Pushing Buttons
I’m as guilty as anyone else on this matter, but I think it’s an interesting view into the human psyche. When I get on the elevator, I always push the button for the floor that I want to go to. It doesn’t matter if the button is already lit up, or if I saw someone push the button just a half second before I reach for it. Somehow I don’t think that I’ll be allowed to get off on my destination floor unless I’m the one that actually pushes the button. Very odd.
I thought that I was alone in this strangeness, but I’ve seen more and more people do it lately. Maybe I’m just looking for it these days to justify this strange quirk in my elevator behavior.
Does anyone else do this?
The Sound Of Battle
While I was back in Texas, I managed to catch the tail end of a fighter practice for the local shire, Black Lake. It’s part of the Society for Creative Anachronisms. I really wanted to catch the whole thing, but the loss of a phone number, the failure of a cell phone, and other commitments made me very late for the fighter practice.
I didn’t get into armor, but I really wanted to get out there and try my rusty skills against some of the best in the Kingdom of Ansteorra. Even though I didn’t get to fight, I still got to watch a few good friends practice with one another. I had forgotten how much I miss the sound of sword on shield. The ring of a a helm from a clean head shot, and the shuffle of feet across the grassy lands.
It really made me start to itch for getting back into armor, but I’m not sure that I’ll have the time for such a thing. I’m already too busy with so many other things as it is right now. Maybe… yeah… I keep telling myself “Maybe, someday” for lots of things. Perhaps I’ll actually sit down and put in the effort necessary to get the time to get out and be more active.
I really miss the sound of battle.
Fortune Cookie
Craing and I went to a local Asian food place today. We both had the daily special, which had a wide variety of flavors in it. It was good food. It was also a little expensive, but it’s a rare treat that I can pay cash for from time-to-time. Of course, at the end of the meal, we both got fortune cookies. I don’t like fortune cookies all that much, but today I decided to crack mine open and eat it. The fortune inside the cookie read:
The philosophy of one century is the common sense of the next.
I liked it enough to keep it. It just seemed to be so true. Thinking back on all of the discoveries that we’ve made over the years, they all start as an idea, a philosophy if you will. Many ideas don’t pan out, but enough of them do that we call it progress.
Our students today take for granted that there are three basic laws of physics, that electrons move from shell to shell in chemical reactions, that certain biological factors are necessary for life, and so much more. I know that I did. While learning all of these great philosophies in school, I never did stop to think too much on how they came about. My public school education required me to read, listen, absorb, and regurgitate. It was a rare teacher (Mr. Landrum, Ms. Setzer, Mr. Franks, Dr. Rucker, Mr. Vetter, Mrs. Ward, Mr. Bell, Mrs. Armstrong and maybe a few others) that really challenged me to think outside the box.
These teachers really changed my life for the better, and I think that is one of the reasons that I want to be a teacher. I want to touch lives for the better. I want to make a difference in the world outside my immediate grasp. If I can bring some of my (limited) wisdom and knowledge to the forefront, and unselfishly give it to another, then they may be able to take that knowledge to another level to make the world better.
Maybe, just maybe, one of my philosophies of this world will become the next generation’s common sense.
Time Management
For the past two semesters, I’ve been in one class (either online or in class) and one guided independent study (GIS) class. The instructor that I’ve had for the GIS classes (the same one for all four classes) just gave me all of the reading assignments, homework, and tests up front, and told me to finish them before the 8 weeks was up for the class. This meant that I had one class worth of work that had a strict schedule on getting things done because I could do work on the GIS class as I had time. I only had to make time for one class.
I’m currently in two online classes (all done with GIS for now), and that means that I have two strict schedules to stick to for reading, posting on the forums, replying to posts, getting homework done, and working on final projects. I’m struggling with getting all of this done, and still finding time to work, eat, sleep, and maybe spending a little time with Kiara.
I’m only in the third week of the two classes, and it’s taken me this long to get into my stride of getting things done on time without waiting for the last moment. I think I’ve finally found a pattern that works well for me, and I’m going to try to stick to it.
I finished all of my homework (except for replying to fellow students’ postings since there are none yet) for my Operating Systems course last night. It was a good feeling to get it all done. I still have a little reading left to do for the class, though. I hope to get that done tonight. How did I do my homework without doing the reading? Well, there are two parts to the readings: the online reading, and the book. I finished the online reading, and that gave me enough information to get started on the homework. Where my knowledge fell short on the homework, I looked it up in the book. I still need to do the reading though since I’ll be tested on it next week.
I haven’t even started the homework for my Object Oriented Analysis and Design (OOAD) class yet. If time permits, I’m going to get started on it tonight, and try to get it finished by tomorrow night.
