I Love Getting Spam July 25, 2008
Posted by Tim in : Silliness , add a commentWARNING! This is going to be a pretty crude entry. I can’t help it, though. It’s just too funny to ignore. My friend, Jake, has also done this on his blog. Both of us recognize that these emails serve no other purpose than to spread viruses and spyware. Well, I don’t know…maybe there really is a company selling a product that will make me that much “manlier”, but I tend to doubt that. I also tend to doubt that I’m going to get a great deal on a watch from somebody who can’t actually construct a proper sentence. Jake and I have both noticed the inordinate amount of spam we get that offers us fantastic deals on great watches. I actually hate watches and never wear them. I think these people are wasting their time. {Rimshot}
Anyway, over the last year or so, I’ve been compiling a list of my favorite subject lines that come in from spam emails. While I may hate the very idea of spam email, I certainly have to appreciate the humor that it can provide. I apologize for the vulgarity, but I am not editing these. This is text that has actually appeared in my email. I might add that after trying several of these remedies, I have seen no significant increase in the size of my…(no, I did not really try them). Please comment and vote on your favorite. Why? I don’t know. It just seems like fun. I’ll start it off. I think my favorite one has to be the one about the 5 inch “weener”. There’s just something charming about the misspelling. Also, I opted to leave out the boring subjects about watches.
Make your trouser python huge and rock hard!
You won’t need to furtively put socks into your trunks anymore!
Grow an anaconda out of your trouser snake!
She will always be hungry for your new big sausage!
Dreamin’ of having a huge schlong, like black bros have? Now that’s not a problem!
She will be totally happy, yet always ask for more… of your new huge dong!
Make your boner something she won’t tear her eyes from
Let your small penis grow into a purple-headed demon!
Encouraging news for your willy
True masculinity is impossible without a substantial volume of male meat
Have you ever felt a kiss of a womb? With your new big rod you’ll feel it!
Beat her womb with your new big rod, so that she knew who wears the pants!
Does your Mr. Winkie need upgrading? Our offer will interest you
Cutest girls will go horny and wild when you pull out your new big python
no pissing around now, you need to enlarge your cock
look down to see a strong meaty cock hanging that you can be proud of
turn all the girls on with a large piece of manhood
Women acknowledge, that big phalli are more attractive!
Your new schlong will win more prizes!
Women love it if you have a 9 inch snake in your pants rather than a tiny 5 inch weener
Add some inches to your microphone
Whip out your Secret Weapon, massive and intimidating
She showed me her perfect boobies
from me make your banana GIANT
The giant rose from my boxers
Get the biggest tool in the town
Statue of liberty, Eiffel tower, then your tool.
Craving for pink shaven puss
Gain a voluminous male package
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Your Hard Drive Will Fail Whether Your Data’s Backed Up Or Not June 23, 2008
Posted by Tim in : Technology , add a commentAwhile back, my cousin sent me an email asking what I recommend for backing up computer hard drives. I was reminded that I’d been meaning to write a post about that very topic. I was also reminded that I’d been meaning to write any sort of post at all. I apologize for the hiatus; it’s been a busy couple of months.
Okay, on to the topic at hand. I was happy to report to my cousin that I do, in fact, have a few recommendations for backing up hard drives. Each option has pros and cons, but if you want to choose one, there is definitely one option that is, in my opinion, the hands down winner. That’s not to say that you need to pick one and only one. You could use any or all of these options together to give you the most flexibility. At some point, though, you may end up spending more time making sure your data is safe than actually creating data to keep safe.
The first option, copying files to an external USB or FireWire drive, is the quickest and easiest. It is certainly better than nothing. However, it’s of absolutely no use if your house burns down, gets pounded by a hurricane, or blown away by a tornado. Unless it’s one of those freaky stories where you end up on the news after the tornado saying, “The twister blew away everything I own except for this one backup drive!” Personally, I wouldn’t want to bank on that one. Remember, though, that natural disasters aren’t the only things you need to worry about. Often, those external drives are kept right by the computer that they are being used to back up. If somebody breaks into your house and goes to steal your computer, guess what. My money says your backup drive is going for a ride, too. The problem with this option is that it keeps the second copy of your data right with the first copy. That’s great until something happens to take out both copies.
