Category Archives: Random

disagreeing is ok

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I’ve had a lot of problems recently expressing something simple. I’m gonna take another crack at it:

  • I don’t really like most anime, but there are some genres I like. I’ll gladly watch anime, live action, play, musical, or whatever to get my dose of genres like random/sketch humour and twisted sci-fi.
  • I’m not a huge convention person. I prefer getting to know people one-on-one, and I find if you do that at a convention, you tend to alienate a lot of people. That said I can function at a convention when required as a speaker or attendee, but I tend to keep to myself.
  • “Alternative lifestyle” stuff is just great. I’m finding I’m happier doing things more mainstream-y, while maintaining an affinity for the unusual, an affection for those who involve themselves in it, and my own brand of quirkyness which is somewhere inbetween cheese and schlock.
  • I don’t enjoy programming big software projects, especially OO stuff and new languages. I respect all you language geeks and coders, especially because of my own past in it, but I’ve just lost the desire to learn new languages, or to actually program anything. I’m pleased to just take off the shelf OSS/COTS and go from there. I’d rather focus on the problem and describing it, working the requirements managing the project, and so on — y’all can enjoy putting that in code any way you like.
  • I’m still happy doing plugins, little projects, customizations, scripting, and what have you. I tend to prefer lower level stuff – microcontrollers, Verilog/VHDL/FPGA work, assembly, C and the like. I understand objects, used to teach courses in them, and can help design an architecture — but I’ve officially jumped off of the programmer bandwagon.
  • Design is good. I do recognize good design. I enjoy it and revel in it. I dislike designer elitism. I still am terrible at designing elegant things myself. I work best with creative folks who can turn my extensive requirements and logic into something aesthetically gorgeous.

Why has this been hard for me? Primarily because my own choices that some things are “not for me” has ended up coming across as disdain for others. Those who know me really well know that I don’t have disdain for anyone or anything, or any action. My housemates have been great in this regard. They know that when I get bitchy about something, that it’s really just about what I’d do if I were in their situation…not my judgement that their way of doing something is wrong or inappropriate.

“Separate but equal” gets far in this world, especially when extended to include cross-pollination and mutual acceptance, not just tolerance. I hope those of you who still read these pages accept my apology for any times I’ve made you feel uncomfortable, or for any who felt I was ever elitist in any way. I’m not better than you — I’m just better at making me happy than you are at making me happy! :D

a week of accomplishments

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This week I have:

  • passed my Gearing Up course, certifying me for an M2 motorcycle license (and a substantial insurance discount!)
  • with a substantial dose of doozer’s help, finished constructing the bike shed (photos to follow)
  • completed the remaining fixup required to my 1977 Honda CB750 (photos also to follow)
  • finished off a bunch of interviews
  • got promoted to Officer in Training with my crew in Puzzle Pirates, and received my officer training
  • got out of the house more than last week
  • cooked a lovely meal
  • helped a lovely woman and her 1 year old move into waynemanor
  • spoke with my advisor at OISE/U of T and feel hopeful about advancing into the Ph.D. program there

I feel…..fantastic!

i am not an artist

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A very good, old friend of mine passed me this article today. Having spent time as a developer of software, and plenty in technical customer serivce, I agree with the sentiments expressed completely.

Where the author’s analogy to most corporate development breaks down is when the development organization actively ignores the requests of the customer to suit its own needs. Occasionally this takes the form of preventing the customer from doing what they want to do. This is sometimes a necessary evil. The effort required to alter some software behaviour is often disproportionate to the gains to be realized from the work. But to actively reject suggestions from customers for convenience, or because “you can get away with it” seems to be the ultimate betrayal of a marketplace.

Even worse is when this is done in a captive market. Witness Home Depot – arguably the single source provider of home improvement and renovation supplies in North America today – and the home building/renovation industry around them. Ever since my second blog entry in 1997, when I complained of cheapo building materials, it’s gotten worse. Two-by-fours are now one-and-a-half-by-three-and-a-half inches, with rounded corners. Delivery of wood often results in timber that is barely usable, including precut studs that are warped beyond recognition and split halfway up the side. There was a time in recent memory when you could go through the wood that was delivered to you, and send back any timber that wasn’t up to snuff – and the lumber company was on the hook to replace the bad wood. Wood is dried so quickly now that fully 1/4 of the studs we recently used to construct a shed in the backyard started to split when nailed up in a frame. And the nails! These hot dip galvanized twelve-penny (12d) nails are so soft that you can straighten them by whacking them on the side with a hammer! (This is not a reason why they are good, quite the opposite.) These were the only 12d nails available at the store, as well. You couldn’t even buy the old type if you wanted to.

So why am I ranting about Home Depot in a post about software development? Because both are indicative of the continuing trend for companies to deliver substandard solutions wittingly, because they can get away with it to improve profitability (in Wal-Mart speak: “to keep prices low for you!” I’m not an artist, to be sure (read the article, will you!) but I do believe in doing the best possible for the ultimate user of a component, be it embedded, traditional, or support technology. Service is just good common sense.

