I have a new blog. I won't be abandoning tales of interest - not that it's bustling with activity - but I'll be writing all my work/tech related stuff on my other blog. If you're interested in that sort of thing, please go to:
http://perpetualdevelopment.wordpress.com/
And if you're not interested... well, you're welcome!
The Book of Revelation
Before you read any further be warned that I'm raising a Level 1 Geek Warning: if you are not in the software development industry, you'd probably enjoy your time better here.
Today, unlike most days recently, was a wonderful day at work. I actually didn't want to leave. I'm considering going to work early tomorrow. What happened? Well, let's go back in time a few months...
I think it all started with Ryan. Now, every day starts with Ryan talking. Usually before I get a chance to sit down and read my e-mail he's already bombarding me with questions about some obscure problem (perhaps only obscure because I'm only half-listening at this point). But those days he started talking about books - or more specifically, the interesting things he was learning about from those books - and I started to pay attention. He told me about this crazy mystical practice called 'test-driven development', where not only do the developers test all their code, but they write the tests before they write any code!?!?! I don't think I actually laughed at him, but I let him know that it all sounded well and good as an academic exercise, but it couldn't really be done in practice by sane individuals.
And so we moved on. Ryan kept reading and kept telling me to read these books, and I kept deflecting and diverting. Then something happened, and I'm not quite sure what it was (hey, I never claimed to be a good storyteller!) but I finally relented to the pressure. The book was 'The Pragmatic Programmer' by Andy Hunt and Dave Thomas (not of Wendy's fame). I don't want to say that this book changed my life, because I hate it when people say things like that. So, I'll just say that this book had a profound impact on how I view myself as a professional software developer. That sounds a lot less sappy.
This isn't a technical book. It's a book about good practices and good attitudes. It's about taking pride in one's career. The book is littered with tips, but here are the first five (which I also have posted on my office door) that I feel are applicable to anyone in any profession:
In a sense, this book revealed a whole new world to me. I had been blind as to how software development could be done. I didn't realize how much more I could be (and arguably should be) doing. And thus I started to read.
I have since read (and recommend)
The book I am currently reading is 'The Art of Unit Testing'. I'm not terribly fond of the format of this book (a lot of repetition), but it's a good beginner reference. I knew before reading this of the importance of formal unit testing (even though I had done little of it myself), but it has enlightened me to some techniques, common problems, and frameworks that could save a lot of time and effort in generating new tests.
So that brings me to today. I had been working on a connectivity bug over the last couple of days and during my analysis had uncovered a few 'loose ends' in the connectivity framework that Ryan and I had developed. Empowered by the 'fix broken windows' philosophy we decided to fix the root of the problems as opposed to patching the symptoms. The root of the problem was unfortunately embedded in the original design, but as Martin Fowler says: refactoring means never having to say you're sorry.
It was this morning that we first embarked on our first voyage of pair-programming test-driven-development. We had done plenty of pair-programming before (very successfully I might add), but never true test-driven-development (TDD). We knew that one of the main classes in our framework had too much varied responsibility, and we wanted to break that up. Instead of liberally ripping apart the code we wrote test cases to help guide how we wanted to refactor. Instead of building from the inside out (i.e. implementation->API), we were building from the outside in (usage->implementation).
This shift in thinking was phenomenal. Traditionally in developing something, I would figure out generally what a component needs to do, and then figure out the best way for it to do that (i.e. figure out the best implementation). The API would then be driven by the implementation. In the act of generating the test cases however, we were thinking about what we wanted to be able to do with the class, which in turn defined how we wanted to use the class. Thus, we first defined the API, and the implementation flowed naturally from there.
Now, perhaps this is how everyone else has been developing software and I've just been in the dark. But I've been around long enough to know that this isn't necessarily common practice, even if it is common sense to define the API and interactions first. The great thing about doing TDD is that it creates a smart and usable design, and you get a mechanism to automatically verify the functionality of your component. Two birds, one stone.