Another option is to periodically burn your data to CDs or DVDs and mail them to somebody else (family member, attorney, etc.) for safe keeping. I’ve heard Steve Gibson of GRC talk about using this method. If you don’t have a lot of data, this option is still pretty easy in terms of getting the data copied. However, it becomes a bit more of a hassle when you have to put the disc in the mail. But, with the extra hassle comes some extra piece of mind. Even if something happens to your computer’s location, you’ve got off-site backups that you can use to restore your data.
Wouldn’t it be great if we could essentially combine those two options? Give me the ease of backing up to a huge hard drive, but make sure it’s off-site. That’s where my third option comes in. It is something that is relatively new, at least in terms of being cost-effective. I’m referring to internet-based backup. The idea is that you use somebody else’s hard drives to keep your data off-site. There are various places on the web where you can go for online backup but I am going to focus on Amazon’s S3 service used in conjunction with a program called Jungle Disk. I started using the service about 3 months ago and I really can’t say enough good things about it. It is as seamless as having an external hard drive connected to your computer, but it’s off-site. Best of all, it’s very inexpensive. The only downside is the transfer speed. If you don’t have broadband internet access, forget it. But if you’ve got a good connection, then you should check this out.
If you go to www.jungledisk.com, you can find all you need to get started. Jungle Disk is the program that will run on your computer. They have versions for Windows, Mac OSX, and Linux. It’s free to try for a month and then 20 USD for a lifetime license. I could go on for a long time about all of the features, but I bet you don’t want me to do that. I’ll just hit some of the main points. When you start your computer, Jungle Disk will mount your S3 drive so you can copy data to and from it just like a hard drive. It allows you to encrypt the data you save to it. You can also set up a scheduled backup. And as I said before, it’s cheap. You can look at the details on the website, but I can tell you that I’m backing up around 20 - 25 GB of data and I’m paying around 4 USD a month. Plus, I’ve heard that Jungle Disk and Amazon S3 will also open your beer and put extra hot sauce on your buffalo wings. Okay, I made that last part up because I’m on the verge of annoying even myself with how many compliments I can give this service.
I’m done now. Just try it. You’ll be amazed at the warm, fuzzy feeling you get when you know that you could pound a railroad spike through your computer’s hard drive and still have all your data.
Ben Stein, Please Shut Up April 10, 2008
Posted by Tim in : Science, Silliness , 5commentsWell I’m sure this post will offend a fair share of people, but I guess that’s the risk you take when you like to run your mouth on the internet. While it is not my intent to turn my blog into one about religion, theology, faith, or debates concerning such topics, it is also not my intent to shy away from controversial issues if I feel compelled to comment. This post happens to be about one of those issues. In the interest of full disclosure, I will start by pointing out that I am a science-minded individual who is a proponent of the theory of evolution. I also feel that the teaching of Creationism, Intelligent Design, or any other similar belief has no place in public science classrooms.
With that out of the way, let me get to what is prompting this post. In a little over a week, a movie called “Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed” starring Ben Stein is supposed to be released to the general public. The movie is meant to be a documentary about how “Big Science” has expelled smart new ideas from the classroom. In other words, this is the Creationist/Intelligent Design crowd trying to get sympathy by saying their ideas about “science” are being discriminated against in public classrooms. If you visit Expelled Exposed, a site that has been set up to cut through the propaganda surrounding the film, you can read reviews by people who have seen advanced screenings. Although I haven’t yet seen it myself, there are already several things about the movie that bother me.
First, as may already be apparent, I completely disagree with the whole premise of the film. If you are not familiar with the hoopla around Intelligent Design over the last few years, I will give a very brief summary. Basically, Intelligent Design is the idea that life and other things we observe around us are too complex to have developed via natural means; there must have been a designer. Proponents of ID claim that they are not talking about any specific god or religion, just that there must be some sort of designer. In my opinion, though, ID is really just an attempt to “science up” Creationism in an effort to slip it into public schools as an “alternative” to the theory of evolution. The problem I have is not that people believe in Creation or Intelligent Design or anything else for that matter. My problem is that regardless of what you call it, it is still a matter of faith, not science. Therefore, it has no place in public school science classrooms. Science, put simply, is the process of making an observation, forming a hypothesis based on that observation, testing that hypothesis through experimentation or further observation, and then drawing conclusions. If the results of the experimentation do not support the original hypothesis, then the hypothesis is modified and the process starts over. A critical aspect of that process is the fact that the hypothesis can be shown to be false. One of the biggest flaws with Intelligent Design being considered science is that it is not falsifiable. Anything that is observed or the result of any experiment can always be explained away as, “That’s just how the Designer designed it.”
