Category: Fun

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In just washed away Ubuntu in favor for Windows Vista on my laptop.
The reasons being that I want to:

  • be able to play extinct games, such as Deus Ex and Max Payne 2
  • use TVersity to transcode HD movies to my xbox 360

So, how do I roll with a fresh setup of Vista?
Well first, I have to install a bunch of drives, which is something I didn’t need to do in Ubuntu.
After that (and a reboot) I go straight to Windows Update to get the latest version of the operating system.
Then, I install Firefox.
Using Firefox I download and install all of those apps that I use:

  • AVG Free
  • Google Chrome
  • Pidigin
  • uTorrent
  • 7zip
  • FileZilla
  • E-Texteditor
  • Last.fm
  • Spotify
  • TVersity
  • Daemon Tools Lite (without the adware)

I don’t need any office apps since I use Google Docs. Pidgin is too good to live without, even though I enjoy using Meebo.

What apps do you download after a fresh Vista install?

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This timeless piece is written by W. Livingston Larned.

Listen, son: I am saying this as you lie asleep, one little paw crumpled under your cheek
and the blond curls stickily wet on your damp forehead. I have stolen into your room
alone. Just a few minutes ago, as I sat reading my paper in the library, a stifling wave of
remorse swept over me. Guiltily I came to your bedside.

There are the things I was thinking, son: I had been cross to you. I scolded you as you
were dressing for school because you gave your face merely a dab with a towel. I took
you to task for not cleaning your shoes. I called out angrily when you threw some of your
things on the floor.
At breakfast I found fault, too. You spilled things. You gulped down your food. You put
your elbows on the table. You spread butter too thick on your bread. And as you started
off to play and I made for my train, you turned and waved a hand and called, “Goodbye,
Daddy!” and I frowned, and said in reply, “Hold your shoulders back!”

Then it began all over again in the late afternoon. As I came up the road I spied you,
down on your knees, playing marbles. There were holes in your stockings. I humiliated
you before your boyfriends by marching you ahead of me to the house. Stockings were
expensive-and if you had to buy them you would be more careful! Imagine that, son, from
a father!

Do you remember, later, when I was reading in the library, how you came in timidly, with
a sort of hurt look in your eyes? When I glanced up over my paper, impatient at the
interruption, you hesitated at the door. “What is it you want?” I snapped.

You said nothing, but ran across in one tempestuous plunge, and threw your arms
around my neck and kissed me, and your small arms tightened with an affection that God
had set blooming in your heart and which even neglect could not wither. And then you
were gone, pattering up the stairs.

Well, son, it was shortly afterwards that my paper slipped from my hands and a terrible
sickening fear came over me. What has habit been doing to me? The habit of finding
fault, of reprimanding-this was my reward to you for being a boy. It was not that I did not
love you; it was that I expected too much of youth. I was measuring you by the yardstick
of my own years.

And there was so much that was good and fine and true in your character. The little heart
of you was as big as the dawn itself over the wide hills. This was shown by your
spontaneous impulse to rush in and kiss me good night. Nothing else matters tonight,
son. I have come to your bedside in the darkness, and I have knelt there, ashamed!

It is feeble atonement; I know you would not understand these things if I told them to you
during your waking hours. But tomorrow I will be a real daddy! I will chum with you, and
suffer when you suffer, and laugh when you laugh. I will bite my tongue when impatient
words come. I will keep saying as if it were a ritual: “He is nothing but a boy-a little boy!”

I am afraid I have visualised you as a man. Yet as I see you now, son, crumpled and
weary in your cot, I see that you are still a baby. Yesterday you were in your mother’s
arms, your head on her shoulder. I have asked too much, too much, yet given too little of
myself. Promise me, as I teach you to have the manners of a man, that you will remind
me how to have the loving spirit of a child.

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One strategy to become a competetive and attractive employer is to treat your employees as your customers. A workplace should consist of more than sales and sallaries. Meaning is of greater importance. David over at 37signals wrote beautifully about this in “Put a dent in the universe“:

“To truly be inspired for great work, you need to know that you’re making a difference. That you’re putting a meaningful dent in the universe. That you’re part of something that’s making a difference and that your role in that something is significant.”

This is very true. The question is, how do you make your workplace significant? When you write PM’s, what are you focusing on? My guess is that you focus on how your product line will improve over the next months, how last months sales went and then you finish up with a promise about that upcoming mandatory holiday party you’ll be arranging. Where is the significance in this to me as an employee?

To me as an employee, it is useful to know the numbers, but only if my eventual feedback on these numbers will ever be considered and treated with respect. If not, I actually don’t give a damn. And why should I?

If your employees are limited to a box where they can post ideas about eventual improvements you might consider some time in the future, expect no love. The formal authority must be shared in order to open up for real love and practical use of the collective brilliance of your team.

I you as an employer look at your employees as your customers, you’ll constantly try to make your offer look and work better for them. You’ll always try to improve, and you’ll do your best to keep them more than satisfied. In fact, you’ll do your best to make them love your sweet deal. You want them to feel important, as if their work really mattered. And of course, it does. You can’t  fake this, if you’re clueless about how to approach this, ask someone for advices.

A basic course in marketing teaches you that your company have to have a story towards your customers. What story are you telling your employees? Or even better, what stories are you and your employees making, together? Do you have any tools for this? Are you sharing your love for your work with the world? In which way are your work improving the world? In which way are your work improving itself? In what way are you helping your employees grow? If your work isn’t developing the world right now, then change customers! Help your customers make the right choices. Make your work important!

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One year ago I got an employment as a junior developer. Since then I’ve learned quite much, especially things about working as a junior developer.

Things that might be useful:

  • If you have someone more experienced on the office who could review your code before launch, insist on that they do it. She or he can tell you how they would have done stuff (and things you have missed), you’ll learn tons from it. If you’re lucky you might even get a mentor you’ll be able to ask questions, and who’ll be glad to review your code.
  • Just because you just got hired doesn’t mean that you should stop reading. Continue to read, write and evaluate your methods. This is a way to keep the work funny and interesting as well. Never stop learning.
  • Take initiatives, ask around. Take the chances you get to get to know your team mates better.
  • Ask your team mates what they are doing, and why they are doing it that way. Question everything.
  • Write down the stuff that you learn and share with others who are, or will be in the same position.

And then we have a few optional things that I personally do:

  • I keep my desk clutter free. At my workplace, it’s not a requirement or anything, but I just like to be able to focus on the screen and the tasks ahead of me.
  • Always show up early, or at least in time. This is not a solid requirement at my work place either, but I like to show up early, and then leave early. I tend to do the heavy tasks in the morning, and more light weight tasks in the afternoon.
  • Be polite and generous with compliments, remember peoples names and details about their personal life. But don’t pretend to be interested if you’re not. Falsehood always shines through.
  • Do your work. You might find this point very obvious, but I’ve seen enough people showing up at work to just spend the time procrastinating.

Most of these things are common sense, but you’ll be surprised of how many who wouldn’t agree with them. The important point is that you deliver what you promised, and that you do it on time. When you work in teams of more experienced people and you get to work with different projects (both fresh and uh-oh-so-old-and-completely-idiotic) you learn the most important things. The small things that no one ever seem to cover in those books that you read, or that tutorial that you walked. You learn things that could only be learned through hard earned experience.