If you haven't tried or heard of TDD, don't laugh and discount it like I did; I encourage you to research it to see if it's right for you. And, as Ryan has already mentioned to most of our colleagues, if you value your career as a software developer, you owe it to yourself to read 'The Pragmatic Programmer'. Let me know if you want to borrow it.
Today, unlike most days recently, was a wonderful day at work. I actually didn't want to leave. I'm considering going to work early tomorrow. What happened? Well, let's go back in time a few months...
I think it all started with Ryan. Now, every day starts with Ryan talking. Usually before I get a chance to sit down and read my e-mail he's already bombarding me with questions about some obscure problem (perhaps only obscure because I'm only half-listening at this point). But those days he started talking about books - or more specifically, the interesting things he was learning about from those books - and I started to pay attention. He told me about this crazy mystical practice called 'test-driven development', where not only do the developers test all their code, but they write the tests before they write any code!?!?! I don't think I actually laughed at him, but I let him know that it all sounded well and good as an academic exercise, but it couldn't really be done in practice by sane individuals.
And so we moved on. Ryan kept reading and kept telling me to read these books, and I kept deflecting and diverting. Then something happened, and I'm not quite sure what it was (hey, I never claimed to be a good storyteller!) but I finally relented to the pressure. The book was 'The Pragmatic Programmer' by Andy Hunt and Dave Thomas (not of Wendy's fame). I don't want to say that this book changed my life, because I hate it when people say things like that. So, I'll just say that this book had a profound impact on how I view myself as a professional software developer. That sounds a lot less sappy.This isn't a technical book. It's a book about good practices and good attitudes. It's about taking pride in one's career. The book is littered with tips, but here are the first five (which I also have posted on my office door) that I feel are applicable to anyone in any profession:
Care About Your Craft
Why spend your life developing software unless you care about doing it well?
Provide Options, Don’t Make Lame Excuses
Instead of excuses, provide options. Don’t say it can’t be done; explain what can be done.
Be a Catalyst for Change
You can’t force change on people. Instead, show them how the future might be and help them participate in creating it.
Make Quality a Requirements Issue
Involve your users in determining the project’s real quality requirements.
Critically Analyze What You Read and Hear
Don’t be swayed by vendors, media hype, or dogma. Analyze information in terms of you and your project.
In a sense, this book revealed a whole new world to me. I had been blind as to how software development could be done. I didn't realize how much more I could be (and arguably should be) doing. And thus I started to read.
I have since read (and recommend)
- Implementing Lean Software Development: From Concept to Cash
- Practices of an Agile Developer
- Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code (minus the large reference section)
The book I am currently reading is 'The Art of Unit Testing'. I'm not terribly fond of the format of this book (a lot of repetition), but it's a good beginner reference. I knew before reading this of the importance of formal unit testing (even though I had done little of it myself), but it has enlightened me to some techniques, common problems, and frameworks that could save a lot of time and effort in generating new tests.
So that brings me to today. I had been working on a connectivity bug over the last couple of days and during my analysis had uncovered a few 'loose ends' in the connectivity framework that Ryan and I had developed. Empowered by the 'fix broken windows' philosophy we decided to fix the root of the problems as opposed to patching the symptoms. The root of the problem was unfortunately embedded in the original design, but as Martin Fowler says: refactoring means never having to say you're sorry.
It was this morning that we first embarked on our first voyage of pair-programming test-driven-development. We had done plenty of pair-programming before (very successfully I might add), but never true test-driven-development (TDD). We knew that one of the main classes in our framework had too much varied responsibility, and we wanted to break that up. Instead of liberally ripping apart the code we wrote test cases to help guide how we wanted to refactor. Instead of building from the inside out (i.e. implementation->API), we were building from the outside in (usage->implementation).