The main problem that I’m having is that most online courses follow the same pattern:
- Reading (online and book) to be done by Thursday night.
- Forum post by Thursday night.
- Reply to two forum posts by Sunday (sometimes Saturday) night.
- Homework turned into professor by Sunday (sometimes Saturday) night.
- Work on final project (which is due at the end of the term.)
This is a double-whammy for me since I have two classes that follow this pattern. That means double the normal homework to get done at the same time. Since I have D&D Thursday night, I have to get my homework done by Wednesday night. I lose a whole 24 hours of time, so that I can make it to the D&D game. Of course, if I don’t finish the homework by the end of Wednesday, I have to bail out of the D&D game for the week. I’ve been good so far, and this hasn’t had to happen. I hope that it doesn’t, but I know where my priorities stand. I’ll do it if I have to.
Nice Day
“It’s a nice day, isn’t it?”
“It’s so nice, I don’t want to go back inside.”
“I can’t wait to get home because it’s such a nice day.”
“It’s just too nice outside to be at my desk today.”
“I have no motivation today because it’s so nice outside.”
ENOUGH ALREADY!!!
I get it! OK?!? It’s nice outside. Quit bitching, grab your golf clubs, take the afternoon off, and go fuck off for a few hours.
I’m tired of listening to this crap. I know that we’ve had a really harsh winter and all these people that think you need sunlight to survive have finally come out of their darkness-induced comas, but I’m tired of hearing it. I think I’m going to start responding with things like:
“Damn. It’s bright. I’m going inside where I can take off my sunglasses.”
“Bah. It’s skin cancer season again.”
“Crap. That bright orb in the sky is out again. I gotta go inside.”
“Good thing my desk is inside. It’s too breezy out here to concentrate.”
DoS
DoS = Denial of Service
The network that my server is on suffered from it today. One of my “network neighbors” came under attack from an IP from a Japanese university. That pretty killed the network, so my server was inaccessible. That happens from time-to-time, but it still pisses me off. I hope that the attacker wasn’t just going after a random someone. If you’re going to be malicious have some point behind it.
There’s no guarantee that this won’t happen again, so if my server vanishes, just be patient. It’ll come back soon enough.
OSCon
A couple of nights ago I got a flyer for O’Reilly’s OSCon. It’s their Open Source Convention that they hold annually. Normally, I don’t even bother looking at these because I always want to go, but I never seem to be able to afford to go.
My company has a training budget, but I’m not sure if I can get them to part with the necessary cash to allow me to go. The conference normally costs $1690.00 (for early registration,) but since I’m a full-time student, I get 65% off of the fees. That drops the price to $591.50. I wonder if I can convince them to part with the $600 for the convention.
Of course, there is hotel ($109 a night for 5 nights [$545.00]), and airfare (which I have not checked into yet) to consider. These extra costs may drive the price up to high for my company to pay for, or I may have to cover those costs myself, which may preclude me from going.
There are all sorts of activities during the week. There are tons of tutorials (half-day classes) and sessions (1-3 hour classes) during the week. I made a list of the ones that I would like to attend in hopes that it will show to the Powers That Be in my company that it will help make me a better programmer, and, thus, a better employee.
I’ve had one company in the past send me to training, and I had to sign a contract saying that I would not voluntarily leave the company for a year. I was OK with that, and I’d be willing to do that again especially since I have zero intention of leaving my currently employer for many years to come.
Some of the classes that I’m interested in are:
- PHP Extending/Embedding Tutorial
- You Got JavaScript in My PHP! And…
- Advanced VIM Scripting
- Pro PostgreSQL
- Learning AJAX
- PHP and MySQL Best Practices
- Technical Management of Software Development
- Essential PHP Security
- Making Programs Faster
- Simple Ways To Be A Better Programmer
- Practical Design for Web Developers
- Performance Whack-a-Mole
- The Future of Rich Internet Applications with PHP
- PHP Security: Fact and Fiction
- How I learned to stop worrying and love my database: MySQL to PostgreSQL.
- PHP – Bigger and Faster
- Network Monitoring with Nagios
- High-Performance JavaScript: Why Everything You’ve Been Taught is Wrong
- High Performance Web Pages
- Improving Performance by Profiling PHP Applications
- Windmill — Automated Testing of Your Ajax Web Applications
- VIM for PHP Programmers
- Error Handling in Ajax
- AJAX and Web Services
- PDO: PHP Data Objects
- Offline AJAX – Taking large browser based applications off-line
- Security 2.0
- Accessibility for Web 2.0
- Prototype & Object.prototype: JavaScript Power Tools
- Untangling the Web: Dealing with Legacy PHP Code
- Introduction to PL/PHP
- OSS Amateur Robotics
Many of these classes overlap, or are held at the same time. I’ve got a prioritized list in a spreadsheet on which ones I would like to attend. Many of you may think that I’m sick in the head, but I think this would be a totally fun way to spend a week. Learning, meeting people, seeing new technologies, learning new ideas, and hob-nobbing with my fellow OSS (open source software) geeks sounds like a total blast.
