L.A.B. Unleashed

Well it has been 1 week since the start of my new venture, and though I feel like I got off to a slow start early in the week, by the end of the week, I felt a huge amount of momentum, and was happy with my progress overall.  I have purposely not spoken much about this new project yet, perhaps because a code name had not previously been determined.  Over the weekend, with some friendly household banter, the code name "Remy" came up, so now I can at least refer vaguely to the project.  We are basically going to be providing an innovative solution, to a problem that a majority of people hit on a daily basis, and in the words of Forest Gump, that’s all I have to say about that … right now. 

I am loving being able to program with Ruby on Rails 100%!  It is so much fun, instant gratification!  I gave up on the Amazon EC2 stuff for now, because it was taking up too much of my time, when there really isn’t a working app to deploy yet.  When I am ready, I did find a great tutorial and EC2 image built for Rails here.  I am content with the current hosting environment which runs mongrel, and should be able to scale with the goals for the next few months.  Maybe it was the pinnacle of a long week of coding, but a co-worker and I hit a belly laugh generating error message:

/opt/local/lib/ruby/1.8/uri/common.rb:436:in `split': bad URI(is not URI?): http://supposidly.a.bad.uri.link.here (URI::InvalidURIError)


To understand the utter hilarity here, you have to get your best Yoda voice on and say out loud …. "is not URI?"  We get this message that is an InvalidURIError, which says as part of the message that it is a "bad URI", then it very politely, in a distinct Yoda voice asks "is not URI?" …. I’m thinking … I dunno, punk … IS it a URI or NOT … you tell me?  You’ve already said that it is invalid and bad … so I don’t see how it could be a URI.  It was like the compiler was just trying to be polite in asking … "are you sure that is a URI, or am I not understanding you correctly?"  Again … maybe a long week of troubleshooting Ruby code, but I am still laughing at the wording of this message.

To top off the week, an old co-worker and close friend from IBM sent me the best gift … a money tree.  Legend says that this tree turned a poor Taiwanese farmer into  a wealthy entrepreneur.  Although I am driven less by the fortune, and more by the excitement of what I am doing, I’ll take any luck I can get!  I don’t have the greenest thumb, so let’s just hope I don’t kill it!!

Its been a while since I did a recipe post.  Tonight I tried a new dish out of the latest Rachel Ray magazine.  I like her meals because they are quick, easy, the ingredients are familiar, and they always taste quite good!  The recipe, called Shrimp and Spaghetti in Coconut Broth,  was a fun noodle dish, and an easy way to get some Asian flavors, which are normally intimidating to me, mixed into a meal at home.  The recipe in the link above is for three meals, so that you can eat one now and freeze two for later.  I’m not looking to cook for an army, so I cut the recipe down on my own, making enough for two hearty main serving dishes.  Here are the proportions I came up with:

• 1 13.5 oz can of coconut milk
• 1/2 of the coconut milk can (used above) filled with chicken broth
• 1/2 tablespoon Asian Fish Sauce (i found this in the seafood section at Stop and Shop, McCormick Brand)
• 1 tablespoon chopped garlic
• 1 teaspoon ginger (I only had crystallized in my cupboard, which worked fine)
• 1 teaspoon hot chili sauce
• 1/2 pound of Shrimp
• 3/4 a box of spaghetti
• 1 bunch of cilantro

I found some fantastic syntax today.  I wanted to add a simple select box to my view, and I wanted the box to be filled in from a database table.  I also wanted the list sorted by name.  In the past, I have done something like this in my view:

<select name="obj[thing_id]">
   <% @things.each do |thing| %>
       <option value="<%= thing.id %>">
         <%= thing.name %>
       </option>
   <% end %>
  </select>

That required a @things = Thing.find(:all, rder => ‘name’), in the controller for the view action.  Today, I came across this one-liner, that handles everything in the view (nothing additional needed in the controller), in one fell swoop:

<%= select(:obj, :thing_id, Thing.find(:all, rder => ‘name’).collect { |p| [p.name, p.id] }, {:include_blank => false}) %>

p.id is used as the option value, and p.name is used as the text to display in the box. 

This is and other tips and tricks can be found in this elaborate cheatsheet.  A nice one to bookmark for future reference!

The more they stay the same!  It was a slow start today with the new project.  I’ll still be working from home for the majority of my time, so I still rolled out of bed to the same home office across the hall.  It didn’t feel very different right away, so I decided to get really crazy, and change things up a bit.  First, I moved my monitor from one side of the desk over to the other.  Next, I erased my white board, and cleaned out my bookshelf.  These actions did actually help to differentiate things a bit.  One obvious difference, is no more T42 Thinkpad glaring at me, and no more interactions with PCs in general!!  Hooray for that!  I am running an exclusive MAC shop, with my Mini and Mac Book vying for my attention.  So far I’m a slave to the Mini, while I get SVN and Amazon EC2 set up for use with Rails.  Once that is done, I’ll be able to work mobile on the Mac Book.