This shift in thinking was phenomenal. Traditionally in developing something, I would figure out generally what a component needs to do, and then figure out the best way for it to do that (i.e. figure out the best implementation). The API would then be driven by the implementation. In the act of generating the test cases however, we were thinking about what we wanted to be able to do with the class, which in turn defined how we wanted to use the class. Thus, we first defined the API, and the implementation flowed naturally from there.
Now, perhaps this is how everyone else has been developing software and I've just been in the dark. But I've been around long enough to know that this isn't necessarily common practice, even if it is common sense to define the API and interactions first. The great thing about doing TDD is that it creates a smart and usable design, and you get a mechanism to automatically verify the functionality of your component. Two birds, one stone.
If you haven't tried or heard of TDD, don't laugh and discount it like I did; I encourage you to research it to see if it's right for you. And, as Ryan has already mentioned to most of our colleagues, if you value your career as a software developer, you owe it to yourself to read 'The Pragmatic Programmer'. Let me know if you want to borrow it.
How George got his mowing groove back
As most of you probably don't recall, several Earth Day's ago -- that is to say, three years ago, on Earth Day -- we bought a battery-powered lawn mower. It was a gesture to Mother Earth, but also an opportunity to avoid gas-permeated hands. I remember those days fondly.
But, frankly, the old lady doesn't quite cut it anymore (pun intended). I can mow the front and part of the back in one evening, and the rest has to wait until the next night (which is typically not actually the subsequent evening). I happen to have busy evenings so the grass gets longer faster than I'd like it too, particularly when the weather has been as rainy as it's been. So, we come to the second problem of the mower, which is that it doesn't really like cutting long grass.
I mean, it cuts long grass, but it doesn't cut George-long grass. (Some of you may be familiar with the George-hour... the concept is very similar.) And because of this critical deficiency, I made the painful but necessary decision to seek a replacement.
Meet, the Bull. El Toro, the Magnificent.
This beautiful piece of self-propelled machinery galloped across my jungle of a lawn, dragging me behind while indiscriminately gobbling up all the herbage in its path. This was definitely a sight to see. Instead of taking 2+ hours over the course of multiple days, it took me a total of 45 minutes to cut my entire lawn!
I must admit, the decision to replace my Earth-friendly yet cojones-deficient mower with a gas-guzzling grass-eating beast was not an easy one. It took me two years to actually admit I had a problem. I had no choice but to eventually succumb to reality and accept the fact that my needs can only be met at present by the power of combustion. With that acceptance has come a sense of excitement that only comes when a man gets a shiny new toy. For the first time in a long time, I'm looking forward to mowing my lawn!
But I still hold out hope that one day I can return to friendly energy again, preferably in the form of the Bat Mower!
But, frankly, the old lady doesn't quite cut it anymore (pun intended). I can mow the front and part of the back in one evening, and the rest has to wait until the next night (which is typically not actually the subsequent evening). I happen to have busy evenings so the grass gets longer faster than I'd like it too, particularly when the weather has been as rainy as it's been. So, we come to the second problem of the mower, which is that it doesn't really like cutting long grass.
I mean, it cuts long grass, but it doesn't cut George-long grass. (Some of you may be familiar with the George-hour... the concept is very similar.) And because of this critical deficiency, I made the painful but necessary decision to seek a replacement.
Meet, the Bull. El Toro, the Magnificent.
This beautiful piece of self-propelled machinery galloped across my jungle of a lawn, dragging me behind while indiscriminately gobbling up all the herbage in its path. This was definitely a sight to see. Instead of taking 2+ hours over the course of multiple days, it took me a total of 45 minutes to cut my entire lawn!
I must admit, the decision to replace my Earth-friendly yet cojones-deficient mower with a gas-guzzling grass-eating beast was not an easy one. It took me two years to actually admit I had a problem. I had no choice but to eventually succumb to reality and accept the fact that my needs can only be met at present by the power of combustion. With that acceptance has come a sense of excitement that only comes when a man gets a shiny new toy. For the first time in a long time, I'm looking forward to mowing my lawn!
But I still hold out hope that one day I can return to friendly energy again, preferably in the form of the Bat Mower!