Now, I want to be clear…the fact that I disagree with the premise of the movie does not mean that I think the producers of the film don’t have a right to make it. Everybody has the right to express their views. However, their approach to making the movie is the second problem I have. “Expelled” features interviews with several notable scientists. According to the scientists who were interviewed for the movie, they were told that they were being interviewed for a movie called “Crossroads” that was going to be an examination of both sides of the Creation/Evolution debate. They were never told that in reality, the movie was a slanted propaganda piece and that the footage of their interviews would be twisted in such a way as to make them look ridiculous. I think it speaks volumes that the filmmakers needed to resort to dishonest and underhanded tactics in order to get footage they could use. To me, that says the arguments they have for their side of the debate don’t have enough merit to stand on their own.
Finally, I want to briefly mention a situation that occurred at the Mall of America in Minneapolis. There has been plenty written on the web about it already, so I will just hit the main points. One of the scientists interviewed in the film, PZ Myers, registered online to attend a pre-screening event at the Mall, following all of the rules that were put in place. However, when he was waiting in line the night of the event, he was approached by a security guard and informed that he needed to leave. The producer was not allowing him to attend the screening. He’s in the movie! It seems to me the producers were probably concerned that he would cause a problem during the question and answer period following the film. Of course, the “Expelled” camp is claiming that he “crashed” the screening because it was invite-only, but that is not true. You can get much more detail on the affair from PZ’s blog, Pharyngula, and from the Expelled Exposed page mentioned above.
I do eventually want to see the movie so that I can witness first-hand how bad it is (the reviews I’ve read have been far from glowing). I’m afraid it will have to wait, though, until I can see it for free on HBO or something. I just can’t bring myself to support that trash by purchasing a ticket. If you end up and see it while it is in the theaters, drop me a note and give me a review.
Update: The Douchebag Experiment March 27, 2008
Posted by Tim in : Science, Silliness, Technology , add a commentThis is a follow-up post to last month’s “The Douchebag Experiment”. You will need to have read that post for this one to make any sort of sense.
I have good news, more good news, and then some bad news that came about because of the second bit of good news. I’ll give you the good news first…and second, for that matter.
First good news: the data collection period of The Douchebag Experiment went extremely well. I was bombarded with Twitter posts that contained the words “douche” or “douchebag”. In fact, it got obnoxious. I finally just had to stop tracking those words because it was honestly a bit ridiculous.
Second good news: a new update for my phone, the Sprint Mogul, was just released earlier this month that added some fantastic features. I am really enjoying the update!
Bad news: part of the update process for the phone is a complete reset of the device. That means I lost all of the Twitter text messages I had collected. I still might be able to get enough from the Google Talk instant messages I received (which are saved in my Google account), but I haven’t gone through them yet. We’ll just have to wait and see what I can glean.
I also ended up with an amusing, somewhat related story. Shortly after I had started tracking “douche” and “douchebag”, I was describing to a friend what I was doing. He thought it would be fun to also track the phrase “hoochie mama”. I insisted that nobody would be using the phrase “hoochie mama” on Twitter, but I have actually been proven wrong. I believe I have now received three or four posts containing “hoochie mama”. So, Matt, I can’t believe I have to say this, but you win!
Steal My Laptop, I Dare You March 18, 2008
Posted by Tim in : Technology , 2commentsOkay, well don’t really steal my laptop. I’d rather not have to deal with the hassle of either buying a new laptop or tracking you down and kicking the crap out of you for stealing my laptop. You think I’m joking, but I really would do that. Buy a new laptop, I mean.
But aside from the hassle, let me tell you why I don’t care if you steal my laptop: you can’t get my data. I am so confident of that fact that I would be fine with popping the drive out of the computer, handing it to the NSA, and daring them to try and get my bank account numbers from my Microsoft Money file. In case you’ve never heard of it, the National Security Agency is the U.S. government agency that deals with cryptography. What does that mean? It means they’re in the business of coming up with secret codes that even a Little Orphan Annie decoder ring couldn’t crack. It also means that they’re in the business of cracking those same kinds of codes so that they can obtain the information they need to defend against bad guys.
