and vandalism are major security concerns. Some larger dealerships can contract outside security firms to remotely monitor their lots, but what about small, local dealerships? With new car dealerships all over the country being hit hard by the financial problems of the major car makers, an affordable security option that can be monitored successfully by existing dealership staff is in order. Read more
~JessicaFollow Me on Twitter
Temperature and humidity monitoring in storage facilities
Filed under: General, humidity monitoring, temperature monitoring
In college, I was enrolled in a program that rotated academic quarters with work quarters. I took advantage of my work quarters to do a little traveling around the country and as a result I ended up moving all my stuff in and out of storage units quite a bit. Of course as a college student, I didn’t really have many valuable items that needed to be protected from temperature fluctuations. However, a lot of people do use storage facilities during transitional periods to store valuable items like furniture, electronics, and musical instruments that are highly sensitive to temperature and humidity fluctuations. Even papers and books can be damaged in a high humidity environment. This problem came to my attention today when a customer called seeking a solution for monitoring the temperature and humidity in some of the units at the mini-storage he owned. Read more
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Happy Holidays from Ravica!
Happy Holidays everyone! As I was trying to come up with some way to tie-in Christmas Eve with environmental monitoring, I discovered that it was a completely futile activity. I mean, it’s Christmas Eve for goodness sakes. I’m sure you all ha
ve more important things to think about, like picking out those last minute gifts, partaking of a little eggnog, and gathering with co-workers, friends, and family.
So, instead of touting the virtues of our SensorProbes, I would just like to thank all of our wonderful customers for your business over the past year. We look forward to providing you with quality products and service in the upcoming year! And remember, the entire Ravica line of products come with unlimited lifetime support. That is our holiday (and everyday) gift to you!
So Happy Holidays from all of us here at Ravica! We wish you a very joyous and prosperous New Year!
~JessicaFollow Me on Twitter
Environmental Monitoring During the Winter Months
Filed under: General, environmental monitoring, water leak monitoring
Today, we had our first major snow storm of the season. I’m a transplant to the northeast and winter in
Maine is still a jarring experience for me. My hometown of Vancouver, WA basically shuts down at the first sight of snow and doesn’t reopen until all the white stuff has melted away, which in a normal year is sometime before 4 pm on the same day. Around here, you just prepare, plow through and get on with business.
Winter requires some special preparation for the inside of your facility as well. With snow and ice comes the threat of water pipes bursting and power outages. Make sure that your facility is protected by having a back-up generator in place. You should also be sure that the main water pipes and any pipes that are running along uninsulated walls have been winterized. Read more
~JessicaFollow Me on Twitter
Mount Wilson Observatory In Danger From L.A. Fire
I just read this post on Slashdot:
“Mount Wilson is in danger from the Station fire burning near L.A. Their servers have gone offline, but there’s a temporary mirror cam. It doesn’t look good. Picture twenty-four on the L.A. Times photo gallery shows the observatory from the air. If anyone has any inside news on the condition of the facility, I’m sure there are lots of people on Slashdot that would love to hear it.”
It got me wondering about what type of SensorProbes they have. Most companies will never see this size of fire, but even a tiny fire can put a server room out of commission. That is why it is so important to use sensor probe technology to monitor our environment and alert us when something is wrong.
Anyway, I don’t want to use this as a sales pitch. So, let’s use the fire in California to remind us to check our home and office fire detection systems.
My prayers go out to all of the fire fighters, the people who have lost their homes and the people who’s homes are in danger.
- JimmyD
All my peeps have a smartphone!
Today is a hot day here in Maine. When it gets hot, in the 90’s, things slow down quickly. You have to remember that our bodies, our minds and our buildings are programed with the goal of staying warm. Staying cool just 
isn’t a necessity, since we have four warm days out of the year.
Like I said, today is hot. So to help deal with the heat, I decided to write about a light subject, something easy to swallow. Today’s blog is about my peeps and their SmartPhones.
Jon has an iPhone. I nag Jon everyday for being an Apple lemming. My issue with Apple goes back a long time and is purely personal. I was a eight years old and I really wanted a Macintosh. My parents couldn’t afford a Mac, it was only for the better off people. This divide made me bitter.
