Easter Greetings

Regardless of your faith or non-faith, I’d like to wish you greetings and good fortune today. I am a Christian so this is a special day in my mind. I never thought or planned on sharing such opinions but I felt compelled to wish everyone well and share my fondness of this holiday.

We are all human, and that’s about all that should be required to respect and wish well for each other. I’m just choosing my faith and hope as a reason to express it today.

Alt.Mean?

I’ve been seeing a lot of complaints lately about discussion among Alt.netters getting mean or visceral.  Maybe I’m just toning out the right things or am not privy to those discussions.  I still see a lot of good, helpful people in the so-called alt.net community.  Even at Microsoft; see the Gu shift post.  From helping solve problems to really off topic help, there are just a lot of good devs out there.

We devs can easily get negative because of our predominant traits for analyzing and problem solving.  It’s just not fun or appropriate after a certain point.  I’d be less inclined to go to a meeting or conference where the majority of conversation is complaining or stupid opinion arguments.  Fortunately, I just don’t see a lot of that.  Finding a better way is my main objective in exploring ideas, and I think the same is for other alt.netters.  If I’m naive about this, then fine because I have a positive view of many others out there on the intertubes.

As a warning, please remember this: nobody’s perfect, everybody has opinions, personal style should be respected, and getting the job done and getting along are very important.  Thanks to all those who have taken the time to help or chat with me.  I hope to be as helpful in return or to others.

Here’s a little cred to some of the many who deserve it:

• Sean Chambers
• Justin Etheredge
• Brad Wilson
• Scott Hanselman
• Rob Conery
• Ayende
• ScottGu
• Tuna Toksoz
• Scott Cate
• Joe Guadagno
• Tim Heuer
• Dave Campbell (just noticed his twitter background is from his fave camping spot. cool.)
• Donn Felker
• Damien Guard

There are more.  I just wanted to make the point there are plenty of good devs out there.

The Pirate Way

Yes, that is George Washington crossing the Delaware. No, I am not suggesting that Washington was an actual, unlawful pirate. I condemn the immoral, brutal acts of real pirates; it’s the principles embodied that I admire. To me, a pirate represents freedom and the resolve to fight for it. In that regard, George Washington and the Founding Fathers represent my ideal of a pirate.

Current events in my country and professional life have prompted this post. There is much to admire and respect about my country, but which is being dismantled by the current administration. I see the same malaise set in within my professional world. The hard truth is that security is an illusion with a heavy price that buys you nothing but misery and failure in life. Liberty, morality, responsibility are the only way to succeed.

In the corporate world, as in daily life, making tough decisions and taking bold actions is something most people avoid. That is especially true when there are significant or dire consequences. When guided by common sense and good morality/ethics, those who take those risks are usually rewarded. When the safer road is followed, there is little or no success. What little success there is is mostly a second level benefit of those that took the risks. This is the path of fear, bureaucracy, and big government. And it’s usually laden with advertising for compassion, fairness, and community responsibility. There is nothing compassionate about losing freedom, encouraging failure, and lowering expectations.

Pirates take risks. Pirates rise up and rebel against oppression, and are rewarded for their resolve. Liberty and responsibility are the only way to succeed. AND it’s a reward we all share – a rising tide lifts all boats. There is no limit to growth and success that prevents others from sharing when some succeed. We all win if we choose to play.

This is so evident in business; it is often a complaint among those that work in large corporations, and yet so many chose to ignore it. So many projects fail because no one wants to make decisions and be responsible. Yet so many want to take credit in any success. That’s one big, hairy, headless ego monster that’s eats up everything around it, my friends.

I am not discouraged, because every wrong attempt discarded is another step forward. – Thomas A. Edison

Rebel for individuality, be resourceful, take a chance, make a decision, push for better, be open to improvement, and always take responsibility. That’s the pirate way. That’s why pirate ships worked against against a much better prepared, armed, and trained British Navy all those years ago. The captain took action, and was held responsible. The crew followed and took initiative. Those that didn’t were put off the ship. The bad captain was overthrown. The lesson is that each wrong attempt is an opportunity for improvement and success when you have freedom and responsibility.

