First day at the office was wonderful. It's probably just due to the fact that everything is different. I love the more modern looking office. I actually, for now, enjoy the nicer dress code. I love the opportunity to learn a lot in a short time frame, and a lack of distractions in the way.
We haven't quite worked out all the Feng Shui of the office Josh and I share. I haven't figured out how to get quality coffee. I haven't figured out exactly what machine I'll be using for work (Still hoping to upgrade to a 15" macbook pro). I have been really impressed with the performance of the macbook thus far, and in fact, a new cable and a new monitor somehow equaled no lock-ups today.
Very excited, will post more tomorrow, with pictures, and hopefully after doing something closer to real work as today was pretty much paperwork and fighting to set all the stuff up on my computer.
Oct 13, 2010
Oct 12, 2010
Today I had an encounter with greatness. Not a life altering one, not God style greatness, just pragmatic and capitalistic greatness. I called Apple technical support.
I've only had my Macbook Pro for about 1 month now, and for the first 3 weeks, it functioned flawlessly, as I had hoped. As I sit and type on it from home, it continues to amaze me in its simple, elegant functionality and beauty. But then I hooked up an external monitor and it turned into a temperamental child.
It turns out I'm far from the only person struggling with this. Forums abounded with people claiming the exact problems I saw, and described them as intermittent, possibly the worst description of any bug ever, and certainly the most frightening. So I've been fighting this for a couple days and decided to call Apple about it.
First, I actually initiated a tech support request online, which yielded a human answer in less than 1 minute, which was impressive. She was fluent in English, friendly but respective of my time and concerns. Her suggestion was one I was skeptical of (connecting the external monitor to a different power outlet to ensure no fluctuations in power consumption by the monitor were affecting the laptop), but she was knowledgeable enough to describe it in a way that sounded worth trying, and made it super simple for me to follow up. Which I did 15 minutes later when my laptop locked up again.
Again, less than 1 minute from my dialing a number, I'm on the phone with another English speaking gentleman who mentioned that he'd seen different displays behave differently, to which I responded that I'd be using a different monitor starting tomorrow, which would likely be the one that matters. He still brought on a higher level tech to advise, and he advised having the cable inspected at an Apple store. So although I had purchased a knock-off cable, which they never asked about, I purchased an official cable from Best Buy today to make sure the blame cannot lie with third party adapters.
All this to say, I'm thinking about actually paying for Apple's nearly legendary, and also stupidly expensive tech support. For a machine that is to become my daily driver, I need to know someone is covering for me. So far, so good. Now let's see if Apple can deliver a laptop capable of driving an external monitor. :-(
I've only had my Macbook Pro for about 1 month now, and for the first 3 weeks, it functioned flawlessly, as I had hoped. As I sit and type on it from home, it continues to amaze me in its simple, elegant functionality and beauty. But then I hooked up an external monitor and it turned into a temperamental child.
It turns out I'm far from the only person struggling with this. Forums abounded with people claiming the exact problems I saw, and described them as intermittent, possibly the worst description of any bug ever, and certainly the most frightening. So I've been fighting this for a couple days and decided to call Apple about it.
First, I actually initiated a tech support request online, which yielded a human answer in less than 1 minute, which was impressive. She was fluent in English, friendly but respective of my time and concerns. Her suggestion was one I was skeptical of (connecting the external monitor to a different power outlet to ensure no fluctuations in power consumption by the monitor were affecting the laptop), but she was knowledgeable enough to describe it in a way that sounded worth trying, and made it super simple for me to follow up. Which I did 15 minutes later when my laptop locked up again.
Again, less than 1 minute from my dialing a number, I'm on the phone with another English speaking gentleman who mentioned that he'd seen different displays behave differently, to which I responded that I'd be using a different monitor starting tomorrow, which would likely be the one that matters. He still brought on a higher level tech to advise, and he advised having the cable inspected at an Apple store. So although I had purchased a knock-off cable, which they never asked about, I purchased an official cable from Best Buy today to make sure the blame cannot lie with third party adapters.
All this to say, I'm thinking about actually paying for Apple's nearly legendary, and also stupidly expensive tech support. For a machine that is to become my daily driver, I need to know someone is covering for me. So far, so good. Now let's see if Apple can deliver a laptop capable of driving an external monitor. :-(
Oct 2, 2010
We went to see The Social Network this weekend with the 4's and Matty. This movie got me thinking, and reading, about the value of ideas.