As far as a phone goes, it is one of the best. The double touch screen is slick, over all he doesn’t seem to have any complaints. The software selection is good but regulated. If Apple doesn’t want you to build a program for their phone, then you can’t sell it. Again, I’m kinda bitter about this.
I have the AT&T Tilt. This is a Windows Mobile phone that has its good and bad points. The best thing about my phone is that it is NOT an iPhone.
Since the Windows Mobile environment stretches across multiple platforms and has been around for quite a while, the software selection is abundant. In general it is an open environment and has a vibrant community.
The screen isn’t as responsive as I would like and sometimes you can really mess up your phone if you install the wrong piece of untested software. Can you say “Bricked!”?
Dale just got a Google phone. Dale was one of those people who always said, “I don’t need a phone like yours. I only make calls.” It has been a few days, and he has clearly changed his song. He is now a disciple of the goodness that is SmartPhone technology. Dale is installing apps, using GPS, texting and making calls. He is a happy camper.
So why am I telling you about my peeps and their different phones? Simply put, we have three different camps of people, with three different ways of thinking.
You have your iPhone people, who want their provider to make sure every app works on your phone, protects you from any bad application and distributes their apps via one common provider. You get a good, safe and friendly phone.
You have the Windows Mobile camp, who believe that any app, no matter how bad or untested it is, should be available. They want choice, multiple phones, multiple options and freedom. The Windows Mobile world has its ups and downs. If you are not careful, you can get more then you bargained for.
The GPhone has a large community. Their software is built on an open source environment. They are safe, regulated by the users, tested by the users and over all crunchy.
Even though all of these phones are different, they still can easily communicate with each other. Maybe our politicians should learn a lesson from the ups and downs of the SmartPhone market? Maybe they could learn to communicate with each other in one common protocol and have the luxury of error checking?
What a wonderful world we live in? I wonder what technology my daughter will use when she is my age?
- JimmyD
Should we Recycle Server Room Heat?
Over the weekend, I was watching System, which is one of my favorite shows on Revision3 .com. One of the questions was on how to use the excess heat generated by computers to heat a room. I am a big supporter of the “Reduce, Reuse and Recycle” philosophy, and thought that was a great idea.
After some hard and heavy Google’n, I was excited to find out other ways people have used this wasted server room energy. The story of a Mid-Western college saving their greenhouse caught my eye.
“The University of Notre Dame’s high-performance computing (HPC) department has taken things a step further. It now reuses the heat generated by its servers to warm up a historic greenhouse that the city of South Bend, Ind., has threatened to shut down.”
By using the heat from the server they are saving the university $100,000 on cooling costs and the owner of the botanical garden, the City of South Bend, Indiana, another $70,000 on heating costs. It’s win-win for everyone.
Now I am trying to figure out ways to implement this type of thinking here at work and at home. I think that my first step would be to add another temperature probe to the back of the server rack. This should give me the data that I need.
Maybe I can use the excess heat to warm up my cube. I’ll update you with what I find out.
Office Humidity Monitoring
Filed under: General, Intelligent Sensors, SensorProbes, environmental monitoring
Until a few years ago I didn’t worry much about the humidity level in the office. One day I was commenting to one of my coworkers about how my body is prone to more static electricity shocks in the winter. He brought up the topic of humidity.
I decided to look into what the proper humidity level should be in our office. I found out that when relative humidity is kept at about 50%, employees have fewer respiratory problems, as well. Humidity at too high a level makes the office feel “stuffy,” not to mention the problems it can cause with bacterial or fungal growth.
Humidity lower than 50% can cause discomfort by drying out the mucous membranes, contributing to skin rashes. Dry conditions cause electrostatic charge on both office equipment and their users. Ouch! Wouldn’t want expensive electronic equipment to start having problems.
Here is the humidity level in the office of one of our customers:
Does it look healthy to you? He decided to put the humidity probe on the internet so that the land lord could see it from the internet. If it isn’t fixed, he could setup the probe to email him every time a threshold is breached. HA!