So now you’re thinking I’m pretty pompous for saying that not even the NSA could get my data. Well I assure you, I don’t say that because of anything I’ve come up with. I give all the credit for me being able to make that statement to a program called TrueCrypt. TrueCrypt is software designed for the protection of data. It does this by encrypting the data. Without going into a lot of painful geek-speak, encryption is essentially the process of taking files on your computer and then shifting, mixing, and jumbling them around until you’re left with nothing more than an unrecognizable mess. Of course, if you know the password, then you can reconstruct that unrecognizable mess without issue and the files work just as they normally would.
I could go on and on about the many benefits of TrueCrypt, but I want to focus on one specific feature that was added to the latest version. Plus, there are people far more qualified than myself to give you the real nitty-gritty of how it all works. For a good in-depth review of TrueCrypt, you should listen to Leo Laporte and Steve Gibson in Episode 41 and Episode 133 of their “Security Now!” podcast. That should be enough geek for all but the geekiest of you. Also, since this is a fairly complex topic to cram into one blog post, please feel free to email me if you would like to find out more.
The new feature that I want to point out is System Encryption, which allows you to encrypt the entire hard drive partition on which you have Windows installed (basically, your C: drive). To encrypt your system partition, TrueCrypt employs something called pre-boot authentication. That means that you have to provide a password before your system will even attempt to boot into Windows. That password is required whether you have shut the computer down, or if you have put it into hibernation. If you don’t provide that password then the entire drive contains nothing but garbage. So even if somebody connected the drive to another computer and tried to get the data without booting into Windows, they would see only random bits.
Now when I say random bits, I really mean random bits. TrueCrypt employs the most sophisticated encryption that is currently available. To give you an idea of what that means, if you use an appropriately strong password and you assume our current level of hardware, then in order to brute force the password (try every possible combination of upper and lower case letters, numbers, and symbols), it would likely take a bad guy more years than the age of the universe to stumble upon your password. I’m going to go ahead and assume that after another 13 to 14 billion years, I won’t really care who suddenly gains access to everything they need in order to steal my identity.
Now I know you’re thinking to yourself, “Well that’s just great, Tim. I’m sure with all the countless millions you rake in by posting your thoughts to a web page that you can afford to have the best encryption available. What about the rest of us?” First of all, if you happen to run across those countless millions, please pass them this way because I certainly don’t have them. Secondly, you don’t need countless millions. In fact, you don’t need counted pennies. TrueCrypt is absolutely free. It is open source software which means you can download, install, and use it all you want without paying a thing unless you’d like to make a donation. It’s also worth pointing out that while I can only attest to the Windows version; there are also versions available for Mac and Linux.
Another benefit of the software being open source is that anybody who wants can download and examine the code that was used to create the software. That’s important in this situation because it means that other security experts could determine if there were secret backdoors programmed in to allow somebody to get around the encryption if they know a “master” password or something along those lines. I’ve looked through the source, but that was more for amusement. It’s not my area of expertise, so I trust the developer community to have vetted all the code to the point that I can be confident in the finished product.
Bottom line, if you have a laptop, I highly recommend using the System Encryption offered by the latest version of TrueCrypt. It is far too easy for those types of computers to get lost or stolen; a fact that has been learned the hard way by more than one government agency in more than one country. As I said in the beginning, nobody wants the hassle of a missing computer, but wouldn’t it be nice to know that none of your personal data would be compromised if it did happen?
What’s up with “What’s up with Tech?”? March 7, 2008
Posted by Tim in : Podcasting, Technology , add a commentSome of you have been asking about what is going on with the “What’s up with Tech?” podcast that I produce with Jake Kerber. If you are not familiar with the podcast, it is something that Jake and I started doing last year. It’s a technology news and information podcast that we try to gear toward the normal person who has an interest in technology, but doesn’t obsess about it the way we do. In other words, it’s geeks explaining geeky things to non-geeks. We managed to put together 5 episodes that are available from the website or from iTunes.