Jack: The Lovable Allergen
I've had nasal congestion for as long as I can remember. It's just one of those facts that you assume is an unalterable truth, like the fact that people will always add an 'a' or an 'r' to your last name when trying to pronounce it. I used to think I had a cold, 12 months of the year. I find it odd that people don't have boxes of tissue in every room of their houses. But mostly I didn't think about it, because there was no point.
I didn't think about it much until last year. I had started getting a wheeze whenever doing strenuous activities like shoveling snow. I attributed it to the cold weather, but the problem didn't dissipate by spring so I went to my doctor about it. It was at this time I decided to ask about the congestion problem too, as I figured I shouldn't waste a good trip to the doctor. After my appointment I had an inhaler for exercise, an appointment with a nose/ear/throat specialist, and a spot on a waiting list to get on an even more exclusive waiting list to see an allergist.
The inhaler works miracles. I take it before playing sports and I can breathe normally. If I didn't have it, I suspect I would have had to give up such activities, so I'm thankful to modern science.
The specialist had me in for septoplastic surgery within 6 weeks to correct a deviated septum that could be causing my congestion. I was anesthetized for the surgery, which I was told was a success. The post-op was very uncomfortable (apparently I'm a bleeder), and the recovery was just plain awful. My nasal passages were plugged to stop the bleeding, so I had to breathe through my mouth for 2 weeks. Breathe through your mouth for 1 minute and see how dry your mouth gets; now imagine how dry it gets after doing that all night. Rigging a humidifier with some duct work to redirect the moisture at my face didn't work, and neither did sleeping in the bathtub after getting the bathroom extremely humid. The unfortunate result was that I had so many mouth sores I couldn't eat anything that required chewing. As I mentioned, it was a miserable recovery.
The worst part of the experience was the end result: I was no less congested than previously, and possibly even worse off. It was very disheartening.
Okay, so that's the history.
Today, over 1 year later, I finally saw the allergist. I told him about my results with the deviated septum surgery. He told me I should have come seen him first. I restrained myself from attacking him. Actually, let me step back a moment.
For those who have never had an allergy test, here's what they do:
1) Clean the inside of your arms with some sort of alcoholic solution
2) Write a few numbers on your freshly-cleaned arms
3) Take what appears to be a souped-up bingo dabber, dipped in another liquid, and dab your arms beside each of the numbers
4) Find something pointy and jab your arm in each of the little drops of liquid
They then leave you alone for 10 minutes with instructions not to scratch. Of course, the only distraction in the room is a couple of out-dated magazines, and some large medical posters on the wall. If you're going in for one of these tests, make sure to bring a book or a video game.
The allergist finally came to inspect the damage, and immediately pointed at the angry red splotch on my left arm. That, he informed me, was cats. He pointed to a relatively insignificant splotch on my right arm: maybe I was allergic to mold too... but cats were definitely my problem.
Now, the best defense against an allergen is to eliminate it from your environment. He gave me a pamphlet explaining this. I can see how that tactic works well for things like dust mites and maybe even pollen, but Jack isn't exactly easy to move -- there's a lot of inertia there. Of course, I didn't even consider that option, so we went to plan B, which is a nasal spray to help with the congestion.
We then did two respiratory tests to check for asthma. The first test - the standard one - came back negative, just as it had the previous year. But the second and less widely-accepted (nitric oxide) test came back resoundingly positive. And I'm relieved because finally I have an explanation for my wheezing/breathing problems. The asthma too, he suspects is aggravated by (if not caused by) Jack. But I've got a prescription for another inhaler that should eliminate my wheezing.
The allergist seemed genuinely positive that my symptoms would disappear within a few months, and that has me excited. In retrospect, I've had cats for most of my life, so it's empowering to know how much I've been affected by them. Even if the inhaler/nasal spray combo doesn't work, there is one more chance in the form of allergy shots; however, that is a big commitment that I'm hoping to avoid.
