Geek

I know, ’tis the eve of Christmas Eve, but I’m going to go full on geek with this blog entry. So bear with me.

You see, I’ve been a little bit stressed about getting a project completed at work. I haven’t been losing sleep from the stress or anything like that, over the years I have learned how to deal with stress when the situation calls for it, but I had this need to accomplish something before Christmas and when I started the workday this morning I really didn’t think that I was going to be able do it.

A couple of weeks ago I was showing off a very rough draft of the latest functionality I am building into the application they use at work. The new functionality will be a task management system that will be used by several key individuals and their teams in our organization, so I’ve been feeling a little pressure from myself to make sure this new part of the application does what it needs to do. During the presentation, one of the future users asked if I could add a “drill down” capability to one of the data lists of projects currently being worked down. It’s a really good idea; the user clicks on a button and the tasks associated to the project are available for the user, easily accessible and simple to modify. I love efficient user interfaces, and that’s something that I strive to achieve, probably to a fault, so when they asked for this I answered with my standard reply: “of course I can.”

And I knew that I could build this. I fully believe that a computer can do anything we want it to do and if it doesn’t it’s because the programmer is lazy. Those that say “It can’t be done” or “the system can’t do that” are just lazy as far as I’m concerned. It might take some extra time or there might be a learning curve, but something as simple as building a drill-down “info box” in the middle of a table should be a no-brainer.

I’ve never built anything like this before. But after many hours of Googling variations on a theme, lots of experimentation and some yelling at my work MacBook Pro, right before the end of the day today the functionality was there and working brilliantly. In the grand scheme of things, I’m not going to change the world with my coding skills but at the moment I felt really good. I accomplished something that I didn’t really know how to do that long ago. And I figured it out all on my own.

I had to call Earl down to my basement office at the house to show off what I had just built. He was impressed because he could tell I was excited about it.

And this is how I know that I am a full-blooded, full-on geek: I spent 15 minutes clicking on a “+” sign just to watch the new animation of a drill-down info box showing itself in the middle of a table full of data. It even passed the cursed “Internet Explorer” test. Right before the end of my day, I pushed the update to production.

And then I did a little happy dance. Happy Christmas to me.

Now, back to your regularly scheduled holiday.

I wrote this blog entry back in 2005, which includes this very descriptive paragraph.

I think I’m becoming a little hostile towards cell phone users. A couple of weeks ago while we were at the State Fair, some moron would walk by, talking away on his cell phone and completely oblivious to the fact that he had just stomped on my foot, knocked an innocent grandma out of her wheelchair and that the cow ahead of him was not his girlfriend and was in fact shitting on his shoe. I would simply proclaim in a very loud, obnoxious, stage presence to the back of the auditorium voice, “OH MY GOD I’M AT THE STATE FAIR AND I MUST MAKE A CELL PHONE CALL RIGHT NOW!”. Then I’d raise my Motorola up like Kunta Kinte and genuflect. I would then proceed to dial random digits and order a pizza for the 10 people around me.

This is something I could have easily written about any interaction with the public today. Some things never change, apparently.

So Google has opened up the Glass waiting list a little bit, giving more of the general public the chance to sign up purchase their next big thing, Google Glass. For those unfamiliar with Google Glass, here is a video with a nice man explaining all about Glass for you.

I have talked about my interest in Google Glass before. I have met a few folks that have actually tried Glass and I’ve chatted with even more folks online about the experience and I have to say that I’m still pretty intrigued. I can’t say that I’ve seen a lot of people wearing Glass in the wild, but then again, there’s not that many people that have the pre-release Explorer edition of the device. When you couple this with the fact that folks in our neck of the woods are still using flip phones and dialing up sex lines on a 900 service (calm down, I’m kidding), it’s not really surprising that there’s not a lot of Glass around here.

If you know about Google Glass and you know what it’s capable of (see the video link at the end of the first paragraph), I’m curious as to whether my gentle readers would ever be interested in such a device. Rumor has it that it will work to a certain degree with an iPhone, but for the full Glass experience you’re better off being an Android user.

Me? The only thing that I’m really hesitant about is being seen in public with Glass on. I think I’d be shy about it at first but who knows, maybe I’d scream “Glass ON!” and then don my Glass when I wanted to be all techy in public. I wouldn’t have to wear tights or a cape or anything. That’d just be too much. I think Android has progressed to the point where I would be very comfortable moving to the appropriate smartphone to support the device.

What are your thoughts? To dorky? Do you love it? Will it catch on with the masses?

Lead image courtesy of blogs.blouinnews.com. We love his mustache.

