Month: February 2008

Ethical dilemma

I’m in the middle of a big refactoring job for my work project. I’m basically restructuring all the classes that make database calls so that they use connection pooling with a per-thread “DatabaseHandle” that caches PreparedStatements. It’s a big job, and it’s going to take a LOT of time and concentration, which means that home is a far better environment to work on it than at work. The problem and dilemma comes because I was on a roll when I hit 40 hours for the week. I’m not allowed to bill more than 40 hours, and I’m sure as hell not going to do it for free. Nor can I work from home without prior approval and that’s not easy to get.

So my question is, do I quit now and hope I can quickly get back in the groove on Monday morning, or do I work on it this weekend and then when I’m done spend an equivalent amount of time at my desk at work working on personal projects, like my photoshop stuff? I’m thinking it’s probably safest, although nowhere near as productive, to shut down Eclipse right now and don’t look at it until Monday morning.

20 Random Songs meme

The rules, as quoted from Eminy’s LiveJournal:

You know the rules: 20 random consecutive songs from my library, first lines given here (or second lines if the first contains the title). You identify the song, and I’ll cross it out. Googling is cheating. N.B.: Items in square brackets are instrumental only, included here to preserve the consecutivity principle.

  1. I have to swear by Almighty God Guns On The Roof, The Clash – Rob G
  2. When we were young, we pledged allegiance
  3. All you pretty women, bring it to my home
  4. [skipped one in Bulgarian]
  5. I’ve been [loved?], down in the delta
  6. Her eyes they shone like diamonds Black Velvet Band/Galway Shawl, 4 To The Bar – Ayana C
  7. Dust falls on the empty halls of my old school
  8. Well, you could see it in his eyes as they strained against the night
  9. Men and people will fight ya down (Tell me why!) Exodus, Bob Marley – Ian York
  10. [Bach keyboard concerto]
  11. [Red Shingle Bay, Many Hands]
  12. He started out to be a tugboat man, but he never got the hang of a ratchet bar
  13. [Something from Green Linnet]
  14. Many’s the day I took for granted, breathing the air that silenced some
  15. Ships may come and ships may go, as long as the sea does roll Jolly Roving Tar, Great Big Sea – Becca
  16. Now come tell me Sean O’Farrell, tell me where you hurry so Rising of the Moon, Shane McGowan and the Popes – Ian York
  17. [Mozart: Ave Verum Corpus]
  18. High speed drift on a prairie road, hot tires sing like a string being bowed SteelSilver Wheels, Bruce Cockburn– Ian York
  19. Well I’ve got a friend who’s a man (who’s a man?) Hateful, The Clash – Rob G
  20. [Duologue, Rare Air]
  21. I was a miner, I was a docker Between The Wars, Billy Bragg – Becca
  22. [Marion Livingstone, Rare Air]
  23. There’s a noble fleet of whalers, a sailing from Dundee Old Polina, Great Big Sea – CMD
  24. In the merry month of June, when from my home I started The Rocky Road To Dublin, The Irish Descendants – Fnord Prefect
  25. [skipped first line]He had a little tavern by the strand Yarmouth Town, Great Big Sea – Laura
  26. [Infernal Dance of King Kashei, Stravinsky]
  27. [Water Music, Handel]
  28. [skipped first chorus]Said – said – said: I remember when we used to sit, In the government yard in Trenchtown No Woman, No Cry, Bob Marley – Ian York
  29. [Trumpet Concerto, Wynton Marsallis]
  30. [The Pigeon On the Gate, Casdh An tSugian]
  31. The island, it is silent now, but the ghosts still haunt the waves Thousands Are Sailing, The Pogues – Ian York

I cheated a bit – I’ve got a lot of music on my iPod that I haven’t listened to or assigned a star rating to yet. I have enough time picking up lyrics on songs I’ve heard a few times, so I did this with my “4 or 5 Stars” playlist.

Anticipation

My new computer skinIn anticipation of today’s announcement of the new MacBook Pro, I ordered the computer skin a few days ago from iToppers.com. Today the guy producing it sent me this image of what it’s going to look like.

I can hardly wait. I hope there is an airshow nearby where I can get the team to sign it.

I guess you can call me a convert, then

A few hours ago I was complaining to a bunch of friends how annoying it was to do Photoshop with a ball mouse. My optical mouse broke (the first button went down and didn’t come back up) a few weeks ago so I’m using this old ball mouse, and no matter how carefully I clean the rollers, it seems that when I click and drag to the left, the mouse will stop. If I just move the mouse without with the button down, no problem, it follows it all over the place. But it takes multiple attempts to drag anything to the left.

One of my friends, Harry, is an extremely experienced graphic artist, and he said “forget the mouse, buy a Wacom Bamboo tablet”. At first, I was reluctant, because the logo for this thing looks like the word “Bamboo” drawn on an Etch-a-Sketch, which doesn’t say much for its drawing ability. Also, the Wacom promo stuff talks only about it as a device for mouse-replacement and handwriting, with absolutely nothing about using it for drawing or other artistic work. But I found a couple of user reviews where they pointed out it has force sensitivity, which is not something you need for handwriting and mouse-replacement. They said it was an excellent tablet for amateur artists, as well as something professionals might want to put in their laptop bag for use on the road. So on the way home from lunch we stopped off and bought one.

I’ve been using it continually since then, and as far as I’m concerned I should throw away all my mice and buy one of these things for every computer I use. I’m using it for general mouse-replacement and it’s great. The only thing I reach for my mouse for is for the scroll wheel, and that’s mostly force of habit since the tablet has scroll buttons on the top. This thing is extremely great.