I don't plan on eliminating cats from my life, so I'm optimistic that the solution is at hand. But, tonight I'll probably start insisting that Jack sleep at the foot of the bed, instead of beside my chest. Wish me luck.
I didn't think about it much until last year. I had started getting a wheeze whenever doing strenuous activities like shoveling snow. I attributed it to the cold weather, but the problem didn't dissipate by spring so I went to my doctor about it. It was at this time I decided to ask about the congestion problem too, as I figured I shouldn't waste a good trip to the doctor. After my appointment I had an inhaler for exercise, an appointment with a nose/ear/throat specialist, and a spot on a waiting list to get on an even more exclusive waiting list to see an allergist.
The inhaler works miracles. I take it before playing sports and I can breathe normally. If I didn't have it, I suspect I would have had to give up such activities, so I'm thankful to modern science.
The specialist had me in for septoplastic surgery within 6 weeks to correct a deviated septum that could be causing my congestion. I was anesthetized for the surgery, which I was told was a success. The post-op was very uncomfortable (apparently I'm a bleeder), and the recovery was just plain awful. My nasal passages were plugged to stop the bleeding, so I had to breathe through my mouth for 2 weeks. Breathe through your mouth for 1 minute and see how dry your mouth gets; now imagine how dry it gets after doing that all night. Rigging a humidifier with some duct work to redirect the moisture at my face didn't work, and neither did sleeping in the bathtub after getting the bathroom extremely humid. The unfortunate result was that I had so many mouth sores I couldn't eat anything that required chewing. As I mentioned, it was a miserable recovery.
The worst part of the experience was the end result: I was no less congested than previously, and possibly even worse off. It was very disheartening.
Okay, so that's the history.
Today, over 1 year later, I finally saw the allergist. I told him about my results with the deviated septum surgery. He told me I should have come seen him first. I restrained myself from attacking him. Actually, let me step back a moment.
For those who have never had an allergy test, here's what they do:
1) Clean the inside of your arms with some sort of alcoholic solution
2) Write a few numbers on your freshly-cleaned arms
3) Take what appears to be a souped-up bingo dabber, dipped in another liquid, and dab your arms beside each of the numbers
4) Find something pointy and jab your arm in each of the little drops of liquid
They then leave you alone for 10 minutes with instructions not to scratch. Of course, the only distraction in the room is a couple of out-dated magazines, and some large medical posters on the wall. If you're going in for one of these tests, make sure to bring a book or a video game.
The allergist finally came to inspect the damage, and immediately pointed at the angry red splotch on my left arm. That, he informed me, was cats. He pointed to a relatively insignificant splotch on my right arm: maybe I was allergic to mold too... but cats were definitely my problem.Now, the best defense against an allergen is to eliminate it from your environment. He gave me a pamphlet explaining this. I can see how that tactic works well for things like dust mites and maybe even pollen, but Jack isn't exactly easy to move -- there's a lot of inertia there. Of course, I didn't even consider that option, so we went to plan B, which is a nasal spray to help with the congestion.
We then did two respiratory tests to check for asthma. The first test - the standard one - came back negative, just as it had the previous year. But the second and less widely-accepted (nitric oxide) test came back resoundingly positive. And I'm relieved because finally I have an explanation for my wheezing/breathing problems. The asthma too, he suspects is aggravated by (if not caused by) Jack. But I've got a prescription for another inhaler that should eliminate my wheezing.
The allergist seemed genuinely positive that my symptoms would disappear within a few months, and that has me excited. In retrospect, I've had cats for most of my life, so it's empowering to know how much I've been affected by them. Even if the inhaler/nasal spray combo doesn't work, there is one more chance in the form of allergy shots; however, that is a big commitment that I'm hoping to avoid.
I don't plan on eliminating cats from my life, so I'm optimistic that the solution is at hand. But, tonight I'll probably start insisting that Jack sleep at the foot of the bed, instead of beside my chest. Wish me luck.