Kobe is still king of the kingdom … nothing has changed there … although he is *not happy* his name is Kobe, with the NBA finals season in full swing!

Well, I made it through my last day at big blue and I have to say I feel many things.  Mostly I feel that I can finally breathe!!  The gigantic blue pillow that has been suffocating me is finally gone.  I don’t feel so tied down anymore, having to watch what I do and say… so watch out people … I am finally and truly UNLEASHED!!! 

I have been a work at home employee for over a year now, so I wasn’t actually planning on spending my last day in the office.  I had been out there on Thursday to tie up my loose ends, turn in my lappy, and share a drink with some good friends.  Friday morning, the inexplicable "they" asked me to come back in at noon that day for an exit interview, and because I like to follow the standard protocol with such things, I obliged.  The fifteen dollars it cost me in gas money, round trip, was reciprocated with a literally 3 minute  meeting, in which not even the slightest likes of an exit interview took place.  I was told we have no HR present in the building, and that "they" know why I am leaving, so "they" can relay these reasons to the appropriate channels.  Usually, "they" ask you to sign a form that we are "all squared away", but because the Intranet was down, the form was unavailable.  RESULT:  There was absolutely no reason for me to be there.  I am shocked that this large corporation does not have a standard exit interview procedure.  Now I am wondering, if "they" just did not want to do an exit interview with me at all for some reason.  Oh wait …. I did get an "Exit Survey" in my email.  That’s right … I did the survey online, and I guess the questions that were asked resembled what I would think a typical exit interview would be like.  Perhaps, they’ve streamline the exit process so much, to the point that it is completely automated, and requires ZERO human interaction.  Would have been nice to have some closure, and feel like my concerns and frustrations were being heard by someone who might actually care.  Or could at least nod their head and pretend they did.  Back to reality … this is IBM.  This exit interview LAMENESS pretty much sums up what brought me to this point.  I guess I should feel like I have my closure with that realization.

Anyway … enough with the negativity!!!  Can you believe my attitude?!  I am unleashed for one weekend, and just look what happens!!!  First day on the new job tomorrow.  I am moving on and will be channeling positive energy from here on out! 

I found a new app on Facebook that has peeked my interest!  The MyType application, asks you to answer about 10 minutes worth of multiple choice questions, and then it assigns your Myers-Briggs personality indicator type.  I remember taking this test a long time ago, where I was also pegged as an INTJ, which this app labels "The Free Thinker" and means – Introverted iNtuitive Thinking Judging.  Although you can range on a scale for each letter, it is scary how right on this assessment can be.  The explanatory paragraph for INTJ says:

INTJs are strong individualists who seek new angles or novel ways of looking at things. They enjoy coming to new understandings. They are insightful and mentally quick; however, this mental quickness may not always be outwardly apparent to others since they keep a great deal to themselves. They are very determined people who trust their vision of the possibilities, regardless of what others think. They may even be considered the most independent of all of the sixteen personality types. INTJs are at their best in quietly and firmly developing their ideas, theories, and principles.

I think being content with working from home full time, and not interacting with a lot of people on a daily basis, supports my introverted (I) spirit.  Also, my interest in theoretical subjects, such as computational complexity theory, makes sense with second letter, being intuitive (N).  I found it interesting that the paragraph above says that "mental quickness may not always be outwardly apparent to others", which could be why, at times, I have felt underestimated by others.

The really cool thing about this Facebook app, is you can invite your friends to take the test, and then their "type" displays in a diagram, showing how their personality may interact with you.  In the picture below, I am in the center, and it shows how all the other personality types relate to me.  For instance, I have a friend who is an ISTP "Suitemate", meaning we’d share a work space well together.  Or another friend who is an ESTJ, a "Counterpart" complimenting my personality traits nicely.  What I am wondering is, what about the other INTJ’s out there?  Do we have a love-hate relationship?  Or do we coexist in perfect harmony because we are one in the same?

There are many FREE places online you can take your own test, so if you are not on Facebook and are curious what your personality type is, it is easy to get an assessment with a quick google search.  I’m interested to hear if you think INTJ describes me, and what your type is.

Yes, it is true!  I am moving on and away from big blue.  It was a tough decision, and even though everyone "says that", it really is true.  I have spent 7 years there, and possibly more significantly, my first 7 years out of college.  This was my first job right out of school, and I have never known a work environment any different.  That being said, I am looking forward to trying something new, different, challenging, and exciting!  "They" made it really difficult to leave, but in the end I used my super analytical skills to assess the situation – a "Pros and Cons List".  My cons out-weighed my pros, and that was that.  I really enjoyed working with the people there and will definitely miss them!

So what am I onto next?  Not 100% sure, but a small start-up type environment.  There will most definitely be more to come on that front.  Hey … maybe my blog *just* got a bit more interesting??

Last day at IBM is next Friday, the 13th.  Wow … "Friday the 13th" … hopefully that’s not a bad omen!!!  Since my wonderful IT guy was born on Friday the 13th, it can’t be THAT bad!