Tuesday, February 28. 2006
This is a survey kind of blog entry which I'd like to know what's in your mind that a killer app should be. For example a lot of people think that iTunes, Google Maps, iFlickr and etc. are their favorite killer apps and they use those softwares almost everyday. May I know know yours?
Saturday, February 25. 2006
Wanted to better categorize my posts this morning and end up with only two categories: Computer and non-computer. I think it seeems to be enough and I'm happy because in real life based on the feedbacks and comments I get from friends, there are only two groups of them: who like to read technical stuff and who don't. Ok, done. I can keep on writing as usual finally. PS: Apparenly this one should be under "non-computer".
Friday, February 17. 2006
I was trying to open up J2SE 1.5 API docs by searching "j2se1.5 api". As usual, first with Google, I really don't like the result:  In contrast, Yahoo! is much better in this case (with exact search terms):  Finally I decided to change my behavior of web search from always using Google to using both Yahoo! and Google alternatively.
Wednesday, February 15. 2006
I'm asked many times when would I like to move up from programmer's job. Most of the times this question came from my friends who are also working as a programmer. It seems that most of the local programmers are hoping to move levels up within the organisation's ladder. It also means that most of the local programmers consider their current job some sort of ground and temporary work. Am I thinking too much or it is actually a fact?
This is the typical job position hierarchy in most of the local software companies (in terms of power, pay and authority):
Project Manager
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System Analyst
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Solution Architect
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Programmer
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Tester
Many of us strive for the project management role merely because of the mentioned factors (power, pay and authority). How many of them looking for project manager position because they like to manage customers and programmers? If they really do, will they be still enjoying in such position if they have lesser power, lesser authority and lower pay comparing to what programmers have?
Will this hierarchy possibly be changed where programmer can also be a very influential position? It indeed happens in US, but somehow, it just seems impossible for Malaysia.
I did not have to make a request and the company just gave me a new optical scroll mouse and no signature required. This incident made me questioned myself that why had I been filling forms just to get a tiny device, like a mouse. I understand that most of us feel not safe working at small company, or we don't choose small firm for a more valid reason, low pay and
financial unstability. There are two kinds of big company: good and not-so-good. Do you think Google will require their top coders filling up form just to get a keyboard or mouse while they're competing with Yahoo!, Microsoft and etc. into the extent that they release new feature almost every week?
"How can everyone get new hardware as they like, we must follow procedure". Sounds familiar?
Over here in the company I'm working at, we fix a bug only if it is reported in the issue tracking system, we must follow certain application building and deployment procedure and we verify articles before posting to our internal knowledge portal. But we don't have to do anything to get our 2-button mouses replaced.
PS: we should define, obey and follow those procedures which really offer benefits.
Tuesday, February 14. 2006
Glad to know that I have one more friend just entered the Blogosphere. It's quite a big surprise to me because he's been giving me the impression that he isn't the kind of person who would like to express feelings about anything to public. Anyway, I found out that he'd probably focusing on the topic of photography and as I know from him that he's trying extremely hard to master all kinds of skills and techniques of photo shooting. I'll be more than happy to follow his posts as often as I can, hopefully he will keep his posting short and often.  I'm pretty sure that there will be a lot of nice pictures coming on his blog. Enjoy! PS: Finally I won't have to ask him "Why don't you blog?" anymore
Monday, February 13. 2006
PM - Project manager (who don't know Java at all), Dev1 - developer 1, Dev2 - developer 2
PM: Can we call ActiveX from Java?
Dev1: (Rolling eyes) What is that for?
PM: Because we're having an existing ActiveX component which can generate PDF
Dev1: But there's bunch of free Java tools can do that also...
PM: But we already have an existing tool, so...
Dev2: (Exciting) Why don't we use Web service?
PM: You know how to do it?
Dev2: Yeah, Web service can literally call anything, and blah blah blah...
Dev1: (Faint) ...
Sunday, February 12. 2006
A friend of mine asked me what is it so cool about Matisse but unfortunately I was busy at the moment and didn't get the chance to discuss with him in more details. Many developers are having the wrong perception that Matisse is just trying to achieve what Visual Studio is having for years, as a matter of fact, it is much much more than that. Kindly follow this link to see one of the many cool things of Matisse.
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