We were starting to get more of a consistent process down and were attempting to get on a more regular schedule when we hit a bit of a wall. It was a combination of things, really. I think the two biggest factors were that the holidays hit and that Jake has been incredibly busy with the launch of his new site, Film Triangle. And I’m quite certain that a show consisting of only me blathering on to myself about gadgets, computers, and science-fiction is something that the world is better off without. Just ask my wife.
So, the point of this post is that I wanted to take a quick moment to let our listeners know that we really do plan on getting back to the show as soon as it is possible. Jake’s in and out of town right now attending some film festivals, and I’ve been working on a redesign of this website. But hopefully, just in time for the weather to finally turn warm again here in Iowa, we will be able to retreat back inside to record some more episodes!
Attack of the Project Manager – Round 2 March 3, 2008
Posted by Tim in : Corporate America , add a commentUn-freaking-believable. I’ve completely had it with this guy. First off, if you haven’t read my blog post about the project manager I am dealing with at the company where I am on a contract; take a few minutes to go check it out. It’s from February 15th under the category of Corporate America. Actually, the more I think about it, the one I’m writing now could also be a follow-up to my last post about the word douchebag, but since I haven’t yet called him that to his face, I’ll just keep it as is.
So where did I leave off in the project manager saga? Oh yes, he wanted me to move my code to production a month early, thereby reducing testing time in the environments where no real damage can be done. Then I had informed him that I was not aware of things being done that way in our area using a tone that said, “I’m not actually calling you a dickhead out loud, but I sure am thinking it.” See, I completely understand that it takes time to get up to speed when you first get to a company, but don’t be difficult while you’re doing it!
After that conversation with him, my supervisor actually got involved. He told the PM to schedule a meeting with all of the developers to hash out expectations of production dates. It actually went better than I expected. I started off by just stating that I think some of the confusion is coming from the fact that, in our area, we’ve never worked on the kind of timeline he’s trying to push. That’s something that’s done for other parts of the business, but not us. I assured him that if my code didn’t make it to production on February 29th that was perfectly fine because I still had the whole month of March to work with. I even told him that I could probably have it there by March 7th, but that it would not be in by February 29th. That’s one week later and still three weeks before the deadline. He seemed to accept that.
The only other hiccup that occurred shortly after that, was that the developer who was supposed to make the changes to the application I am responsible for got pulled off onto something else. That wasn’t a big deal, though, since I could just make the changes myself and start the process of moving the application to production. Therefore, I thought that would be the end of the drama. I made the changes and had the business test everything. I was right on schedule to move everything to pre-production on March 3rd and to production on March 7th. Part of the process we need to go through to move applications through the different environments is to get approvals from certain people. I sent my approval request email to my supervisor and to the PM. My supervisor sent his approval but things just couldn’t be that easy.
Now, the PM did send his approval, so I thought everything was fine. But then I got another email from him that just said “Tim, what happened to 2/29?” Remember what I wrote above? The last time I had spoken with him, I had told him that it would not be in production by February 29th. Not only that, but he had been copied in on the email that the business tester had sent on February 26th saying that everything tested fine and we could move to pre-production on March 3rd. The standard process here would not allow an application to move to production three days after being validated in the test environment. It’s not that it couldn’t happen, but it would require additional approvals and would be a big headache.
I was at a loss. I couldn’t figure out if the PM was really that oblivious or if he was intentionally being a jerk. I decided that either way, I should just let my supervisor handle it. The next morning, I had an email from my supervisor saying he wanted to discuss the whole deal with me. He had basically decided that in the interest of shutting the guy up and being done with the project, I should go ahead and move my application to production on February 29th or March 3rd. I told him that I disagreed with that because I really wanted my changes to have sufficient testing time in pre-production. So my supervisor (agreeing with me) said he would talk to the PM and say that the production move would be March 5th at the earliest. He also said that since then it would only be two more days to follow the standard procedures, he would try to talk the PM into just waiting until March 7th.
I should also point out that the PM actually was successful in getting another project to alter its schedule so that it could be in production by February 29th. What was the impact of that? Well, one of the other big projects I am working on was dependent on changes that were in progress on the application that had its schedule altered. So those changes had to be rolled back in order to meet the February 29th date. In other words, the PM is not just being a pain in my ass, he is also affecting the timelines of other projects. I can’t figure out who is letting him get away with this. My supervisor seems to be at a loss, too.