As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he. – Proverbs 23:7

That which shackles you in your current life is almost assuredly in your own mind. It is the invisible cage we put ourselves in. Do you want to succeed in your personal or professional life? Do you want to make a difference in life? Be a pirate! Take action, learn, improve, and you will succeed. Everyone will benefit from it; your family, your community, and your country.

Why Pirates are better than Ninjas

Disclaimer

I have some personal admiration for the dedication and aesthetics of ninjas and samurai. I just find the pirate embodies more of the values I embrace. That’s not to say their history and brutal practices, but rather the liberty, individuality, and creativity are things to admire and even strive to. In the real world, this also means adhering to common sense and morality. Actual real pirates are generally horrible people lacking a moral compass. From here on out, I mean the idealism embodied by a pirate and not the scoundrel.

Liberty

A pirate is a free individual; unbridled by any man or government. Ninja’s are servants who exist to obey their master. Liberty is the first and most important value of a pirate.

Creativity

A pirate is resourceful and creative in solving problems. Always looks for new and better ways to attack a problem. A ninja is dependent on practice and aesthetics; his approach to any problem always comes from tradition.

Responsibility

All pirates take and are held responsible for their actions. If not on their own then by their crewmates; or possibly by their captures. Responsibility can be painful, but leads to greater success. A ninja is traditionally bound to hold themselves responsible or be shamed. The modern, westernized ninja does not adhere to this. Instead he shuns responsibility and simply moves on.

Decisive

A pirate makes decisions and takes actions. Even serving on a ship under a captain is the explicit choice of the pirate. No pirate would ever willingly live in compulsory servitude, and would fervently rebel against any loss of liberty by compulsion. The ninja lives to obey and lacks or has limited free will of his own. A ninja without orders has no direction. A pirate would take the lead if no one else does, or he is no longer satisfied with the current leadership.

Conclusion

Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are the way of the pirate; to which I add a moral & ethical compass. These are the American ideals, and the values I embrace. These ideals lead to personal and professional success, and is beneficial for both the individual and the community. It would greatly benefit many people and humanity as a whole if more people embraced the pirate way. The ninja way is content with dictators, fascists, and socialism; things that oppress people and limit both freedom and happiness. Therefore, pirates > ninjas!

Its not that hard blog engine

I started thinking, again, about writing my own blog engine ever since Rob Conery threw out the challenge.  He’s followed through on that himself too.  My excuses are pretty simple and real: Don’t have the time and have too much other non-paid work already.  Still, I keep thinking about it because I’m not completely satisfied with blogengine.net.  It’s a fine blog engine, but it’s doesn’t integrate well with the rest of this site.  Also, I’d like to see something handled differently; more that I could do by contributing to the project.

The thing is, it’s not really that hard to build a simple blog engine.  As with anything, I’m sure it takes a little more to make it really good, but it’s just not that hard.

Think about it.. what entities do you need assuming this is database driven? Users, Posts, Comments, Categories, and some settings.  You’d probably want a built in post editor; there’s also the fairly simple Metaweblog api which would let you support Windows Live Writer.  I’d suggest supporting future posts; that’s just checking the publish date before showing a post.  Support saving a post as a draft is simple too.  It only gets more complicated with extra features like full-text searching, or roles for multiple authors.

So if someone just started a project, used FluentMigrator to manage the schema, and Fluent-NHibernate to wire up the models.. well.. you’re a fair ways to creating your own blog engine.  Oh, and use Free Text Box for the built-in html editor to make it easy.  I’m not necessarily going to do this; just thinking out loud.

