This year’s unofficial University of Waterloo tour coincided with UW’s own Open House event, and took place on Tuesday, March 11th. Which just happened to be on the same date as the last year’s tour. This was my 3rd year organizing and hosting such campus orientations, and it was the best yet.

More people came out this year, though that also meant that it was harder to get a hold of everybody. It didn’t help that I was meeting most of the group, in person, for the first time. The planning stage was rushed, and I know that some people weren’t able to make it out due to conflicting plans. Sorry guys.

The theme for this year was “standing around in a circle”. We stood around in the Student Life Center, waiting for everybody to show up. We stood around in the DC Library waiting for late people to show up. And there was more standing around at various locations on campus, for a variety of reasons. Though we did manage to cover the Math/CS part of the campus, as well as a couple of residences. There was also a side-quest through the Robotics Club of Waterloo’s Engineering. There A.J. has managed to sneak in a game of speed-chess, for no apparent reason.

And as a tradition, now 3 years in the making, we finished with a round of wings at the Molly Blooms pub, on campus plaza. What I find the best about such tours, is that they are very social events, not scripted “sell this University to students” guides. Over food, the entire group discusses the tour, the impressions of campus, the quirks specific to this University, but also why we still stick around. It’s a good mix of prospective high school students with University undergrads that generate a compelling discussion.

For combo points, everybody was also a compsci.ca member, so it was an excellent chance to meet and get to know the people in the community. Besides the Waterloo’s campus, we also got to discuss the Canadian Computing Competition, DWITE, obviously Computer Science and Programming, but also the structure of the Universe and the elective courses one can take to understand it all better.

It’s been great fun. I’ll be putting together another University of Waterloo campus tour in March 2009, let me know if you are interested in joining us for some wings!

Related posts:

1. University of Waterloo Tour + Wings 2007
2. it’s a Student Life
3. Getting into University of Waterloo

The entire setup runs off my shiny MacBook — 2 Ghz Intel Core 2 Duo, 2 GB RAM. And yes, that’s a pair of rubber duckies that help me with my software development.

The main screen is occupied by Eclipse, while the laptop’s screen hosts webserver and autotest logs. The extra space is crucial for the development as it allows space to keep the background tasks by the side, not in the background. Having autotest visible is exceptionally useful as it lets me know if I’m breaking any code (assuming I keep up with writing my specs that is). Though then again, maybe a second monitor just makes me feel better about myself.

No related posts.

My consulting work, as a Web Developer, sometimes requires cross-browser development. It’s an annoyance to find common ground between different CSS implementations in different browsers. Though I hear JavaScript is worse. So while working at the office, we had a machine dedicated to testing with IE. Now that I’m back at the University of Waterloo, the fact that I don’t own a copy of Microsoft Windows is becoming much more apparent.

I need to run Windows to run IE to test websites I make. Hmm…

Got it. I’ll get myself a MacBook!

So there you have it – I have bought myself a MacBook for the sole purpose of testing websites with Internet Explorer. Well that’s not quite true. I wanted an Apple laptop for quite some time, but I didn’t really need one. My Linux powered laptop has performed well over the last 3 years. In fact, I would have probably continued on with it for a while yet, if it wasn’t for this work related necessity.

A MacBook is a wonderful development laptop. The hardware specs are an amazing improvement over 3 year old state of the art. It puts me in the very enjoyable and very productive OS X environment. And BootCamp makes dual-booting into Windows a snap.

It’s been a while since I was this excited about getting a new piece of technology!

Related posts:

1. My workstation setup

right now I would jump at an opportunity to learn something brand new, over doing more of the same

GigPark was more of Ruby and Rails, but it didn’t even come close to doing anything of the same. This little Canadian startup is full of big ideas, and I got to contribute to the design process and to implement a lot of the features. It felt really good to have worked on a project that is publicly accessible, and has a userbase of people other than just your boss. I can now claim to have contributed to building a little piece of the world wide web.

At the start of the job, I’ve pointed out how much fun it was, and it remained so throughout the term largely due to the awesome people (aww, I didn’t make it into the contributors list) I worked with! Noah Godfrey (you need to get yourself a blog), Pema Hegan, and Paul Dowman made for a wonderful team. It would be difficult to match the fun, challenging, productive, rewarding, simply amazing environment that those guys created for me.

During the last day, I was taken out for lunch, and presented with a going-away gift of a bunch of giftcards. Starbucks (coffee), Cineplex (movies), Futureshop (tech gadgets), and LCBO (I am yet to blog about having a party). Not quite an iPhone (*hint* *hint*), but little gestures like this do wonders for students, as it’s definitely a show off point for when everybody exchanges workterm stories during the first days of classes.