So a few months ago I thought I would take the extra step to reduce our carbon footprint here at The Manor. We have recessed lighting throughout most of the house and our old incandescent indoor flood lights were starting to burn out in a curiously methodical fashion. When it came to return the bulbs, I “thought green”, did the research online and went with natural daylight CFL bulbs from Lowe’s. The bulbs in question are made by Utilitech.

I talked about this project right here on this blog back in June.

One of the reasons I went with the Utilitech brand was because they were touted to be at nearly full brightness when powered on. Many CFL bulbs require a warm up period and I have to tell you, this drives me insane. Since CFL bulbs are allegedly a forward step in technology AND in saving the environment, I believe that the forward step should include being able to do what their predecessors did, namely, provide light to a room when switched on.

After a few months these Utilitech bulbs are no longer living up to the “instant on” hype. It seems that as each day passes the bulbs give off less and less light when first turned on. They take longer to warm up to their proper temperature.

It’s a small wonder that these guys are projected to last twice as long as their predecessors. They’re not doing anything!

Now, I’m all for saving the environment. I believe that we should leave the world in better shape than when we found it, but the poor performance of these Utilitech bulbs, coupled with the fact that they have to be handled like a hazardous material when disposing them due to the amount of mercury they contain, makes me wonder why we have this insane push to get everyone to buy these bulbs.

I don’t think our relatively new bulbs are going to make it through the end of the year. And I’m definitely not going to replace them with CFLs again. I think we are going to end up switching over to LED lightbulbs. This is not the optimal solution, after all, LED bulbs are fairly expensive, but they light up instantly when required to do so and then even work on dimmer switches.

On the other hand, I could go crazy and just stock up on incandescents while I still have the chance.

For the past 24 hours or so my iPhone and iPad have been going crazy with app updates. I probably have around 50 apps on my iPhone and 100 apps on my iPad and I would say that half of them have been updated in preparation for the big release of iOS 7. For those not familiar with iJargon, iOS 7 is the latest iteration of the operating system used on the iPhone, iPad, iPod and Apple TV. iOS 7 brings a paradigm shift in look and feel of the OS and also brings along a whole bunch of new, nifty features.

Android fanboys will tell you that Apple is catching up with Android. Apple fanboys will tell you that Android is just a copy of iOS. People will snarl, people will yell and I will close the window that contains the conversation because as the outdated saying goes, “Ain’t nobody got time for that.”

One of the features of iOS 7 is AirDrop, which allows you to select something on your iPhone or iPad and magically, breathlessly beam it to another person with an iDevice. You can confine AirDrop to folks on your contact list or you can make AirDrop be wide open so anyone can beam a file (a picture or a document or whatever) over to your phone.

The possibilities are endless!

I kind of like the idea of AirDrop, in fact, I used it to beam the photo of my iPad that you see above. Long, long ago I used a similar feature on one of my Palm devices to send my phone number over to another passenger on the T in Boston. I was single at the time but he never called. At least I hope I was single at the time. Hmm.

Oh the way I kid. Earl and I shall laugh about this little bit of kidding this evening over supper. We’ll have a nice laugh together.

I mentioned on my Facebook stream yesterday that folks should go ahead and update to iOS 7 when given the opportunity. Though I have an iPhone 5 and an iPad 4, I’ve heard good things about the new operating system on older devices, though if you have an iPhone 3GS or an original iPad, you’re out of luck.

Now, I’m going to confess right here and now that I have been toying with the idea of switching to an Android device, more specifically, a Moto X. I’ve read great things about it. I’ve heard great things about it. But I’ve touched it and while it is quite nice, it’s still not as solid feeling as the iPhone 5 that I currently have. I’ve become accustomed to technological perfection through Apple’s attention to detail and while Apple does stumble from time to time, you can’t deny the polish that their iDevices have. I like solid. I must have solid. I hear the new iPhone 5c, in its polycarbonate shell, has a metal frame which will help maintain that solid feeling that so many of us Macboys enjoy.

So I’m still on the fence about moving to the Moto X and if I continue to feel the way I feel today, I probably won’t do anything of the sort because my iPhone and iPad are behaving wonderfully with the new iOS that comes out shortly for the masses.

Awwwwwwww geek out! Le geek, c’est chic!

So I just got back from a ride in the Jeep. When I was a baby, my Mom and Dad would drive me around in their Volkswagen Beetle in an effort to make me fall asleep. I guess I wasn’t the best of sleepers when I was a wee lad. I wonder if I crawled in my sleep. Hmmm.

It’s a beautifully clear night here in Central New York. Like earlier today, the air is crisp. As I turned on the radio and realized that Sirius/XM is playing the exact same songs in the order that they played them in six hours ago, I started punching buttons on my stereo and landed on the AM band.

