This is one of the weirdest tests I’ve ever taken – it shows you a bunch of shapes and asks you questions that are not related to those shapes, but your answers are to choose between the shapes.  Sounds bogus, right?  Well, I think it nailed me pretty darn well.  WEIRD!

Here are my results…

Verbally and mentally fluid, you are refreshing and illuminating to those around you. This is occasionally somewhat discounted by the obvious pleasure that you take in exercising your mental acuity. Although generally peaceful you can often take a verbally aggressive tact in relations with the world, which can often be misunderstood by those around you. Innovative in the extreme, you can often think yourself right out of the correct answer to a given problem. Many times you are referred to as your own worst enemy. You tire very quickly of routine and so make poor clerks or administrative help. You also have no respect for authority and little patience for those you regard as inferior, most especially those in charge. Experimentation is your watchword and can occasionally lead to experience for its own sake and shallow decadence. Your thought can sometimes be scattered and disconnected.

It seems I do this every year or so, but I really do want to get back to writing often on my blog.  There’s something about a long-form blog post that just doesn’t come across with a 140 word Tweet.

Ironically I always used to wish there was a venue for short posts, links to interesting articles, an easy way to share a picture, etc.  I’ve taken to that pretty well with 2600 Tweets so far (www.twitter.com/nanovak) and an active Facebook account too (www.facebook.com/nanovak – and no, it’s not public, much to Facebook’s chagrin).

I’m hoping to use the blog as a forum for posts about both technology (I’m a gadget geek and an operations engineer for Windows Live Messenger) and my personal life.

Speaking of my personal life, I’m 48 hours away from having knee surgery so I’m going to blog about what’s going on and my recovery process over the coming months.  Months…bleh.

More to come … honestly this time.

In the mean time, time will continue to be spent sitting and waiting … and fuming.

One issue that I haven’t liked is the Windows Live Messenger client wants to live in the taskbar with the rest of my running apps instead of the system tray where I’m used to it staying.  But  I just came across a way to make it work like I want and stay over by the clock in the system tray: compatibility mode!

Here’s what to do:

1. Close/exit Messenger
2. On your local computer browse to C:\Program Files\Windows Live\Messenger\ (or \Program Files (x86)\ on a 64bit OS install)
3. Right-click on msnmsgr.exe and choose Properties
4. On the Compatibility tab click the “Run this program in compatibility mode box and choose Windows Vista.  Click OK at the bottom.
   
5. Now you can start Messenger again from the Start Menu.
6. In the System Tray click on the “Show hidden icons” arrow and then click Customize.
   
7. In the Notification Area Icons dialog find Windows Live Messenger and in the dropdown to the right choose “Show icons and notifications”.  Click OK at the bottom.
   
8. There you go!  Messenger back in the System Tray!

Credit to www.mess.be for the tip!  Unfortunately they don’t have URL’s directly to their posts.

You may have noticed that I’ve added a couple of links/feeds to the right of this page.  The first one is my Twitter account: http://twitter.com/nanovak.  I have actually been quite active over there as I find the 140 character short post syncs up well with my usual desire for blogging: oh that would be a cool thought or quote to share.

The other feed is a “link blog” feed of blog posts and articles that I find interesting to share.  Some good stuff there! http://feeds.feedburner.com/NathansLinkBlog

I’m starting to get motivate to write a 2008 year in review post, so stay tuned for that.

For now, it’s off to bed to try to get rid of a head cold.  Joy.

Funny Pic: The Financial Crisis Piggy Bank

The best post I’ve seen just came in while I was at lunch, and is in response to my beautiful wife pointing out that a newspaper article said people in Snoqualmie were driving half an hour to get to a grocery store.

But then he got a phone call from a retail developer at Snoqualmie Ridge, who said the community’s only supermarket had closed and residents were driving a half hour to shop for food.
-Puget Sound Business Journal

What a load of bull the retail landlord fed these people!  There’s a small organic grocery in downtown Snoqualmie (3-5 minutes) as well as a QFC and Safeway 6 miles away in North Bend.  The response?

“Not sure where people would get information line that…”

Thanks Chris!

To intro the page the have a great graph that espouses what I’ve been saying for a long time … if your company is having issues or entering tough times cut early, cut ONCE, and cut deep.  I’ve lived through not doing that in the last dotcom bubble burst in 2000-2001.  The company I worked for went through seemingly endless layoff rounds and morale was totally shot.  We were eventually purchased for about half the amount of cash we had on hand … bought with our own money.

Essentially, if you make a deep cut in workforce early in a downturn sure there’s a morale hit, but at the same time the core group of folks who are left know that management is serious about preserving the company – and their jobs.  If management decides to cut a few jobs here and there “so as not to make anyone worry” they’re actually doing the opposite – who knows when you could be next.