The Deep South - Pt. 1
Carolyn and I have been back from our road trip to Florida for 1.5 weeks now, so I'm overdue to post something.
We managed to leave on Wednesday night and made it all the way to the disappointingly ordinary city of Erie, Pennsylvania. The following day we stopped in the Steel City - Pittsburgh.
A view of one of the rivers in Pittsburgh (not sure if it's the Allegheny or the Monongahela).
Statues of what I am calling engineers. They look busy.
The destination for Day 2 was New River Gorge, in West Virginia. Carolyn had found out that we could camp there for free. As seems to happen on camping nights, we got there fairly late and had difficulty finding a campsite. We drove through the first of several shanty towns we would encounter on the trip; I would consider them Class D ghost towns, but sorry, we didn't stop to take pictures. I'm sure I could hear a banjo playing in the distance. After driving for hours around unmarked, dirt roads in the middle of seemingly-nowhere, we finally found a spot by the river that had a picnic table and a grill, so we set up for the night. I took some night shots but they were pretty crappy. Here is a sample (not flickr-worthy) that shows we were in a valley.
The next morning, we figured out where we had been camping. Did I mention that we had some wine with dinner the previous night? From cartons!
Anyway, we got up early (around 6ish) to see the bridge in some good morning light. I'm not terribly pleased with my digital photos, but I am hopeful about my film ones that I have yet to process.
Supposedly you can stack two Statues of Liberty plus one Washington Monument beneath that bridge... or perhaps it is one of the former and two of the latter? Try it and let me know!
We managed to leave on Wednesday night and made it all the way to the disappointingly ordinary city of Erie, Pennsylvania. The following day we stopped in the Steel City - Pittsburgh.
A view of one of the rivers in Pittsburgh (not sure if it's the Allegheny or the Monongahela).
Statues of what I am calling engineers. They look busy.
The destination for Day 2 was New River Gorge, in West Virginia. Carolyn had found out that we could camp there for free. As seems to happen on camping nights, we got there fairly late and had difficulty finding a campsite. We drove through the first of several shanty towns we would encounter on the trip; I would consider them Class D ghost towns, but sorry, we didn't stop to take pictures. I'm sure I could hear a banjo playing in the distance. After driving for hours around unmarked, dirt roads in the middle of seemingly-nowhere, we finally found a spot by the river that had a picnic table and a grill, so we set up for the night. I took some night shots but they were pretty crappy. Here is a sample (not flickr-worthy) that shows we were in a valley.
The next morning, we figured out where we had been camping. Did I mention that we had some wine with dinner the previous night? From cartons!
Anyway, we got up early (around 6ish) to see the bridge in some good morning light. I'm not terribly pleased with my digital photos, but I am hopeful about my film ones that I have yet to process.
Supposedly you can stack two Statues of Liberty plus one Washington Monument beneath that bridge... or perhaps it is one of the former and two of the latter? Try it and let me know!
Why my wife is the best...
Coming home from a bad day at work (yes, on a Saturday) I was greeted by the smell of:
- butternut squash soup (made from our home-grown squash)
- edamame salad (very refreshing!)
- chipotle-glazed baked potatoes (spicy!)
- bacon-wrapped chicken breasts stuffed with brie (drool)
And to top it off, we enjoyed dinner with a bottle of St. Urban Riesling from Vineland Estates. What a perfect evening!
- butternut squash soup (made from our home-grown squash)
- edamame salad (very refreshing!)
- chipotle-glazed baked potatoes (spicy!)
- bacon-wrapped chicken breasts stuffed with brie (drool)
And to top it off, we enjoyed dinner with a bottle of St. Urban Riesling from Vineland Estates. What a perfect evening!
