WTF KFC ATM LOLZ

Remember the days when the Internet first started and all of a sudden there was this new language to learn?

I think they called it ‘net-speak’ or something as innovative as that.

My first experience of such a phenomenon was the emoticon, back in 1994. I was one of those dorky Uni guys that would spend most of the day in the computer labs discovering this new thing called ‘The Internet’ which meant that I could talk to random strangers on the other side of the world IN REAL TIME.

I mean, how cool was that? I was saying something and then someone else was saying something back, and it’s not even a phone!

So, anyway, I was using Telnet to connect to these servers which hosted things called MUDS, or MUCKS where you would connect to a virtual world as a character and then go around talking to people, jumping around and being a fool or doing other such unsavoury activities that a 17 year old might do. Especially when you are 17 year old that spends all day in a computer lab.

I digress. I started noticing people were ending their sentences with 🙂 or ;). I thought it was some sort of way to end a sentence, or that they had simply added extra random characters at the end of their line.

Then one day, someone told me to turn my head to the left.

All of a sudden, 🙂 became something different altogether.

Over the coming years we would be bombarded with every emoticon possible. Even Slash uses his special Slash emoticon on this twitter feed  – Iii|; )

Not only was the emoticon an innovation, so were the net acronyms. The first one I came across was brb, closely followed by bbs, atm, irl and ttfn. Although to be fair, ttfn was stolen from Tigger.

Of course, the big one. The real doozy of a netcronym (like what I did there?) is LOL. Fucking Laugh Out Fucking Loud. It shits me. It always has. I have never used it. I don’t laugh out loud very often I guess, but really, does anyone that writes LOL really Laugh Out Loud when they are typing? Based on my in-depth research I would say. NO.

Instead, I use the eloquent and succinct ‘hehehe’. You see, it gives the impression that you think something is funny with a little snigger, but doesn’t go over the top with the whole boisterous laugh about something not very funny.

The even weirder thing is that nowadays the old acronyms are becoming everyday vernacular.

People are LOLing and OMGing all over the place. I have been known to drop to odd ZOMG and FFS as well.

I have no problem with this, for the most part. I feel that I am a part of the generation that helped to bring The Internet to the masses and reveal this whole other side of geekdom.

I may not use telnet any more, but it’s sure nice to know that 16 years later there are still remnants of those first few weeks of ‘online’ time that live on today..

Oh yeah, and enjoy this clip 🙂

I felt the Force. It was sorta squishy.

Yesterday I shot up to Sydney for a day trip with my eldest son who has a recent fascination with Star Wars.

I think that this is an awesome thing because the Star Wars movies were an obsession of mine when I was a kid and I still love them today.

The Powerhouse Museum has been showing a Star Wars exhibition for the last 6 months or so.

There’s a collection of models, costumes and kids activities on show and it was very entertaining! I wish there were things like this when I was younger.

I took quite a few snaps of the models and puppets used in the movie.

Did you know that Chewbacca was a runty wookiee?

Did you know that Wookiee is spelt with 2 e’s?

Did you that that they used real buildings in Tunisia for some of the Tatooine scenes?

Too bad the exhibition closes at the Powerhouse this weekend, but if you’ve heading to Melbourne, it’ll be there for 5 months from June!

It was nice to have a father/son day. Especially when we could talk about superheroes, aliens and cartoons all day!

There’s something wonderful about having a child grow up to share similar interests. Not that they’re not allowed to have their own interests of course, but I love that we can communicate about these things so well and it takes me back to my childhood.

Fortunately he also follows the Eels and Brumbies 🙂

It’s Download Day!

Be part of a World Record and go and download Firefox 3 NOW.

There is currently no official record for the most downloaded software in a day, but Firefox is hoping to set it TODAY (from 10am Colorado time)

It’s easily the best browser around. I have been using Firefox 3 Release Candidate 3 without issue for the last few weeks. There are some handy new features, such as:

The Awesome Bar – type in something into the address bar and it’ll show you a myriad of sites to chose from that you have been to before. Not that disimilar to how it used to work, but prettier 🙂

Download….Pause…Resume – You can pause a download and continue where you were up to. This has been available in 3rd party apps for a while, but nice to have it built in.