So in the last couple weeks we’ve heard of lots of layoffs from companies that are well funded (Zillow for one).  While a lot of folks are viewing this as a sign of the economy tanking (and I don’t disagree there), I think this is more of a sign of CEO’s making the right decisions for the good of the business and the majority of their employees.  Sure it sucks to be the 1 in 4 employees laid off from Zillow, but 3 in 4 now have a good fighting chance of riding through this recession in one piece.

If only my former employers heeded these lessons…

Tonight we watched the closing ceremonies on NBC in HD – the fireworks and other bits of eye candy look so much better in HD.  That being said, for the past 2 weeks we’ve been pretty firmly planted “north of the border” watching the Games on CBC.  That’s right, Comcast carries Vancouver, BC, Canada’s CBC channel here in the states.  AND THANK GOODNESS FOR THAT!

We’d watch an event one evening live, and then notice that the same stuff was getting replayed 18 hours later on NBC.  Especially crappy was when NBC did decided to show something live they only did so for for the east coast of the US.  They tape-delayed EVERYTHING for the west coast, but still kept the “LIVE” banner on the screen.  Can’t the FCC get them for false advertising?  And don’t get me started on the inappropriate and moronic comments that Bob Costas feels like filling airtime with.  Spare me.

Next time, especially with Vancouver hosting the Winter games in February 2010 we’ll be watching a LOT of CBC.  I only hope Comcast starts carrying their HD feed here in the states by then.

I read a story this evening on Engadget HD that at least gives me hope … ESPN is thinking of bidding for the 2014 and 2016 games and promises to never tape delay anything.  NICE!  I can’t wait to watch Olympic dodgeball on ESPN 8 … The Ocho!

For those frustrated by NBC’s arrogant mishandling of its broadcast rights, there exists one slim ray of hope (other than living somewhere lucky enough to get Canadian television so you can actually see the events before reading about them in the paper or on NBC’s own website), ESPN. That’s right, with Brett Favre finally on an NFL roster, the sports giant has apparently found enough free time to consider taking a run at broadcast rights for the 2014 Winter Games and 2016 Summer Games.

I mentioned the other day that I couldn’t say anything… and at the time I couldn’t.  But that’s since changed.    The first couple days of the week I got to help with a couple ISA Server exam refreshes, so there’s part of the mystery.  And here’s the other part…

I’ll be in the New Employee Orientation session at Microsoft’s Redmond campus on Monday, July 28th.    I’m joining the Global Foundation Services group to help run the infrastructure behind behind a little program you may have heard of called Live Messenger (it does instant messaging, or “IM” as they say – evidently all the kids are doing it these days).

I’m truly honored and humbled to have even been considered, much less offered a position on the team and with Microsoft.  I’ve always had a goal to work for Microsoft, going all the way back to college (I even interviewed with MS my senior year).  I thought I’d gotten as close to that as I was going to when I spent 2.5 years working at Cascade Investment (I received annual “head-nods acknowledging my existence from Bill Gates during my tenure).

About 6 weeks ago I read a blog post by Dare Obasanjo talking about the availability problems of Twitter of late, and how the architecture decisions they made in the beginning lead to some of their issues today (and limit what they can do to easily resolve them).  At the end of his post he throws in something that really grabbed my attention: “If this problem space sounds interesting to you, we’re hiring. I’m specifically looking for good operations folks.”

That got my mind running … designing and implementing systems at huge scale has always been an area of interest for me, but I’ve never found myself in a spot to actually be doing it.  After a day or so of mulling things over in my mind I bit the bullet and sent an email to a friend who’s been on the Live Operations team (now GFS) for a couple years to get his take on things.  His reply was a shocker: “I work directly with Dare on a current project I would love to have you onboard.”

I don’t know if that was a sign or not, but things sure did go quickly after that.  All told I had about 9 hours of phone calls, lunches, and onsite interview sessions.  These were perhaps the most grueling interviews in my life (I really haven’t interviewed cold for a new job since January 2000), but at the same time it was a lot of fun! 

There’s something to be said for asking someone a demanding question they have no way of knowing the answer to (or maybe there is no answer) and evaluating their thought process, analytical skills, and ability to ask good questions.  The next time I have to interview someone I definitely have to work some of this technique into the mix.

I’ve always heard and known that Microsoft’s interview process is a gauntlet that is exceptionally difficult to pass.  I never thought I’d have what it takes to make it through, especially interviewing for a position that runs such a large-scale system when my background is clearly in the SMB range (small/medium business).  A couple of the folks I spoke with, though, said that if they went looking for people with experience in the scale of systems GFS deals with they wouldn’t be able to find anyone; find a smart person who fits the team and they can learn the details.

