Category: it could be called work

Monster – My Monster

I just cleaned out all my ineffectual resumes and job search agents at Monster.com.

Good riddance.

University of Washington

I begin employment with the University of Washington’s Shidler Center for Law, Commerce, and Technology on January 13, after 101 weeks of involuntary retirement.

OrcaWare Consulting – Orca Documentation

Paul Beard’s description of how to set up Orca on a number of Solaris hosts

Got a note from the author of ORCA that he was including a link to these notes at his site.

I may once again join the ranks of the paid (and insured) working class. I’m not going to slay the fatted vegetable calf just yet, but perhaps next Tuesday I’ll be able to muster some honest enthusiasm.

tried to look at the Pacific Science Center’s website this morning . . . . couldn’t resolve their address.

Here’s why:

[/home/paul]:: dig pacsci.org ns


; <<>> DiG 8.3 <<>> pacsci.org ns
;; res options: init recurs defnam dnsrch
;; got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 2 ;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 2, AUTHORITY: 0, ADDITIONAL: 2 ;; QUERY SECTION: ;; pacsci.org, type = NS, class = IN

;; ANSWER SECTION:
pacsci.org. 1d3h11s IN NS DNS1.pacsci.org.
pacsci.org. 1d3h11s IN NS DNS2.pacsci.org.


;; ADDITIONAL SECTION:
DNS1.pacsci.org. 1d4h25m28s IN A 204.29.25.5
DNS2.pacsci.org. 1d4h25m28s IN A 204.29.25.6


;; Total query time: 34 msec
;; FROM: blue.paulbeard.org to SERVER: default — 204.127.198.4
;; WHEN: Sun Dec 29 11:18:28 2002
;; MSG SIZE sent: 28 rcvd: 98

Both their name servers are on the same network segment and neither can be pinged. Having two next to each other is worse than having just one, since it leads to a false sense of security/redundancy. If something breaks connectivity or power to one, you lose both.

onfocus.com : free to the public

For many jobs I’ve applied for, these general knowledge skills like application design and user experience design rarely come up. In fact, I’ve often had to fill out a grid of numbers: years of experience with given technologies. I imagine they take these grids and input them into a computer, calculating scores for all applicants. I know it’s not that cut and dried in reality, but when programmers are hiring programmers it makes sense that they’d come up with an algorithm so they don’t personally have to focus on the task.

It’s not the programmers of technical folks who try to pigeonhole you: it’s the HR types who don’t know the technology and what skills are transferable. If you know C/C++, the various scripting languages or java would be easily grokkable (not so going the other way): the HR person reviewing resumes against job descriptions is going to pass on someone who doesn’t have the magic buzzwords on their application.

a friend writes . . . . .
the proposed state budget has thrown the school into a panic. signs of
bureaucratic fraying are evident. i’m juggling tuition deferments until
my subsidy is processed, and i’ve been informed that it won’t be procesed
until after the deadline. translation: “we will pay your tuition, but not
until we drop you from your classes”. i’m told i am far from the only
student in this situation right now. the only reason i haven’t been
dropped from my classes is because a couple of school employees have
agreed to temporarily misplace my paperwork. talk about personalized
customer service….

Ben Hammersley.com: RSS to iCal

In a fit of madness, I made RSS feed of all the homepages of people who have commented on this blog in the past month.

This is an interesting idea: how better to populate a blogroll than with people who’ve commented on your posts?

I’ve had this HP1100 for a few years, and while it worked quite well for most of that time,it started having issues taking up just one sheet of paper. It would take up 2 or 3 and then invariably jam. Annoying, to say the least. Turns out it’s a defect . . .

Individuals experiencing problems with the printer mis-feeding and multi-feeding, should try this URL:

http://www.hp.com/cposupport/printers/support_doc/bpl10122.html

and on that page we find this:

ISSUE: The HP LaserJet printer experiences increasing multiple feeds, misfeeds, and input jams toward the end of the warranty or the service life. The separation pad installer provides a one-time solution to the issue of multi-feeds and jams caused by the hardening of the old pad.

Oh, well then. I’ll just order the replacement thingie and then I can stop hand feeding this thing one sheet at a time.

And the scheduled delivery? December 25th. Bet they don’t deliver it on the day, but merry christmas to me, anyway.

Vorsite Corporation – Content Management Solution Specialists

DPVStore extends SPS and enables content contributors to auto-populate meta-data information entered during the check-in process. The add-in helps to simplify the check-in process, decreasing time to market and promoting fresh content. System administrators can install DPVStore in a matter of minutes with minimal configuration.

“Content contributors can quickly tag their documents with previously saved personalized data within seconds, decreasing the amount of time it takes to complete the check-in process and increasing employee productivity,” said Diane Gallagher, Vice President and co-founder. “We are dedicated to providing the business community with tools to increase productivity and decrease time to market.”

So how does creating additional work — tagging documents with “appropriate” tags — increase productivity? What’s needed is something that eliminates tagging, meta-data, or any other kludges and can derive thematic information from the untreated content.

I wasn’t aware anyone was still working this old notion.