Remember the AM band?

As I slowly spun the dial, carefully landing on each available frequency to see if there was anything other than static available to the listener, I instantly noticed that there’s not a lot of music available on the AM dial. This is OK, because music on the radio these days is mostly crap, in my opinion, unless it’s something nostalgic.

Making my way down the dial brought back memories of sitting in my bedroom at age 14 looking for Dr. Ruth on a Sunday night. Even back then I was a huge geek and I would opt to listen to Dr. Ruth on Rock 102 out of Buffalo instead of listening to her on the much closer Y94. I have always found it so cool that at night (and during thunderstorms) you can tune in some distant stations on a good radio. This works on both the FM and the AM band.

During my ride a few moments ago I listened to WBAL out of Baltimore. I also tuned in a station that never mentioned its call letters but it talked about Sudbury and North Bay. Since I know a radio engineer in that part of the woods, I’m not surprised that his transmitters might be cranking out the amount of power required to reach my ears. It’s a cool way to connect.

The AM radio band is pretty much forgotten in today’s digital age. Spinning the dial around the three and four digit frequencies relaxed me enough to know that I’m going to get a good night’s sleep.

Sometimes it’s good to be nostalgic.

This clock has shown the time as 8:27 for many years. I’m thinking of letting a local school know about my clock geek skills and offering to get this outside clock working again. It seems like it would be a fun little project as long as I don’t have to play with any mice or anything. I’m curious if this stopped clock is something that only I notice or if anyone else in the school district would be interested in seeing the clock work again.

I think I’ll reach out to the district this week.

So as I was sitting at my desk this morning, getting ready to jump feet first into this experience we lovingly call Monday, I was about to fire up Microsoft Lync on my work Mac. Now, there is nothing unusual about this, being a WFH guy (work from home guy) or telecommuter, it is important to use as many tools possible to remain connected with your co-workers. When you can’t collaborate in person you must do so electronically. It’s all logical.

The downside to Lync and Facebook and Google+ and Twitter and text messaging and Instagram and all that stuff is that it is really a boatload of distraction. Whether these tools are used for work or play, when not managed properly they can take you out of the moment. Your “here and now” is actually elsewhere. At work, a Lync popup can pull me out of my coding zen space because when I hear that “message!” sound I feel compelled to see what’s up. When I try to get back to my coding I think I had started where I left off, when in reality, all lines of code start to look alike and I didn’t really leave off at the particular point. I then think that I’m being productive when in reality I’m just breaking something because I have left some unfinished code lingering where I really left off.

I hate it when I do that.

When a message pops up on our phones or whatever, it takes us away from the moment. I noticed that I checked my phone on a couple of occasions between courses at dinner the other night. That was rude of me and I am publicly apologizing to my husband right here and now for that. I don’t know that he noticed because he was checking his phone at the time. By the way, we’re not awful, we don’t check our phones during a meal or in lieu of a conversation, only in lulls of activity, but still, I guess I was being a little rude and I don’t like that. My I should strive to be less lulling. I think it’s important to set a good example. Maybe one in a million will notice and do the same.

Another thing that has kind of been getting on my nerves lately is the number of people taking selfies in front of important things, like visiting the Queen of England or sitting between Abraham Lincoln’s legs.

Well I do take my share of selfies and I share them via Instagram and all things connected to that, it’s not something that I want to do. The analytical side of me wants to know why I’m doing this. What need does posting yet another photo of myself fulfill? I have no idea.

So in an effort to be a little less distracted I made a couple of adjustments to my iPhone this morning. First of all, I deleted Google+ and Facebook right off of my phone. If anyone needs me immediately they can send me a text message; they know how to get a hold of me. Now, I’m not committing to this forever, I am going to try to go FB and G+ free for a week. I still have Instagram and I still have Twitter because well, truth be known, Twitter is my favorite of the the social networks and I do like looking at all kinds of photos on Instagram. As a quick aside, if Facebook gets ad crazy with Instagram, I will dump it like a hot potato in an instant and go back to Flickr.

I can’t do much about Lync at work, I just need to train myself better in not being distracted when that awful “new message!” Lync sound rings out from my MacBook. But I can be vigilant about making sure my status is up to date and sharing with the world when I’m in that zen worker bee space.

I think the most important thing that I’d like to figure out this FB and G+ free week is how to be in the moment with the people I’m in the moment with. I think I might have lost touch with that a little bit. If it’s worth sharing, I’ll share it when it’s appropriate and most likely via my blog.

Let’s see how this goes.