Give a man a phish.. – There’s built in malware and phish protection. VERY good for those people who like to click click click on anything!

Smarty Pant Bookmarks – There is a ‘Most Visited’ Bookmark Folder and ‘Smart Bookmarks’ that give you quick access to your often visited sites. Although if you really wanna go to Facebook, there are quicker ways 🙂

Yes, I would like to remember this password, thanks for asking – The popup box that used to stare you in the face after trying to log in? It’s still there, but at the top of the page now, letting you click it whenever you want, and not just to keep loading!

Strap on an Add-On – The Add-Ons are the best feature of Firefox and always have been. Customise how it looks, acts, moves and shakes. The Add-On Manager lets you search for stuff straight from the Add-Ons List (without searching in a web page). Easier. Yay!

Integrate my Back to Front! – The back and forward button has been modified so the BACK is bigger and there’s just one little button to show you previous pages you’ve been at. It works good even if you don’t understand what the hell I mean.

No more months in a leaky boat! – Firefox used to churn through memory and CPU like it was butter. Although you churn butter, it doesn’t actually churn anything. In any case, this version of Firefox is reportedly the best performing browser on the market, and that’s a good enough reason to download it in itself.

So go on, just download it.

This timer will tell you how much longer you have to wait before Download Day begins!

Grindhouse is finally Here!

Almost a year ago I wrote about how disappointed I was that the Quentin Tarantino & Robert Rodriguez Double Feature was to be split for all audiences outside of the US.

I then went on to see Death Proof when it was released at the cinemas separately last year.

Well imagine my excitement when Dendy have decided to show the full length 190 minute Grindhouse double feature from next week here in Canberra!

It will be shown in it’s complete 35mm, fake trailer, print scratches and intermission goodness. Can’t wait!

Anyone wanna come? I’ll shout the popcorn 🙂

Geek Update

We’ll call them Bill and Ted. (not to be confused with the cool Bill and Ted)

2 nerds that really need a life. It seems they have become best friends and are now sitting together in one temporary bay (for the next week) reading SLA’s (Service Level Agreements) and Documentation…

….and of course discussing the intricacies of installing Linux on a Playstation 3.

The scary part? By some weird shift in the universe, the one with the hunchback, thick rimmed glasses and tuft of fluff on his chin is MARRIED.

I would like to see his wife. Really…I would…

Nerd Boy meets….

Nerd Girl.

They live happily ever after in their wireless universe.

You know what no wires means? Means you don’t have to be connected to anything…

Could be the basis of their marriage.

Interview 2

The traffic on Northbourne was hectic. Move 10 metres. Stop. Move 12 metres. Stop. I’m getting nervous and glancing at the clock. “Do I know what I’m talking about? Will they notice that I am really a 21 yr old in the skin of a 30 yr old? Will they tell how much I want this job?”

4 sets of traffic lights later I see the building and find a street parking spot nearby.

The tie had been installed at the 1st traffic light. The tightness around my neck doesn’t help my anxiety. But I catch a glance of myself in the mirrored building.  Bald head. Blue Shirt. Matching Tie. It actually looks ok. (Shit. No Suit Jacket. Why did I forget that?).

3 Minutes before interview time. He answers the phone and sounds older than he appears as he exits the elevator.  The cleaner had let me into the building. He says that I must have shown ‘initiative’ to get in. I told him she must have just liked my face. He said to stick with initiative.

He’s younger than me but I am getting used to that now. Once upon a time I was the youngest in the workplace. It’s funny how things change. He’s wearing a suit jacket and no tie. Spikey hair, hint of a pommy accent? The Lotus Notes expert wears an industry polo shit. Nice. I could handle wearing that to work. But I hate being a walking advertisement for the product that I work with.

The ‘expert’ is older (maybe 45?). He seems friendly enough and when we start chatting about replication, clustering and notes.ini’s I start to feel comfortable. I know my shit. Why am I worried?

I run through my experience. I find that taking the lead in such things makes it easier. Don’t wait for them to ask questions, just dive right in and tell them what you want THEM to hear. Spikey tells me that he is impressed and then the Expert starts to ask me technical questions. He asks me specific queries about what I would do if a client said this, or the server did that.

