August 30, 2007
August 28, 2007
links for 2007-08-28
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It only makes sense now since Yahoo! now owns Flickr
August 27, 2007
August 26, 2007
August 24, 2007
August 22, 2007
August 21, 2007
August 20, 2007
August 18, 2007
August 14, 2007
My gap year coming up
And no, I am not a student. I've been working since I graduated in '99... yeah, yeah, a dot-com baby. Worked in 2 very different companies, one is your atypical American corporate company (Sun Microsystems) and my current one, which is a small-medium local Irish company.
I made jovial comments that I would NOT go back to college, for my fear of exams got the better of me. My venture into Open Uni course put the end of my appetite for college courses, yep, I had to do an exam at the end of it. *Pleurgh!
I know I loved workshop type courses, and from my years of working in the industry, it's definately the only way to learn.
So I chose to go to DCU to study MSc. Multimedia. My main reasons:
- No exams
- Picking up skills to improve my websites (I'm currently revamping one at the moment)
- Picking up the business end of things that will help to push my current IBC further.
- Venture into a more creative area of the industry, programming is just not my cup of tea, it's fun, but just not me.
So I have alot riding on this course. My career, my future, turning my hobbies to a realisation that it can reach more people out there. And hopefully the maintenance of the sites will pay themselves off at some stage.
But I thought many would have thought I was crazy, a minority were curious on why I was not moving up with regards to my career. Why don't I want to become a manager? But there are many that were a bit taken back on what I am about to embark on. I'm not the only one it seems, taking a year off seems to be getting populate according to this indo article.
And so many things happened in my life, and it takes something like my father passing away to wake me up to achieve more, challenge myself more. Life is too short. Each change is a milestone in my life, I am dedicating this "career break" of learning for my own progression in my career path to my father.
Python Ireland Talks - August 2007
Well, it was a success! The Python Ireland August Talks last Wednesday hosted at Google's HQ got a full turnout. Considering that when the announcement for people to sign up (for the NDA), it was full in less than 2 days. People were scrambling to get their names on it. My ball park figure of 25 max was a bit off the mark. Heh.
We arrived on the evening, and signed the NDA, with some hawk-eyed security men glaring at us. Of course, the whole group had to be fully assembled (and yes, Neil was the last one to arrive!). We went down to the cafeteria, and was greeted by some recruiters handing out goodie bags (pen, pad, tee, magnet thingie along with their biz card). All in all, we were not bombarded by them. When upto 4 engineers (included a Google intern) trying to figure out how to get the projector to work with a Mac Book Pro, and 2 other Linuxes laptops, the attendees gorged themselves on Ben and Jerry's ice-cream.
So how many engineers does it take to get projector working with a laptop, well, none really. Ended up turning the webcam towards the laptops. Who would have thunk, ay?
Unfortunately, I was not allowed to video the Python Ireland talks. It's a new thing we are embarking on to share our talks with the world. Well, next time.
The talks went well, on time (me waving my hand to signal 5 mins and then waving again to say time is up, I don't like being timemaster. Heehee!).
We departed to the Schoolhouse pub (5 mins away), I reserved an area, again, I was off with the numbers going the afters. But we mange to fit in ok. Had a good ole chat with folks, and then the usual stragglers (yes, I'm included) got booted out of the pub, as it was closing up.
Well, no talks for next month, meetup at pub instead. Most likely The Pembroke off Baggot St. There will be talks held in October, and possible venue at Trinity College. Now all I have to do is bug people to do talks. \\(;*u^ )//
August 12, 2007
August 10, 2007
August 09, 2007
August 06, 2007
Mercurial and Trac
Just got the Mercurial plugin for Trac working this morning. It's pretty nifty. Configuration was a sinch. It does all I need, revisions, changesets, and if I include the #number for the issue number, it appears in Trac. Well, that's a Trac thing. I've never used Trac with a plugin to source repository before. Heehee, so it was double the bonus, geeky happiness for me this bank holiday 