Keep your fingers crossed, and let’s hope that I get to go. I should know by tomorrow if it’s in the budget to send me to this thing.
Renaissance Geek
To say that I wear many technological hats is an understatement. I’ve always known that to succeed in a company, you have to be willing to do anything that comes along. As I’ve been with my current employer more and more, I’ve come to inherit more hats than anyone else (other than, maybe, my boss.)
Last week (and continuing into this week) I’ve performed tasks that should be performed by:
- a software engineer (which is my title)
- a software architect
- a Linux system administrator/engineer
- a network engineer
- a web developer
- a multi-media artist
- a database administrator
- Windows technical support
- Linux technical support
- a technical writer
I’m not doing this because I’m the only person to do the job. There are plenty of other people on my team. However, I am most often the best choice for the job. I do it better than anyone else on my team. It takes me less time to do the actions, and they are (often) done right on the first attempt. There are even times when I am the only person that knows how to do the job, so I do it. When I realize that I’m the only person that knows how to do the job, I try to educate other members of my team, but their eyes glaze over when I get to step 3 of 22. They can’t grasp the level of technical detail necessary to do my job. They also don’t care enough about it to learn it, even if they had the capabilities.
Am I upset that I am the “go to guy” for all of these various and sundry activities? Nope. It’s job security. I know that if my company falls on economic hard times that I will probably be one of the people labeled as “indisposable”, and I’ll keep my job. I also offer much more expertise to my company than what they are paying me for. My boss is aware of this, and appreciates it. So long as he’s kept around, I’m sure to have a job.
Now, in the past, I’ve made myself indisposable, and it’s bitten me in the ass. It’s meant that I could not get promotions to other departments, transfers to other sections, and I’ve pretty much dug myself in a hole at a job. I won’t mind if that’s the case here. I really love what I’m doing. I like the people that I work with, and, above all else, I really love working for my boss. He’s a great guy! He knows how to do my job, and he understands when things go wrong and take a little longer than they might originally. I just have to up-front and honest with him when things go wrong, and I tell him how I’m going to correct the problem. He’s also very open, friendly, and personable. One of the best bosses that I’ve ever had. If he ever leaves the company, I’m not sure what I’ll do. Maybe stalk him until he hires me at his new job?
I know that a “Renaissance Man” is supposed to be equally versed in art and science, and that computers are mostly science. If you’ve ever worked for extensive periods in the technology business, you’ll understand that there is an art to the way things are done if they are done properly.
Share The Road
Yesterday when I was getting ready to leave, Kiara was already on her way to my office to pick up Shinto and me. She called a few minutes before I was shutting down to tell me that the roads in our area had been shut down for a bicycle race. This was about 5:30. I ask her where she could get to, and she told me that she could get to the intersection by my office, but not through it to my parking lot. I told her to hang out there, and Shinto and I would be down as soon as we could to meet her there.
We shut down our system, packed our stuff, and headed out. I met Shinto outside, and told him that we needed to walk around the building to the intersection. We got there, and I saw Kiara hanging out in the parking lot across the street, but her car was moving. I waved at her, but I didn’t think that she saw me. We decided to head down the road on foot to meet up with her at the entrance to the parking lot.
As we were crossing the street, several cars came by and tried to make various turns on the main street that feeds into our office complex. Race volunteers (none of them cops from what I could tell, at least, no uniforms) ran in front of the cars to make them stop. They were horribly rude, and yelling at everyone to tell them where they could and could not go. It was a total mess.
About the time we got to the entrance of the parking lot across the street, Kiara called me, and told me that she had managed to get into our office building’s parking lot. That’s when I told her where I was at, and she came to pick us up.
I see signs all the time telling me to “Share The Road” with bicyclists, but they seem totally unwilling to share the road with drivers. In the area of our office building, there are dozens (sometimes up to a 100) riders in huge groups riding around the roads. They clump together in huge groups, and most of the time they tend to run the red lights as if the rules of the road do not apply to them.
I’m thinking that it’s time that we take the roads back. I’m going to stop sharing the road with these arrogant bastards. I’m going to start crowding them, making no room for them, and generally being as ass towards them.
If I have to share, then so do they.