Jeff Atwood's post regarding this is one of my favorites. I feel like I agree, and although I probably suffer from at least a bit of the American obsession with coming up with "the next big idea", I think my priority right now needs to be on perfecting my execution. It seems likely to me that this involves not just discipline in every new task, but also practice and dedication to learning new concepts. I want to become a better developer, and this movie was a little bit inspiring in that way.
I also find it interesting that so many reviews of the movie bring up the fact that the portrayal of Mark Zucherberg is of someone to be pitied, an unlikable anti-hero. I don't know this guy, or anything about him, but I watched the movie and was motivated, at least in part, to try to be a little bit like him.
People are describing him as an SOB who thinks he's smarter than everyone else. Newsflash, if you think you're smart enough to create something that grabs 500 million people's attention, do it. Accidental billionaire is such a lame title, betraying petty jealousy, from a lesser contributor seeking significance. It's interesting to talk about the character, or even the real life person's capability to connect personally with other people in a non-threatening, non abrasive way. It's not interesting to hear your description of how that guy that accomplished more than you've ever dreamed possible is only a legend in his own mind, propelled by some fortuitous alignment of the stars.
In the middle of writing this, I've read some more reviews bringing misogyny into the equation, which is funny to me. They describe how unfair it is that there are no positive female characters in the movie. Cry me a river, which female creator of Facebook did they leave out? Was there a substantial financial contributor that was removed because she was female? Is it truly misogynistic, or even racist to tell a story based on real life without checking our race and gender cards to make sure it's a full house (and yes, race jumped into a bunch or reviews as well).
I read my own post, and I'll admit it's not that facinating, and not particularly entertaining. What I'm severely disappointed by is the fact that I rarely hear anyone besides Ayn Rand and her proponents lifting up the concept of hard work anymore. I read and hear so many people talk about unfairness and playing fields, and circumstances, blah, blah, blah. Nobody seems to take seriously the concept that they need to step it up a bit. There are people who can be admired for what they accomplished, without idolizing and wanting to emulate every mistake they may or may not make.
Jeff Atwood's post regarding this is one of my favorites. I feel like I agree, and although I probably suffer from at least a bit of the American obsession with coming up with "the next big idea", I think my priority right now needs to be on perfecting my execution. It seems likely to me that this involves not just discipline in every new task, but also practice and dedication to learning new concepts. I want to become a better developer, and this movie was a little bit inspiring in that way.
I also find it interesting that so many reviews of the movie bring up the fact that the portrayal of Mark Zucherberg is of someone to be pitied, an unlikable anti-hero. I don't know this guy, or anything about him, but I watched the movie and was motivated, at least in part, to try to be a little bit like him.
People are describing him as an SOB who thinks he's smarter than everyone else. Newsflash, if you think you're smart enough to create something that grabs 500 million people's attention, do it. Accidental billionaire is such a lame title, betraying petty jealousy, from a lesser contributor seeking significance. It's interesting to talk about the character, or even the real life person's capability to connect personally with other people in a non-threatening, non abrasive way. It's not interesting to hear your description of how that guy that accomplished more than you've ever dreamed possible is only a legend in his own mind, propelled by some fortuitous alignment of the stars.
In the middle of writing this, I've read some more reviews bringing misogyny into the equation, which is funny to me. They describe how unfair it is that there are no positive female characters in the movie. Cry me a river, which female creator of Facebook did they leave out? Was there a substantial financial contributor that was removed because she was female? Is it truly misogynistic, or even racist to tell a story based on real life without checking our race and gender cards to make sure it's a full house (and yes, race jumped into a bunch or reviews as well).
I read my own post, and I'll admit it's not that facinating, and not particularly entertaining. What I'm severely disappointed by is the fact that I rarely hear anyone besides Ayn Rand and her proponents lifting up the concept of hard work anymore. I read and hear so many people talk about unfairness and playing fields, and circumstances, blah, blah, blah. Nobody seems to take seriously the concept that they need to step it up a bit. There are people who can be admired for what they accomplished, without idolizing and wanting to emulate every mistake they may or may not make.
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