- There’s something to be said for the light rain after a large storm.
- Some days I feel like I can tackle the world. The only problem is tackling the world takes more than a day.
- When in doubt, follow the path before you, but when you see an opportunity for a better route, take it.
- When looking for a particular file suffix, look from the back of the file name.
- When tracking down cupcakes in a convoluted mess of cubicles, one feels a bit like a rat in a maze hunting cheese.
- Mistakes are heavier when wrapped in red tape. Hence, by refining the red tape to be a finer material, we can reduce the weight of mistakes.
- Restarting Windows is like restarting a relationship. It might fix the most recent problem, but the fundamental flaws remain.
- You know you’ve been working too much when you attempt sign into your personal blog with your work ID.
- Every line of code in a block should be at the same level of abstraction.
- If an algorithm dominates a function, separate it into a helper function.
Inspiration: “Brick by Boring Brick” by Paramore
I grew up listening to stories about King Arthur, Davie Crockett, and Paul Bunyan. From there I began reading about Crusades, Roman Legions, Samurai, and World War II platoons. I played Final Fantasy videogames and lived in a world that was all my own. I had an active imagination as most kids do. I became enchanted with the ability to mix history into the stories of our fictional media. It made them seem as if there was a chance they could be real. After all, Medieval stories are full of dragons and demons despite being based on factual events. Is it so hard to believe that such a story as Final Fantasy VI could have truly happened with some slight modifications? I know it did not, but the historical traces laced throughout give it the credence to allow our minds to be encaptured.
Many of the greatest kings remembered in the history books or among the stories of the people are known as warrior scholars. They fought their battles, and when they had an opportunity to rest, they studied. Most focused on topics along the lines of politics, economics, and military strategy. However, there were also those with interests in religion, astrology, astronomy, and agriculture. A man with a talent for battle was a scary sight. A man with a talent for battle and a brain for making the battle easy was something to truly fear.
Lately, I have been associating with this image. I recently graduated college and took a short hiatus to get away from everything. It was a nice break including family, friends, Christmas, snowboarding, and videogames. Yesterday, I returned to the working world. I say return because after three internships and a couple student jobs, I do not feel like it is a wholly new experience. To me, going to work is stepping onto the battlefield. My coworkers are fellow soldiers, and the problems encountered in breaking greater service to the clients is the force opposing us. It is where I employ everything I have learned over the years. It is where all the training comes to the forefront.
Then I go home in the evening. Where medieval kings may have played chest by candle light, I dabble in web development and other programming projects. They are miniature versions of problems I may encounter at work. I begin to expose the forces at play and develop tactics to meet them. I spend time reading books and blogs. I watch enlightening shows on the television. You may think all I do is watch sports, but I argue that football relates to far more of life than the local three-day forecast.
Tonight’s agenda is no different. Tonight, I resume reading The Art of War.
- Programs suck because humans are still involved.
- It really sucks to get an itch on the top of your foot when you are wearing shoes and your hands are dirty.
- The concept of sleep sucks. We should adjust the concept of work/class accordingly.
- Never program in MUMPS.
- “It is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong.” -Voltaire
- Drama is synonymous with bad team dynamics.
- 4-3 Cover 2 is the best base defense in football. Period.
- How many kings could King Kong kong if King Kong could kong kings?
- It turns out “carpe diem” does not shift to “carping the diem” when going from a simple present to present continuous verb tense.
- “Survival of the fittest” used to mean the strong ones watched the weak ones die. Now it means the strong ones pay the bills for the weak ones; so, the weak ones do not have to work. Who are the strong ones now, then?
- Selling a 1080p television to an elderly person wearing bifocals is like selling uggs to a war veteran with no legs
- “Compliance compensates for times when normal market forces fail to provide adequate alignment of interests. For example, when organizations in a position to protect data aren’t responsible for the losses.” – Courtesy of Jeremiah Grossman
- Java is the current latin of programming languages
- Preparing code to change is a lot harder than making the first change without thinking about it
- When building onto a bad system, trying to do things right only makes everything more complicated
- The Unix terminal tab auto-complete feature is the best auto-complete implementation in existence. More systems need to mimic its functionality.
- Programming languages should never use single characters (e.g. $, @, %) to signify data types or other information about variables.
- Programming in pajamas or sweats is 100x more productive than programming in business attire.