Anyway, as I said, my supervisor was going to try to get the PM to just agree to the standard date of March 7th. The next email I got from my supervisor said that I should plan on moving my stuff through on March 5th. So basically, he tried, but the PM pitched a fit about two more days. I want to stress again…this is still three weeks before anything actually has to be in production!
The good news is that I think I now have an answer to my question of whether the guy is an idiot or a jerk. Quibbling over two days no longer lets you skate by with the excuse that you just don’t understand the process. You’re a dick.
UPDATE: This is just too good to not include. Just as I was getting ready to post this to my blog over lunch, I got a call from my business tester. Remember that other application that had to have stuff rolled back in order to rush to that February 29th date? Well it did go to production…and users have now found a couple of things in production that were not supposed to be released yet. Had the normal process been followed, that most likely would have been caught in one of the other environments. But because of Super PM, it’s in production. I love being right.
The Douchebag Experiment… February 21, 2008
Posted by Tim in : Science, Silliness, Technology , 2commentsI have to give credit to my friend Jake for this one. It was his idea. I’m just doing the work. So what is this brilliant idea? Well, as the blog title suggests, I call it “The Douchebag Experiment”. Before I go into much detail about the experiment, I want to cover a few broad points concerning what it is:
- It is childish. But then, so am I.
- It is really quite pointless. But what’s better than childish pointlessness?
- It is not, by even the loosest definition of the term, an actual experiment. If you happen to be a real scientist or perhaps somebody with a rudimentary understanding of science who happened to stumble upon this blog post thinking - “Wow!!! Somebody finally did a scientific experiment on douchebags! Neat! I wonder what the control group was.”- I’m afraid you’re at the wrong place. For real science, I suggest The Skeptics’ Guide to the Universe. Those guys are fantastic and they definitely deal with douchebags on a regular basis.
Now, the actual details of “The Douchebag Experiment” are quite simple. The experiment involves the Web 2.0 website called Twitter. Twitter itself is a bit tough to explain. It is basically a means to keep all of your friends up to date with what you are doing. You can post messages on the website, or using text messaging on your mobile phone. You post a message saying what you are doing, and it gets distributed to everybody who is “following” you on Twitter. When people you are following post messages, you will see the messages on the web site, or get them as text messages on your phone. That’s the basic idea. But one other thing you can do with Twitter is to track keywords or phrases. For example, I live in Des Moines, Iowa, so I track the words “Des Moines”. That means when anybody at all posts a message to Twitter containing “Des Moines”, I will receive it. It’s actually a pretty good way to hear about things going on around town. It’s also a pretty good way to get called a dork by your friends. But that’s beside the point.
That ability to track phrases is at the heart of “The Douchebag Experiment”. Jake and I were talking one day and I think maybe the subject of the word “douchebag” got brought up. We were essentially talking about how popular the terms “douchebag” and “douche” have become as insults in the last couple years. Jake then came up with the idea to track them on Twitter. That’s about it. He had the idea, and I’m tracking them because it seemed like it would be funny. My goal is to let it go for awhile and see just how often those words are used on Twitter. I plan to post some of the wittiest I receive (anonymously, of course). I will also figure out some stats to apply or something. However I decide to proceed, I can tell you that if the first few days of the experiment are indicative of how it will continue, I will have more messages about douches and douchebags than I’ll be able to process.
Incidentally, one unexpected result that has come up so far is that I have learned the French word for shower. That word, of course, is douche. In addition to that, I have discovered that apparently, people who speak French really like to share thoughts about their shower experiences with their friends. I haven’t yet translated an entire message, but I assure you, I have a vast collection to choose from when I get around to it!
I will post more as the experiment progresses.
Here’s how a project manager can help foster the animosity between developers and project managers… February 15, 2008
Posted by Tim in : Corporate America , 1 comment so farOkay, so there’s a relatively new project manager at the company where I have been on a contract for a long time. I have recently had the misfortune of having this PM get assigned to a project with which I have had some dealings. It’s really quite remarkable that I’ve gone as long as I have without stuffing my foot in a place where he would like my foot not to be.