If there’s something I’d like to see improved in the future for myself, it would have to be a nicer office location (something with a coffee shop across the street), and a faster commute route (that’s also closer to my girlfriend’s house). Every other job metric will be difficult to beat, as this was easily my best workterm yet. Thx guys!

No related posts.

I’ve received a letter from my Internet Service Provider, Sympatico Bell Canada, today. Frank and Gordon, Bell’s mascot beavers, have dressed up in scientist / engineer white lab coats and were welcoming me to “the next generation of consistent speed”. It has been two weeks since I demanded to have a fibre optics network installed, and apparently Bell has done just that.

As you may know, Bell has installed a state-of-the-art fibre optic network in your neighbourhood. And we are thrilled to announce that we have moved your current Internet service onto this powerful, new network, at no additional charge.

Score! Lets hear this again – Bell has installed a state-of-the-art fibre optic network in your neighbourhood. Sounds good, doesn’t it? The problem is that my download speed still caps out at the same 4000something kilobits per second, just as it did before this network was installed. Must be limited in the modem itself, after all, there’s still room to pay more for a faster plan.

Oh well, at least all this excess bandwidth should ensure more consistency, stability, etc. And I was given a shiny, plastic, “Speed of Light Internet License”.

Bearer entitled to travel at speed of light on the new fibre optic network.

That might be technically true, but there’s got to be some artificial delays somewhere to make my bandwidth average out to be the same as before. Darn.

No related posts.

Jessica Hagy of Indexed has put things into a nice perspective.

I’m an amateur programmer, I write code for fun, but I also get paid well – for a computer science student. I love my work! I am lucky enough to work with Ruby and Rails. I’m finally getting to figure out AJAX, and more in-depth JavaScript. All this Web 2.0 awesomeness contributes to the “oh, it’s 6pm already? I guess I should go home now…” type of reaction, instead of packing up at 4:55. There is an overwhelming feeling of accomplishment when my code begins to work as it should, and once more when I put the task paper back on the wall, marked with an all done sticker. Alright, I’ll check for your email now.

Though it seems that not everybody is as fortunate, and it appears to be especially bad for many students. Lacking experience and educational credentials, there is little room to be picky about jobs. Some companies worsen the problem by advertising positions through Universities, but are really looking for cheap, disposable labour. Last year I met 4 students from my University (Mechanical and Mechatronics Engineering) who all worked on synchronizing AutoCAD drawings with database data – apparently it’s cheaper to hire a bunch of students than to invest into a piece of software that does the same thing.

In the above example, the guys got as much Facebook experience as they did of technical AutoCAD. Alright, I can see them wasting the day away, chatting to other bored students who don’t particularly care for their Quality Assurance tasks.

Clearly they are in the wrong field. You’ve got to do what you love. Now that I’m here, I can continue on improving my salary with more experience, finishing my undergraduate degree in Computer Science, etc – though not at the expense of enjoyment of what I do. I suppose everything has its price, but I will not cross to the left of the Professional-Amateur line. So that’s why I am not on MSN or Facebook during the day – it’s distracting from what I want to be doing. I might check Digg’s technology/programming sections though.

So where do you find yourself on the graph, and how do you plan on getting to where you want to be instead? Reply with a comment!

No related posts.

Turns out that I am not a complete computer addict, I have managed to survive a day without a computer, without serious withdrawal effects. It was an interesting experience to get myself unplugged from the intrinsic wired environment, and it placed the hyper-communicative networks we have grown to be so accustomed to, into a new perspective.

Things to do offline

Computer’s disqualification has created what seemed like a plethora of free time, where “free time” is defined as a resource no longer allocated for the typical activities. Refreshing change. Highlights that filled up the day included:

• Gone to sleep earlier
• Advanced through Isaac Asimov’s Robot Series books
• Watched tv
• Spend time with family
• Improved game skills for Super Smash Bros

What I’ve missed

Without a doubt, email. To be completely accurate, it would actually be connectivity. Though email is the building block of online communication, so it makes for a representative answer. I knew that notices of new blog comments would be emailed to my inbox. I wondered if someone was looking for my response to some issue.

I felt disconnected from the outside world. Any news would be substantially delayed, and people seeking my attention would have to find alternate routes of communication. I would have to find alternate routes of communication. I actually had to warn some people of my scheduled online absence, as such impairment to the expected channel of reach would have came as a shock. My girlfriend did not understand the decision behind this feat, but I suspect that she welcomed the extended phone conversation that followed in place of text chat. (It is too bad that we were unable to go out on that day)

Lessons learned

This actually made for a psychological vacation, away from the information overload that we are exposed to each day. A welcomed break, though I found myself returning to twice the amount of usual spam, and a pile of unread RSS feed items.