So that’s the challenge for me in the coming months … get up to speed on a completely new system, scale, architecture, paradigm.  It’s going to be tough, and it’s going to take a lot of hard work.  But I’m excited for the challenge; to be outside of the comfort zone that I’ve built up over the last 10 years.

I can’t wait to get this next chapter act in my career started!  Wish me luck!

PS – a special thanks to Alicea, Barton, Brian, and Bryce for sticking by me through all this.  Your insights and simply just being there to listen have been invaluable.  YOU ROCK!

Whew … okay, thanks for letting me spill the beans about all that. 

I hope to be able to share my thoughts more about all this before the week is out.  I don’t know if I could go another weekend without having [redacted] finalized and put to bed.

Speaking of bed … it’s 11:30p!  Yikes!

Report: Starbucks scaling back music offering | Tech news blog – CNET News.com

For those of you who know me, you know that one of my standard answers if asked “how are you doing?” is “hanging in there.”  Well today I can honestly say that’s an apt description.  I haven’t felt this crappy in a LONG time.

These last 6-8 weeks have been the absolute worst season for my allergies I’ve ever experienced.  EVER.  It’s so bad that I’ve even been diagnosed with allergy-induced asthma – oye vay.

So if you see me around and I’m not my normal cheery self, now you know why.  Bleh.

The first session today was about the new Server Core platform for Windows Server 2008.  Essentially they’ve stripped out all of the UI and superfluous apps and tools from Windows and created a lean and mean OS for specific “workloads” (Microsoft’s new term for what a server is used for).  A Server Core installation is managed via standard remote MMC tools, or via command line on the box itself.  The workloads Server Core is used for include a domain controller, file server, print server, basic web server (no .NET), or virtualization server (Hypervisor).  It’s going to be a bit of a change to get used to administering these boxes, but I like the concept.

Next I attended another discussion on Microsoft’s Virtualization platform.  THIS is the session I was expecting to see on the first day.  There was a fair bit of content overlap, but we actually got some good technical information on Windows Server 2008 Virtualization and had a nice Q&A session.  I feel better about what’s coming with Windows Server 2008′s Hypervisor, but if I had to deploy a production environment right now it would be tough for me to not do use VMware ESX.

I finished off my conference sessions the way I began, with a security talk by Steve Riley.  This one was about securing mobile devices (laptops).  Steve spent a lot of time talking about BitLocker in Windows Vista, which utilizes special chips in newer laptops called TPM modules.  I won’t get too technical, but Steve did a great job of explaining how all this works.  I might even be tempted to try it sometime … though I’d need to wipe my laptop to do it as BitLocker needs a disk partition that’s outside your OS to keep unencrypted for some types of application installers.  The official recommendation is 1.5GB of space, though according to Steve he hasn’t had any issues with a volume only 55MB.

And that was that.  I hung out with Will Strye from our Portland office this afternoon & evening.  We walked across the way to Downtown Disney and saw a movie (Oceans Thirteen – liked it). 

After we got out we hung out by the lake for a couple minutes and were treated to a view of the Space Shuttle Atlantis lifting off from Kennedy Space Center 45 miles east.  WOW.  Awe inspiring.  Goose bump moment.  We were too far away to see the shuttle, but we saw a long trail of fire and the smoke trail from the rockets.  We watched it through rocket separation and until we couldn’t see the glow of the main engines anymore.  I’ll remember that forever.  Will try to get some pictures posted from Will’s phone soon.  A couple guys from Ascentium drove out to the coast this afternoon so I’ll get some pics from them too. 

Well, time to pack!

TechEd 2007 – OUT!

According to ARIN, the American Registry for Internet Numbers (via NeoWin) we’re going to be out of IP addresses to dole out to organizations in late 2010.  Zoinks!

Time to get cracking on IPv6 I suppose.  Right after I finish deploying Exchange 2007, Unified Messaging, Office Communications Server 2007, complete a pending merger integration, complete another pending merger integration, move our main offices, and do whatever else comes up between now and mid-2010. 

To make matters worse the ticketing gods sent me from Seattle to Los Angeles, and then on to Orlando.  Yeah – that’s direct.

I get to the airport and the wait for the transfer bus to the hotels is an hour plus.  The wait for taxies is about 3 minutes (but they cost 3x.  After getting up at 4a I’m done with mass transit for the day. 

As a bonus I got Speedy Gozales for a cabbie.  I got to my hotel long before the bus would have even left!

The hotel? under construction on the main floor.  You have to enter through a wing entrance and then walk back to the other end of the complex to check in.  And it’s tough to grab an elevator in the middle of scaffolding.