- Some people draw ugly pictures because they cannot envision beautiful pictures.
- Some people write ugly programs because they cannot envision beautiful programs.
- Teachers and tech support have two very different perspectives on questions. Teachers say, “there is no stupid question.” Tech support asks, “why does everyone ask stupid questions?”
- The only things to fear are fear itself and bad code.
- Java was designed by software engineers who think programmers are better when their jobs are so structured there is no room for error. Unfortunately, the lack of room for success forces errors.
- Programming in Java is like trying to draw a picture using only straight lines.
- Agile development is the hippy approach to programming
- Upon experiencing deja vu while looking at code, it is time to refactor.
- Do not sit at the head of your bed late at night when you have gas if you intend to sleep on said bed.
- Some people just don’t get “while [1]; wget –delete-file $file; done”
- “Hierarchy is natural.” -Dr. James Robinson
- TVGuide.com does not consider the World Series of Poker to be a sport despite it being broadcast on ESPN.
In the past few months, three broad classes of people have been made really obvious to me. I have seen it online playing videogames, at work, and in my classes. I have decided to throw them out here and see what sort of a reaction I get. The three classes are the leaders, advisors, and sheeple. Because I find they have very interesting parallels to common class distinctions in ancient cultures, I have listed their historical parallels in parentheses after the class name.
Sheeple (Commoners)
The sheeple class is by far the largest of the three. The people in this group do the grunt work. They show up at their eight-to-five jobs day in and day out. They will gain a few raises and promotions as their experience grows, but their destiny is limited. They exist because work needs to be done. Most of their purpose will be replaced by mindless drones in the coming decades, maybe centuries, but I doubt it. In all honesty, if one dies tomorrow, the world will never know. Those in direct contact will be upset momentarily before work resumes once again. Their lives are grinding. Fortitude and endurance for monotony are perhaps their most redeeming qualities. They have either come to accept their place in life or live on with misguided delusions of grandeur. It is a sad, cold, hard life they live.
Advisors (Priests)
Advisors are the experts in their respective fields. This includes not only professors, but also those out actively working. While they may very well be doing some of the same work as sheeple, they are working constantly to push the limits. They are inventing new techniques and technologies. They have come up through the status quo, and now challenge it. They have seen how things are, but yet understand how they could be. Their passion is for their work. This most often prevents them from organizing large change. They do not have time to bother with engaging others and convincing them of the greatness of their ideas. More often than not, they publish their ideas in some way that a leader can get a hold of them. They are rewarded for their insight and talents. They will not be glorious figures, but footnotes in history books. History remembers them not as changing the direction of civilization, but as the creators of new things. Those things are then responsible for impacting society. More often than not, there are several advisors behind every great leader.
Leaders (Warriors)
Leaders have a natural skill for knowing when and how to connect the new creations of advisors with the common sheeple. They craft mass opinion in a way to drive their respective communities forward. Their talent is not in new creations, but in rallying the masses around the developments of others. Leaders have best-seller autobiographies. The greatest of them are remembered forever in history books. They are self-starters. They seize upon an idea, and strive to make it reach its full potential. It is not about developing further upon the idea, but rather, embracing the idea into current practice. Their knowledge is more diverse than an advisor, but not as deep. They are dependent on advisors for guiding them in the right direction as well as providing a new direction to guide the sheeple. They also require the sheeple to affect the mass change which makes their efforts meaningful. While perhaps the most prestigious of the classes, it is a symbiotic relationship.
- Successful people are busy. I am busy. Does that mean I am successful??
- Bad things happen to good people because God is kept up all night answering prayers. Then he gets tired and cranky. That’s why I am known for taking days to sleep 12+ hours.
- Man created fire, and then he became a social creature.
- Then man created dukies, also known as cops, and fires became less fun.
- “In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. But, in practice, there is.” -Courtesy of Jeremiah Grossman
- No football defense should use the Cover 3 as its base coverage scheme.
- Andy Roddick lost in the 2009 US Open because CBS chose not to show his match on national television.
- The “your computer might be at risk” warning provided by the Windows operating systems may be one of the dumbest warnings known to mankind.
- The word short is longer than the word long. The word skinny is fatter than the word fat.
- When asked in a job interview, “Are you a self starter??” Do not respond, “I set myself on fire once. Does that count??”