Let me give praise to one company who seems to have gotten it right. It took nearly a year during my employment at SOMA Networks to complete selection and justification of Atlassian‘s Confluence (wiki) and JIRA (issue tracker) systems for use as external document and issue management solutions. These are exceedingly well written tools, with a robust code base, a broad community of plugin/extension contributors, attentive support technicians, and a snazzy user interface. They’re not written as trendy web-2.0 applications, but rather are something you can toss on a box you maintain yourself, keep the total cost of ownership fixed, and tweak to your heart’s content. And the functionality out of the box is astoundingly good.

Don’t believe me? Go get your own free personal license of Confluence and experiment. Then use it in your next project if you like it. There’s even 50% discounts for academic use. And the license fees & maintenance are exceedingly sensible.

Disclaimer: I don’t work for them, but I’m a satisfied customer.

skypeout vs. verizon

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As mentioned at this blog, and as I discovered tonight, Skypeout is blocked from calling Verizon Wireless customers.

[Edit: Apparently this is limited to specific exchanges within their system. Only part of the 408 area code is affected.]

Bastards. I can say that now.

loblaws villere

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compare:
with

Loblaws used to own The Real Superstore chain in the states, which had a number of branches, including the (NOLA)-famous Canal Villere chain. There was another name Loblaws used, which had the logo rotated yet another 90 degrees, but I can’t recall it.

Thanks to Slimbolala, I tracked down another memory, this time of the wondrous price check girls in 2×2 1970s-style roller skates. Wonder if the Real Canadian Superstore near Don Mills & Eglington (Toronto, ON, Canada) still has the rollergirls….

Schwegmann’s holding company announced an auction of the long-time eyesore canal villere properties in June 1995. Seems like such a missed opportunity that no one set up a decent grocery store there…in fact, most of the grocery stores down there seemed decimated.

is that all there is

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Life passes me by in some interesting ways. I made a conscious decision years ago to not have a traditional family; these days, it seems that at every turn some friend I thought of as perenially single is getting married, already married, pregnant, raising children, or some combination of the above. Fighting the biological urge to reproduce for overriding social and humanitarian reasons is difficult, and there’s no one cheering me on from the sidelines, either — quite the opposite, it seems everyone is trying to get me into some steady relationship, engaged, and onto the child-rearing bandwagon. Neither my body nor my mind is strong enough for that right now.

Folks, I don’t air my dirty laundry in public, but there are a lot of good reasons I think it’d be a bad idea for me to be a parent. I also think it’d be stupid for me to carry on the defects in my genetic line, though I’m still flattered by those of you who tell me I’m too beautiful to remove from the gene pool.

joanbits for 2005.12

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  1. The new Doctor Who box set (Season 27) rules. “Are you my mummy?”
  2. Our house LAN party was fun, mostly for the company. I didn’t get to play a single game, because the bastards insisted on playing games I don’t like, like C&C Generals and BF2. Blah. At least we got a couple of games of in!
  3. The poncho is almost done. Really. (It’ll be done just in time for it to be way too cold for me to wear out of the house.)
  4. The Voyetra 8‘s mixer board is almost done being rebuilt. I’ve put on new electrolytics, all new 1% resistors (love them blue bodies), and machined sockets for all the ICs (even ones that weren’t socketed before). I’m in the middle of cleaning up the BOM/parts list, entering the schematic and the new WollyView™ system will leave you begging for more.
  5. I’m learning to work just a little bit less hard, and on a few less things at once. That’s not easy for me.
  6. The house has acquired a really beat-up arcade cabinet. The marquee says “Q*Burt” (yes, with a u) and has a Jamma board for SNK’s Prehistoric Isle in 1930 horizontal scrolling shooter game. Even if we can get the JAMMA board working again, we’re likely to convert it to a MAME box anyway. I’ll try and get some photos up soon, but don’t expect much — the cabinet has seen far better days.

back

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I have just returned home from a thoroughly exciting long weekend in the San Francisco Bay area…and as it was so jam-packed of activity, thought and inspiration, I’ve decided I must vacation the rest of the week to recuperate. Much was discussed, I made some new friends, and am now more eager, ambitious and driven than ever before.

Question to the masses that still read this thing: When you embark on a new relationship, do you find yourself performing “protocol exchange?” That is, do you have meta discussions regarding the sorts of things you’re looking for in a relationship with someone? If so, when – on your first date/email/IM/etc? On the 17th date? When you decide to get married (e.g., Catholic pre-Cana)? Is it too geeky of me to propose a standard for verbal communication of such things, one that doesn’t feel like you’re filling out a form for a dating service?

not a blogger

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So atypical.net’s front page has proudly displayed my blog as the “main attraction” for a while now…but perhaps this isn’t quite right.

I write in my blog only every week or two, and only when I have something to say – I’m not going for volume or website hits, just to show who I am and what I’m thinking about. As time passes, some things stick out in my mind – creative writing, for instance, or personal story. I generally link to those on the sidebar and pull them out into real articles, whith WordPress handles quite nicely. Focusing on the change and the scroll is less useful than having a good information architecture, and while tagging is nice, how many people have actually gone back and read everything I’ve ever posted, other than you stalkers?

Then, I just think about how much of a hassle it’ll be to rearchitect my site, again. Maybe I just need to make the navigation easier, and make it clearer what I have to offer. Stuff like my Voyetra 8 site is some of the most interesting concent I produce, yet it’s buried at the bottom of the list. You wouldn’t think it’s the most important thing I do outside of work and school, would you? (For those of you paying attention, there is V8 stuff coming. RSN. I promise.)