And what’s the deal with all the guys walking around without shirts on … oh my, there’s a different convention here this weekend too.  You haven’t lived until you’ve seen a 6-foot-7 black 200 pound black guy in skimpy “boy shorts” on roller blades in the lobby of your hotel.

As I was checking a heavy-set mid-50′s guy from Alabama (guessing) came up to the front desk demanding to check out without being charged because of the “outrageous displays” parading around the hotel.  He was offended.  I love how tolerant our culture is of people who are different.

This should be an interesting week.

Hurray free stuff!

Give me a yell if you’ll be there!

• Sail & Snorkel charter out to Molokini crater.  There’s nothing like snorkeling in a tropical ocean with visibility measured in hundreds of feet.  And there’s nothing better than getting there on the wind at 18+ knots.  LOVELY.  Take the Paragon II out of Maalaea – check out www.SailMaui.com.
• Road to Hana: swim in the Seven Pools, take the side road down to Nahaiku, visit Waianapanapa State Park, hike through a bamboo forest.  It’s a LONG day to make the trek to Hana and back, and we’ll probably not do that again when we make it back to the island.  But the sights were amazing.
• Hit downtown Lahaina around 6a in the morning to catch the Banyan Tree when nobody’s there.  Once you’ve got a lot of pictures of that, walk across the park to the marina and watch the boats head out and the kids surf.  At 7a the Pioneer Inn Restaurant, next to the tree and the marina, opens.  You can’t go wrong with the Hawaiian sweetbread french toast or the gargantuan pancakes.    After breakfast continue to loll around Front Street as the shops open – you’ll have the street and the shops to yourselves.  When you’re done go back to your room and sleep for a while … you’ll still have most of the day left to do other stuff (or nothing).
• Go to a luau.  It’s cheesy, but you’ve got to do it just once.  We went to the Old Lahaina Luau and from what I’ve heard of the others this seems like a good bet.
• And this is a must … GO TO WARREN AND ANABELLES!  It’s a nightclub and magic/comedy show.  21 and over only, so find a sitter if you need to. Simply amazing and a LOAD of fun.  The first half of the entertainment (nightclub parlor) was a bit lame, but the show is indescribable.  You’ll need reservations well in advance … as in when you book your trip a couple months in advance.  Go to www.warrenandannabelles.com.
• Go to a time-share presentation.  Everybody does it. 

Alicea and I stayed at the Westin Maui Resort and Spa in Kaanapali.  Awesome place, but a bit pricey (we had a special package deal otherwise we wouldn’t have been there).  If you can afford it, though, stay there.

On the flight over (United from SFO to Maui) they did a “Half way to Hawaii” game.  The pilot gave us the distance we were covering, our speed, the tail wind, and the time we lifted off the runway from SFO to the second.  Whoever guessed the correct time we’d be half way won the prize … unfortunately they didn’t say that they were doing it closest but not over.  Anyway, Alicea was the runner up – she was about 6 minutes off.  Someone else was the winner.  BUT I was closest … I was 5 seconds over (I did a lot of math in Excel on my laptop and rounded the seconds for .982344565… of an hour – should have figured it out!).  I got a runner up prize too!

Yeah – we need to find a way to do that trip again.  Special thanks to Alicea’s mom for staying with Kaitlyn back here at home so we had a week to ourselves.  I love Kaitlyn … but it was awesome to have some time without her to be “us” again.

Well, that’s enough rambling for now.  Mahalo (thanks) for the memories Maui!

Wish me luck!

I got to realize one of my worst fears this evening … coming home and finding a beloved pet dead.  What a craptacular moment in my life.  We miss you already little buddy.  Our bed will be awfully empty without you tonight.

In a story posted today by WorldNetDaily and promptly commented on by a zillion bloggers, he blames soy for everything from homosexuality and smaller penises to early menstruation.

Why? Because “soybean products are feminizing, and they’re all over the place. You can hardly escape them anymore.”

Holy crap.  That’s the worst title for an even EVAR!  Even WalMart figured out that they need to wish people Merry Christmas when they arrive at a store.  They didn’t last year and the uproar caused them to have a 6% drop this year in same-store-sales for the day after Thanksgiving.

When will people learn?

Well, the other night his brain made the connection again.  I can only imagine his excitement at the time.

MUST READ. 

When I say my brain remapped, that’s the best description I have. During the worst of my voice problems, I would know in advance that I couldn’t get a word out. It was if I could feel the lack of connection between my brain and my vocal cords. But suddenly, yesterday, I felt the connection again. It wasn’t just being able to speak, it was KNOWING how. The knowing returned.

I still don’t know if this is permanent. But I do know that for one day I got to speak normally. And this is one of the happiest days of my life.

Source: Good News Day
Originally published on Tue, 24 Oct 2006 14:32:07 GMT by Scott_Adams