Thursday, February 19, 2004

I hate Pepsi, but the iTunes promotion has me trying to get by with this inferior product. Thanks to some geeks that have found a way to determine if a bottle is a winner my efforts are not in vain.

On to more important things. WebSphere Studio is outstanding. The IDE is everything I've always wanted in an environment such as this. Some really cool features:

Scrapbook Pages--Every time I want to try out something, I have to build a bunch of code around it to get it to work and see if it will fit my need. Scrapbook pages eliminate this. They work very similar to a SQL query tool, where you type the code you want, highlight what you want to execute and wham, off it goes. Pretty damn sweet. It's basically a scratchpad for code; wicked cool.

Debugger--The debugger in this product is the best I have ever seen. It allows you to virtually change everything to your code as it exectutes and has full error trapping functionality with the ability to trace back the stack calls to find out where your problem originated. Much higher code quality is bound to ensue from anyone that uses this tool.

Back to the books.

Wednesday, February 11, 2004

My evolution as a Java programmer is slowing gaining speed.

After working a bit with Websphere Studio and being constantly reminded each time that the software starts that it will only work for 60 days, it became clear that I needed something free. Because free is good. And because a retail single user license for Websphere Studio Application Developer is $4300.00. Hey, IBM, you realize that I can get MSDN Enterprise for less than that!

Since Websphere Studio is built on top of Eclipse, I decided to download the standard Eclipse software and installed Sun’s Java SDK to integrate with Eclipse. Free. Did I mention that I like free?

Anyway, I’ve been working my way through one of my older Java programming books that I worked through before. Everything is coming back to me, and I’m really, really enjoying the Eclipse IDE. For me, missing a nicely designed IDE is the one thing that really made Java programming a hassle in comparison to Visual Studio. The little wizard to build a simple class is just wicked cool. I don't even have to remember "public static void main(String [] args)" again!

VisualAge for Java was overly complex for no reason, which is one of the reasons it is no longer a product, so it’s nice to see that IBM’s influence on Eclipse turned out very well.

Tuesday, February 10, 2004

I hate people. This is no secret. I especially hated several people at the San Diego Zoo on Sunday.

While viewing the hippos, you may choose one of two bi-level paths. The back path is a bit more raised so that you can see over the people that have chosen the front path. We chose the back path because the front path was crowded.

Person #1: Turns around to see if anyone is standing behind her. She sees me, and looks directly at my two year old son. Despite this, she steps up onto a bench so now she is directly blocking all of our views.

Since I’m in touch with my inner asshole, I loudly pronounce to the kids that we should move down “where we can see past the rude people.” She looked back as if I were the rude one for calling her rude.

Man, it really should be legal to punch someone in the face when they act like an imbecile.


A punch in the face to solve stupidity



So, the kids and make our way to the other side of the hippo enclosure, and come down to the front path to sit on a bench and watch the hippos play in the water.

Person #2: She begins to incessantly talk in a baby voice that “they love each other” and “they are playing with each other, awwww.” What’s with the baby voice?

Again, this merits a punch in the face.

Monday, February 09, 2004


Tivo spelled backwards is "Ovit."
I'm sure that's something evil.


Tivo is evil.

That’s a hard admission on my part, but it is absolutely true. I have the fortune of having two lovely children, one of whom is two years old. However, letting my son get used to Tivo has gone too far. You see, my son does not know of life without Tivo. This fact has escaped me until now.

I journeyed to San Diego this weekend with my children to attend a friend’s wedding and to also to say goodbye to Hua Me. Saturday evening, we stayed at a local hotel and were getting ready for bed. I managed to get both kids tucked in and thankfully, The Lion King was on television. I let them watch the movie as they were falling asleep. Or so I thought.

A few minutes into the movie, the first commercials began showing. My son was visibly upset, nay pissed that I was not fast-forwarding through the commercials. I tried to explain that there was no Tivo here. Unfortunately, the reasoning of a two year old is “Dad’s being an ass for making me watch these lame commercials.” And that is how I spent my Saturday evening; being yelled at by a two year old. The fact that I kept laughing at him probably didn’t help.

I rest my case: Tivo is evil.

Thursday, February 05, 2004


I now officially have Websphere Studio Application Developer running on my laptop. The session that I attended at Lotusphere that explained some of the install issues made it sound like this was a monumental task. It wasn’t. It installed very easily, albeit a bit slow since you have to download binary files, compile them into install images, and then finally install the files.

On the surface, the IDE looks every bit as nice as Visual Studio .NET. Of course, I’m a Java neophyte, so “it looks pretty” probably isn’t the greatest product endorsement.

Hopefully, I’ll have enough time in the near future to put these technologies through the wringer so I can make well informed judgments on exactly where I stand between Microsoft and IBM technologies.

Wednesday, February 04, 2004

The holidays and my vacation are in the books, so the day I returned, I immediately went back onto the Atkins diet. I had gained about 15 lbs. of weight back during the last 2 months, and considering all of the sweets that I ate, I'm surprised I hadn't gained quite a bit more.

I'm tired of people telling me that everyone that loses all the weight on the diet gains it all back, so there's no reason to go on the diet. What a fucking cop out. Please stop telling me this when I talk to you, because eventually, someone is going to get punched directly in the face. What's worse, it's usually people that I generally respect as well-educated and well informed. My opinion on the subject is that you can lose whatever you want, go off of your diet, and when a certain threshold is reached, jump back on the diet. It's really not that hard. Stop with the excuses.

I have to say that restarting Atkins is much easier than other diets. I really didn't dread the first day coming, and quite frankly, I've missed the ability to eat quite a bit of food, always feeling full, and still losing weight (3 lbs. since Saturday). I also really missed the steady energy burn I enjoy all day instead of after meal lulls in the late morning and afternoon.

And the fast food industry is making life much easier. I had the opportunity to try a Subway Atkins wrap as well as a Carl's Jr. Low Carb Six Dollar Burger. Both were outstanding. I thought that the Subway wrap was a bit overpriced for a relatively small meal, but when time is short, this is a great place to stop and get something that tastes great and is hot. The burger at Carl's is simply outstanding. Even if you aren't on a low carb diet, you should try a burger wrapped in a bunch of lettuce versus a bun. I actually think it tastes better! I love In-N-Out's burgers protein style, but Carl's burger is much larger and more satisfying. I hope these products stay around. They make this diet so much easier to stay committed too!