Obviously a new appreciation for the ease of communication. Hundreds of contacts, whom I don’t really know all that well, just a few clicks away on any social website of choice. Actually it is also reassuring that I can still easily get in touch with my entire close circle of friends, regardless of application server explosions or datacenter fires.

Finally, I’ve learned that I have interests outside of the office chair, and that dedicating some extra time could seriously enhance the new hobbies and activities. So next time you catch yourself refreshing a page, waiting for some new story/post/email to come up and fill your time – invest that time into something else instead. What would you do with an extra hour to spend?

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Another world wide social experiment is sweeping the internets. A global shutdown day aims to test if we can go for a day without a computer, and if so – what will happen? I can only hope that the experiment will not extend pass the recreational use, as even a minor disturbance to the vital channels of communication can quickly turn the developed world to that of chaos. Virtually every aspect of our lives is handled by a computer system, at some level. Broken traffic lights, and planes falling out of the sky are common elements of movies exploring similar scenarios.

So in order to continue living (something I currently enjoy doing) for long enough to reflect on the results of the experiment (the details of any measure are left as an exercise for the reader), let us limit the attempts to our personal computers. Conveniently enough the day, March 24th, is a Saturday, so you don’t even have to miss work to participate.

There are plenty of things to do… I think. There’s a whole video – “You don’t have to turn your computer on to have fun with it”, full of ideas. 1:30 in length, quite entertaining actually.

I will be participating just to show myself that I can in fact do this. So here’s the deal, I’m looking for suggestions as to what to do, on this no doubt sunny day. 10°C, possibly scattered showers. If you think you can survive for a day without your computer, what would you do? If not, leave a comment with some ideas for me, I will consider anything short of permanently damaging hardware.

Related posts:

1. The difference between Computer Scientist and Computer Engineer [according to SMBC]

I think it is essential to really research the University, and visit its campus, before committing to 4 or 5 years of study. Twice so, if the University of interest is in a new city. So I am organizing my second annual unofficial University of Waterloo campus tour and wings.

The event is open to all forum members, blog subscribers, and pretty much anyone else who contacts me with interest. The latter you have to do anyways, to find the group. So if you are still deciding on choosing a University, want to get a head start with campus orientation, or are simply looking to meet and hang out with fellow community members – you are invited.

The event will take place on Sunday, March 11th, 2007 – it’s March break (I think), it’s on a weekend, it’s got to be a free time to come out to Waterloo. It will be fun, I promise! After the campus tour we’ll meet up at Molly Bloom’s, the Irish Pub, for some chicken wings and chat.

Coming out (besides myself) are:

• Geoff “Cervantes”
• Martin
• Adrian “Hikaru79″
• Clayton “Freakman”

Small group, but it went quite well last year. Let me know if you are interested, or just leave a comment with any general questions.

Related posts:

1. University of Waterloo Tour 2008
2. it’s a Student Life

Blogging will begin to play a much larger role in this year’s hyper-social internet communities. Digg, del.icio.us, YouTube, and especially discussions taking place in blog’s comments – the social drive encourages to build up an online profile, representation of self, for others. In part this is why MySpace took off into the popularity that it got to enjoy, though I can only hope that people will realize that flashy glitter profiles are not the best for being taken seriously.

This idea was originally sparked by Keith Ferrazzi and his book – “Never Eat Alone”:

“In the future … blogs will become as ubiquitous as resumes.”

I think that 2007 will be that future. Blogs will make their way into the corporate environment. There are some companies with services for corporate blogging, and I already print this blog’s URL on my resume, right under the contact information. And yes, I have been asked about it in a couple of interviews.

This is why I also hope for a distinction between blogs that are treated as personal journals for friends, family and self, from blogs that are a publishing platform between the author and the world. It is time to move away from Technorati’s tagline of “55 million blogs… some of them have to be good.” to 9rules‘ “Explore the best content on the web.” I want to see that difference.

Have an opinion? Leave a comment, or write your own post!

In the suggested manner of tagging the next 5 bloggers, I’d love to hear an update from Keith Ferrazzi himself, as well as some predictions from Keith Casey, Ilya Grigorik, Jonathan Snook and Aidan Henry.

Update: Keith Casey’s trackbackless response has been posted. It’s quite insightful.

“Blogs offer both a look at the person generally and the topic specifically. Any employer not dropping a candidate’s name into Google at this point is missing one of the biggest and best tools for research.”

Related posts:

1. Technorati Noise
2. Rolling with 9rules – best weblogs in the world