The kickoff to my interaction with this PM began a couple weeks ago when he sent a meeting request at 4:51 PM on a Tuesday for a 9:00 AM meeting on Wednesday. I had already left for the day and since contractors are not given laptops, I have no way of checking from home the email account that I have at the client. As it turned out, when I got in that Wednesday morning, I didn’t check my email first thing. I went straight over to talk to one of the architects about some issues on another project. So, that meant I didn’t check my email until 9:20 AM when I found out about the 9:00 AM meeting from which I was clearly absent. I had already heard rumors about the PM being a bit difficult to get along with from some of the other developers, but I thought even though I had missed the meeting, I would just find out from somebody else what had been discussed. Could it be that easy? Oh no, not at all. This guy had to send out meeting minutes to everyone, including supervisors, pointing out those of us (not just me) who were “missing” from the meeting. By the way, the whole point of this critical meeting was essentially to inform us that we needed to meet our deadlines. {GASP!!}
So, the PM was already on my good side, right? Well, it kept getting worse. He was breathing down my neck to find out when the changes were going to be done on one of the apps I support. Now, a couple things…
1) I’m not actually the one doing the development on the app for these changes. This is something I have told him multiple times.
2) The whole thing, which amounts to changing how 2 numbers are displayed in the app, doesn’t need to be done until March 31.
So, on February 7, he emailed me and asked when it would be done. I replied “probably a couple of weeks”. He replied, “February 21.???” Now I’m sorry…my unstated rule is that if you feel the need to repeat your sentence-terminating punctuation to me in such a fashion for this kind of topic, I’m going to assume you’re trying to piss me off and that it’s working. Of course, now that rule is actually stated. Oh well. Anyway, my reply to him was exactly this…
“Right now, I can’t give you anything more specific than probably a couple of weeks. I am meeting with [other developer] tomorrow. As I have said before, he is the one who will be doing the development. He has not worked on [project in question] before, so there will be a learning curve. I don’t anticipate that the actual changes will entail much, but I am not going to commit anybody to a specific date yet.”
The next morning, I had a reply from him informing me that everything needs to be in production by 2/29. No, I didn’t just have a typo. He is now saying 2/29. Not one developer had heard the date of 2/29. That’s a month early. So I went to my supervisor who is already aware of this guy’s disagreeableness (I may have just made that word up), and told him that I don’t know how to respond anymore without losing it. He told me not to worry about it, that he would handle it.
And what do you suppose happened? That’s right…while I was meeting with [other developer], [PM] came to my desk with a printed out project plan. Keep in mind that I was in the process of doing what he’d been hounding me to do. Evidently, that was a good time to f***ing interrupt me. He proceeded to show me on the project plan that if everything is supposed to be completely done on 3/31, we need to be in production on 2/29 so that there is a month of production verification. Yeah, right. I asked him why we would go to production a month early and he told me that it’s “Standard Operating Procedure here at [Company]”. This guy has been here about a month and a half. I assure you that is not SOP. I (not very politely) commented that I must have missed that “production verification” thing in the last 4 years. So basically, he wants to hurry it to production where anything that is wrong will cause real problems rather than have the verification phase be in pre-prod so we’re confident everything works by the time we go to production.
For those readers not familiar with the “developer of software/project manager of software development” culture clash, it’s really quite entertaining. Take one group of people who can’t imagine something not fitting into a Microsoft Project plan and have them try to lead another group of people whose basic mentality is, “F*** you and shut up so I can actually write some code”. The percentage of project managers who can actually pull that off is awfully small. It doesn’t happen as often as we’d like, but it does happen.
To be fair, we developers can be a real fickle bunch to work with. Our foremost attitude does seem to be, “F*** you and let me code”. It takes a special manager to realize that and just trust the coders to create the code. But rest assured, this project manager’s approach is not the way to make magic happen.
So you know what? I guess the real moral of the story is this…
To the project managers who do get what I’m saying, thank you. You are a pleasure to work with. And to the rest of the project managers who probably still think that you get what I’m saying but actually don’t…f*** you and let me code.
Here’s why I need to see the movie 10,000 BC… February 14, 2008
Posted by Tim in : Movies , add a commentThis post is going to be short and to the point. If you haven’t seen the trailers for 10,000 B.C., pause right now and go watch them. Then come back and we can continue.
Ready? As I said, here are the reasons I have for wanting to see this movie…
- Badass battle scenes
- Badass wooly mammoths
- Badass saber-tooth tigers
- I’m a dude
‘Nuff said.