Weekend with the Wightmans
Every so often (more often than not, it seems), Carolyn has plans for the weekend. Usually these plans involve me, but occasionally they do not. Last weekend was one such occasion, as she went scrapbooking for a weekend with her sister and my half-sister. I generally look forward to these times, as I tend to be very productive around the house; however, I also tend to be poor at Self-Nourishment Management (cereal anyone?). Thankfully the Wightmans like me well enough to keep me alive over such weekends, and this weekend was the same: scalloped potatoes on Friday, steak on Saturday, and Marble Slab ice cream on Sunday. I couldn't ask for better friends. :)Not wanting to waste the glorious weather, me and the Wightman clan went to the dog park on Sunday. The shining sun plastered a smile on everyone's face. Thanks to Ryan, Joy, Navilyn and Niko for the great afternoon. Click here to view some pictures I posted on flickr.
Flashback: Monument Valley
Way back in May of 2005 I went to Chandler, AZ on a business trip. My good friend Ryan had already been working there for several months, but hadn't ventured out further than the local burger joint. Armed with our cameras, tripods, and a fierce determination we took a road trip to fabulous Utah - specifically the mythic Monument Valley.
Click below to view some of the photos from that trip, reprocessed (now that I sorta know what I'm doing).
Click below to view some of the photos from that trip, reprocessed (now that I sorta know what I'm doing).
Flashback: Ottawa
I suppose it's that time of year again where I feel motivated to hone my photographic skills. Take a look at the photos I've processed from our trip to Ottawa in 2005. We went to the Tulip Festival and then fed the rabbits at the Big Apple on the way home. Many of these photos had already been posted to flickr already; in fact, these were the first photos I ever posted to flickr. I have touched them up and replaced the existing photos. You can tell which ones have been re-processed by my watermark in the lower corner of the photo. Unfortunately most of these early photos are only in Jpeg format so they are difficult to touch up.
Ottawa Tulip Festival
Feeding the rabbits at the Big Apple in Colborne, Ontario
Ottawa Tulip Festival
Feeding the rabbits at the Big Apple in Colborne, Ontario
Quote of the day
Actually, this is a quote from 3 days ago but I hadn't gotten around to posting it.
This remark was a response to the sentiment that kids these days have poor written communication skills. See the whole article here: http://news.therecord.com/article/665810
I'd have to agree that it seems that kids are getting dumber every year. I suppose this means I've become an old man.
You think commas are sort of like parmesan cheese that you sprinkle on your words
- Paul Budra, English professor at Simon Fraser University
This remark was a response to the sentiment that kids these days have poor written communication skills. See the whole article here: http://news.therecord.com/article/665810
I'd have to agree that it seems that kids are getting dumber every year. I suppose this means I've become an old man.
Another brand new year
This year my resolution is to try and keep my resolution from last year.
NOTE: this post is probably very boring for non-photographers
That being said, I've given up on trying to organize my photos in exactly the structure I originally wanted to. I had originally written a program to gather up my giant pile of photos, weed out the duplicates, and move around the remaining photos into a sensible folder structure (like year\month\day). (It also did other things, like add metadata for copyright, etc.) The original program was meant for a one-time use to clean out the attic, so to speak.
The program I use to view and fix up my photos, Lightroom, also imports into somewhat sensible folder structures, but unfortunately not the structure I liked. So I spent most of last year avoiding importing my photos because of this incongruence. When I was forced to import photos, I would (mis)use my program to do what I wanted, then re-import into Lightroom. This was quite a hassle, and on top of it, I couldn't use this technique for Carolyn because she has a Mac and my program was written for Windows. So I generally didn't touch my photos much.
I've decided to stop being so particular (Carolyn has a different word for it), and just let Lightroom import the way it wants. I've converted all my existing photos into the new structure, and I will do the same for Carolyn.
Furthermore, I finally gave up on building my own back-up server and just bought a NAS, so I can schedule daily backups of our photos (instead of manually backing up to external hard drives). It's all about stream-lining the process so that you don't even know it's there. Hopefully these changes will make the developing part of photography more enjoyable again.
