holy crap

busybusybusy.  this has easily been my busiest semester with regards to non-school stuff.  school stuff is manageable on its own, but when everything else demands your attention as well, it can get a tad frustrating.

i've got a busy busy 4 weeks ahead of me (actually, 3.5 weeks).  couple that with a pressing deadline for work this friday (4/24) and you've got a stressed out caped coder on your hands.  =/

you've GOT to be kidding me

i finally sit down to dive into my networking project for the semester (which involves ssh'ing from my linux box into a box on ece.utexas.edu) and...

www.ece.utexas.edu is *down*

like, down down. i find it simultaneously:

1) frustrating as hell as i've finally sat down to work on my project in networks, and the freakin' site is down

and

2) freakin' hilariousthat the ece engineering site, of ALL SITES at utexas, is down

that's totally FSM's way of telling me to play halo wars instead of do school work tonight...

ooooh, check out this hot action!!!

\>$\{{\rm EAT}:(\forall i:1\leq i\leq 5:{\rm eating}[i] \Rightarrow \neg({\rm

  eaiting}[i\ominus 1] \vee {\rm eating}[i\oplus 1]))\}$\\

and there went february!

i know it's the shortest month and all, but sheesh!  did that go by fast, or what?

i'd apologize, but a) i'd sound like a broken record and b) it's nothing new.  in my defense, however, i *did* face a layoff and the subsequent job search over the past two months.  which makes it *twice* in the past year that i had to do the layoff/job search/job find fiasco.  all while in grad school.  so, yanno, there's that.

i know i know -- *waaaah*.

suffice it to say, i did find a job and am gainfully employed once more.  while i no longer am able to walk to work (alas!  what other burdens and hardships await our hero?), i do enjoy a short, highway-free commute and it really makes all the difference.  never again will i commute 30+  minutes one way for work.  damnit.

ANYHOW, this is a school-related blog and i suppose i should mention it at least once.  in short, i'm really digging this semester.  both classes are lecture classes (as opposed to discussion classes) and i can safely state that i enjoy lecture over discussion.  discussion is great and it allows for interaction and, well, discussion, but i find them to be less structured and, honestly, less informative and educational.  it's great to get a feel for what's topical in academic literature, but i'm more interested in being exposed to more concrete disciplines, with something more tangible to take from class.

networks from the ground up and formal methods of distributing computing -- comin' right up!!  i'm having to use the ol' noggin' to come up with algorithms for formal methods and it's freakin' great.  it's a challenge, but great nonetheless.

the networks class doesn't have any homework, which at first glance is welcomed, but i find that homework is usually the best tool to help learn/retain material over the break between classes.  so there's a hit against it for that.  however, it makes up for it via the optional programming project.  it basically amounts to implementing TCP in C, using the x-kernel libraries.  yes, implementing TCP in C.

coooooooooooool

school hath started!

well, the break is over, back on my knees!  this semester looks to be a good one, albeit a difficult one.  both classes are lecture classes, rather than discussion classes (ie: read literature in the subject, discuss.)  while i enjoy classes structured in such a fashion -- i get exposed to new subjects, engage in intellectual discussion over said subjects -- i must admit to an affinity to lecture classes.  they and their subjects tend to be more knowledge driven -- here's what we know, here are rules and how we got to be here, learn it.  i've got two this semester like that and my geek sense is definitely tingling.

in the morning, it's networks from the ground up.  this is exactly what i need, network knowledge wise, and it looks to be a full-blown knowledge feast on what they are and how they work.  the other class is formal methods in distributed programming.  this looks to be a rigorous account of how to write concurrent programs and be confident they actually work.  ok, that's a super simple take on the class, but that's what it boils down to.

btw, anyone have a job they could spare?  great, thanks!

welcome 2009! starting out, somewhat similar to 2008...

well, 2008 waited till the oft-absent date of february 29th.  2009 didn't have to wait at all.  my contract with my employer was axed at the end of the calendar year 2008 and after a week of consulting and providing knowledge handoff, i'm officially unemployed again.

i was a victim of an across the board termination of all IT contracts, coming from "up up above".  the result was a nondiscriminatory wiping of jobs.  some were expendible.  others were not.  my boss did pretty much all he could to keep me around, but the economy took a nose dive starting in september and my employer was, let's just say, not exactly immune to market conditions.

and not to blow my own horn, but i'm valuable to them.  when you write the backend of the app that was created from ground up -- designed the database schema, created the object model, and wrote all associating data and web services exposing the model -- you possess a heavy amount of what's called "domain knowledge".  normally and in general, domain knowledge translates to job security.  not so much in my professional experience over the past 12 months.

alas, the tides of life.  if you haven't ascertained by now, i'm relatively unconcerned about my current employment status.  sure the economy sucks, but i've got a lot going for me.  i have an excellent early track record with glowing references to use, my undergrad work was rock solid and i'm currently persuing a master's degree in software engineering at one of the top programs in the nation.  (shameless plug)  plus, i have been putting aside money pretty aggressively this past year, albeit for tuition and a new vehicle (go little '91 honda accord!  go as long as you can, baby!!), but enough to easily keep afloat for a month or two with little overall dent to my financial situation.  (never underestimate the value of being a bachelor and living with a roommate.  i can reduce my expenditures to "survival level" pretty easily.)

school starts in a week and a half.  thank whoeverShouldBeThanked for the 5 week winter break from school.  i feel almost fully recharged and ready to attack a new semester.  i'm looking forward to my classes as well and that never hurts.  in continuation of my apparent "never took networking as an undergrad so lets take an assload of it as a grad" trend, i'm taking a class called "communication networks" which, for all i can tell, will be a semester studying instant messaging algorithms.  (i kid?)

the other class i'm particularly interested in: formal methods in distributed programming.  sex-ay.  the textbook is entitled "concurrent programming".  in december, i received a just-released tech book i had pre-ordered for a good six months entitled "concurrent programming in windows".  in my personal opinion, concurrency and distributed programming, manifested in multi-core desktop chips, cloud computing, or both, is where you're going to see massive growth in the commercial software development.  i'm eager to get as much formal chops as i can this next semester and use it to springboard myself into a deeper commercial understanding and skillset for concurrency and distributed programming.

*deep breath*

now, to update my damned resume...