CloudDB and other goings on

I’m continuing to play with CloudDB as the data store for the computerist solutions site. Currently the sidebar links are stored in clouddb, as well as optionally storing most page content in it.  Currently, only the home page has its content in clouddb.  It’s built so most pages check on first load if content is available in clouddb, otherwise render the normal view.

So all this makes me think.. why not add a users table and go full on CMS with it. I think it would work. So why not also build our own blog engine too.  Again, it might just work but it becomes a question of size restrictions.  I just don’t know what clouddb will allow/handle. I’ll have to ask the team about it.

Speaking of features, CloudDB is working on the next version. It may get released by the time this gets published. I’m waiting to see what changes there are.  There will be JSON support I’m told, which will make be wonder whether to stick with the current webservice method of calling it or move to the JSON method.

Overall, I like clouddb. It’s perfect for the csinc site. It maintains the portability directive because we can host anywhere and still fetch data from clouddb.  Plus we have some nice flexibility with the content. It really is an enticing solutions. It took some thinking to centralize the data access and caching, but worked out. Now I’m just waiting to see what clouddb v3 brings.

I’ll probably post again on CloudDB when the next version comes out. I’ll do some code samples at that time. Maybe a working sample project for people to try.

Other Goings On

In other news, I recently found myself considering buying a new vacuum. It was a good vacuum when we bought it but it had lost its power over the last year. Thanks to some random review, I rechecked the filter I thought I cleaned and found that it was actually just the housing for the actual filer. After cleaning it, the power is back! How many times have you felt you code base is old and worn out? Maybe you just need clean it out a bit instead of throwing it away.  Add some tests, maybe use clouddb, or refactor some common code. Having made the clouddb changes to csinc, it feels refreshed and not so stale. I still want some more clean up and better testing but I like where its going. ..just a little life lesson applied to work.

My calendar shows things I wish I could go to

Just looked at my calendar, and realized there is more on there than I actually ever make. It’s become a wall of events I plan to regret missing.

Sept 11 2001 In Memoriam

  Few events left more an indelible mark on me before Sept 11 2001, than watching, in school, the shuttle Challenger explode. But in comparison to 9-11, it doesn’t even register. For the families of the fallen, for the heroes and the brave, for those that have served this country, and for those that are currently serving, I pray.

Let us remain vigilant, lest we forget and evil befall us again.

Project Euler: Uh Oh

  Well I blame Antonio Cangiano for this.. last thing I needed is another distraction, but he just hit my Achilles and gave me a new feed for my RSS reader. I like Math but haven’t done that much since college. I also like what I do which is largely write code. This uses both and is a tempting distraction. Drats!

  Euler (pronounced Oy-ler) was an 18th century mathematician and physicist famous for his work with calculus and graph theory. His work was the basis of my first college calculus class. We studied his work on decision making and routes (graph theory) and led into Riemann sums then integral calculus. Euler did a lot with applied math, which ended up being my focus in earning a Bachelor of Science in Mathematics.

  Project Euler is a web site with math and programming challenges. If you like either, you’ll probably like the site. I may have to intentionally avoid it due to my obsessive drive to solve problems. (I’m sure I’ll do at least a few of them at some point)

HP Mini 1030NR – Webcam Issue

I got an HP Mini 1030NR from Best Buy for one of the kids, and it’s quite a nice little lappy. It’s not going to win any races, but it does the job nicely. Battery life is good at close to 3 hours. It comes with a 16gig SSD, which isn’t a lot but you’re not meant to install a lot on these. The point is a small, portable, cheap internet device.

It has decent hardware specs, but there seems to be a default settings issue with the camera. It’s WAY too dark, and is unusable. I found a few suggestions on the ‘net about how to resolve it. One was to manually update the driver with some driver choices. Another was to physically remove a foil lense cover, which I didn’t feel right about. The last was to open up the settings and turn the brightness up from zero, which is the default. One way of doing that was to install MSN Messenger and use Options –> Audio and Video settings to change settings. I did that since it also gives you a picture preview.

Solved well enough. Skype video now works fine.