I start to babble, and squirm, and let me eyes wander.

Dammit. Just relax. Look them in the eyes. Look confident.

Yeah…look confidently stupid.

I fuck up on a question about SMTP Mail. What’s an MX record again? Shit. I explain the steps an email takes to exit a workplace and enter the wide internet world. Spikey writes it all down and nods. “Good. I wanted to know that”. Meanwhile, I am making the whole shit up cause I don’t do firewalls and gateways. That’s THE OTHER TEAMS problem.

Where’s the water? Why didn’t they offer my water? My tie feels very TIGHT.

I gesticulate with my hands as I show the path an email takes like there are little tunnels and pipes that it travels through.

Maybe my hands distract from my frantically processing brain.

I am still babbling and jibbering and stuttering and mumbling. Fuck, why do I do this. I admit that I have been out of the loop for a year or so and that these things aren’t at the top of my brain right now. He understands and tells me I should do my version 7 upgrade exam soon. Fair call.

The Expert looks suitably impressed and happy with what he has heard though. I mean, he’s the fucking expert, if I can make him happy I feel I have done my job.

Spikey is a little harder to impress. He says that they will be considering me for the Administrator role, not the Expert role. (FUCK) He also says that I went very well, but from my pauses (I paused? I thought I talked and yapped non-stop) he can tell that I need to get back into the work again.

I shouldn’t be upset, and truth be told, I’m not. I originally went for the Admin role anyway, and if they’re going to offer me what I think they’ll offer me, then I’ll take it Thank You very much.

But I am a little disappointed that I didn’t impress enough to get the Expert role. I guess it’s good to have something to aim for. Fuck it.

Stay tuned……

Boring Arse Work Stuff…

I haven’t talked about work, mostly because I sorta can’t, or I could, but I sorta don’t want to.

Anyway, I had a job interview on Wednesday arvo with another private IT company. This is a big company with about 30,000 staff worldwide. I am currently with a smaller Australian IT company, with maybe 500-700 staff Australia wide.

The interview was with a retiring manager who was given the recruiting job as a way to see out his last week (lucky him), and it ended up being a casual chat with this guy, 1 on 1, in the IT recruiters office. It was strange. We just chatted about the line of work, talked about America, politics, sport and the annoying public service. Didn’t feel like an interview at all.

It turns out that he wants me to go for a higher level position where I would not only be in a specialist position where I would have to create processes and liaise with vendors, but would also be responsible for 3 other staff.

Holy crap. Can I supervise 3 people?

FUCK YEAH!

I am really hoping I get this job. I think that at this ripe old age of 30 it’s about time I took that step up from being a technical IT snot and started taking control of my area of expertise instead of relying on dickhead managers who wouldn’t know their USB from their Firewire.

So after my lovely chat with the old chappy, he has lined up an interview with the technical folk. NOW I have to do my homework. I have been out of the Lotus Notes field for over a year and I am starting to think I could be rusty.

Lotus Notes you say? Half of you will be going, “What the fuck is that?” and the other half will be saying. “You work with that piece of shit program. Fuck I hate it. I want Outlook”

But none-the-less, it is my area of expertise and although I considered ditching it and ready in a new direction recently, but just when I think I’m Out…it “Pulls me Back In”

For the ‘What the fuck is that” people. Lotus Notes is a… “… proprietary, client-server collaborative software and email system owned by Lotus Software, of the IBM Software Group.”

Or for the non-wiki-everyday user description. It’s a slow-arse chunky dated application that gives you email, but is not Microsoft Outlook.

However, Lotus Notes also gives you the ability to create applications within itself that you can use for Payroll, HR, tracking how many widgets you have, Footy Tipping Competitions (my personal favourite) or just about anything you can think of. This is where the “POWER OF NOTES” comes in.

Oh fuck…I should shut up. I am really sounding like a Notes Nerd now.

Basically, Lotus Notes is a niche. I am stuck in that niche, and for right now it’s not a bad little place to be.

Just wish me luck in the interview… 🙂