PS For those of you who are interested in my folder structure hangup, this what I wanted:
< year >/< month# >-< month >/< day# >
where month is the name of the month, month# and day# are the ordinal values (like 01 for January).
For example, a given folder would look like:
2007/03-March/17
The months are sorted in the correct order, but you can still see the name for quick access. (Maybe it's just me, but my brain is slightly faster at recognizing 'March' as opposed to '03').
Unfortunately, Lightroom only provides something like the following:
< year >/< month# >/< day# >
or
< year >/< month >/< day# >
The former of which doesn't show the name, and the latter of which isn't nicely sorted. And for some reason, Lightroom does not allow customization of the folder structure, even though they provide customization of file names. I don't think that this would be very difficult to provide, but I expect they just don't have time.
This is what I eventually chose to use in Lightroom:
< year >/< year >-< month# >/< year >-< month# >-< day# >
It's not pretty, but it's organized.
NOTE: this post is probably very boring for non-photographers
That being said, I've given up on trying to organize my photos in exactly the structure I originally wanted to. I had originally written a program to gather up my giant pile of photos, weed out the duplicates, and move around the remaining photos into a sensible folder structure (like year\month\day). (It also did other things, like add metadata for copyright, etc.) The original program was meant for a one-time use to clean out the attic, so to speak.
The program I use to view and fix up my photos, Lightroom, also imports into somewhat sensible folder structures, but unfortunately not the structure I liked. So I spent most of last year avoiding importing my photos because of this incongruence. When I was forced to import photos, I would (mis)use my program to do what I wanted, then re-import into Lightroom. This was quite a hassle, and on top of it, I couldn't use this technique for Carolyn because she has a Mac and my program was written for Windows. So I generally didn't touch my photos much.
I've decided to stop being so particular (Carolyn has a different word for it), and just let Lightroom import the way it wants. I've converted all my existing photos into the new structure, and I will do the same for Carolyn.
Furthermore, I finally gave up on building my own back-up server and just bought a NAS, so I can schedule daily backups of our photos (instead of manually backing up to external hard drives). It's all about stream-lining the process so that you don't even know it's there. Hopefully these changes will make the developing part of photography more enjoyable again.
PS For those of you who are interested in my folder structure hangup, this what I wanted:
< year >/< month# >-< month >/< day# >
where month is the name of the month, month# and day# are the ordinal values (like 01 for January).
For example, a given folder would look like:
2007/03-March/17
The months are sorted in the correct order, but you can still see the name for quick access. (Maybe it's just me, but my brain is slightly faster at recognizing 'March' as opposed to '03').
Unfortunately, Lightroom only provides something like the following:
< year >/< month# >/< day# >
or
< year >/< month >/< day# >
The former of which doesn't show the name, and the latter of which isn't nicely sorted. And for some reason, Lightroom does not allow customization of the folder structure, even though they provide customization of file names. I don't think that this would be very difficult to provide, but I expect they just don't have time.
This is what I eventually chose to use in Lightroom:
< year >/< year >-< month# >/< year >-< month# >-< day# >
It's not pretty, but it's organized.
An end to the Intrigue
All good things must come to an end, and so it is with my beloved 1998 Oldsmobile Intrigue. The doctors..er.. mechanics say she needed some major operations just to make it through the winter, and her prospects in the spring didn't look to promising. So Carolyn and I took her for one final drive last night (but, not too far because we didn't want to have to walk home).
Somehow the car lasted 12 years, and almost 300,000km. We visited a lot of places together, including a 15,000km trip around the USA. In the blistering heat of New Mexico is where the temperature gauge stopped working. Here you can see the Check Engine light, faithfully assuring me that my engine was still located under the hood, ready to be checked.
Here is the Intrigue after the last drive. My father used to say "she looks a lot better than she drives". Very true.
The next morning she got strapped to the back of a trunk and taken to a better place. I can imagine her now... parked up there with the big guy himself (Henry Ford), looking down in jealousy at our awesome Toyota Matrix. So long Intrigue, it was fun.
