Recently I had the chance to do some tuning on a system that was built using Grails (formerly Groovy on Rails) and the short and hopefully accurate enough scoop for our purposes is that includes an ORM layer – a data abstraction layer. ORM’s excel at rapid development/time to market scenarios, and they can also […]
Read more "JTDS & Grails"This week we posted some pending changes to the PASS bylaws. We try to do a review at least once a year and it’s a hard process. Hard because we have to agree on the change we want first, and then we have to figure out how to state it cleanly because this is a […]
Read more "PASS Update #53 (Bylaws)"Wirefly is a website devoted to purchasing cell phones and plans. I found it when I was researching my Droid X, and you know how it is – should I trust a web site to deliver my phone? At the time the difference in cost was substantial, $99 via Wirefly which included 2 day Fedex, […]
Read more "A Plug for Wirefly"PASS isn’t what it should be. I hear that a lot, and in many ways I agree with you. We’re finally growing and evolving, but we’re still far from what I think most of you expect from a true professional association. But. I’m not sure you or I have realistic expectations. So I want to […]
Read more "What Should PASS Be? I Challenge You"I attended the second meeting of MagicPASS (no web site yet) on Feb 16 at Stetson University in Celebration, FL. Great facility – classroom style seating, dual projectors and screens, couldn’t ask for better. The only downside to it so far is that it’s $200 per meeting for the space, quite a chunk of overhead […]
Read more "Notes from the February 2011 MagicPASS Meeting"We recently switched from Brighthouse to DirectTV and of the first things we did was to find the kids channels to see what we gained or lost. I flagged a few to record for use on the proverbial rainy day, and one of the ones I selected was Hong Kong Phooey, a cartoon that ran […]
Read more "Who Is This Super Hero?"I work with a client that has an office about 25 yards from a train track and recently the railroad company decided it was time to do some maintenance on a large length of the track including that piece by the office. That ‘maintenance’ consisted of replacing all the ties under the rails. If you’ve […]
Read more "Working on the Railroad"Packing for Mars by Mary Roach ($15 @ Amazon) is a ton of fairly interesting trivia about the space program, space travel, and the challenges of trying to go to Mars. She talks about doing tests on Earth to figure out how bad body odor would be if someone didn’t bathe for an extended period […]
Read more "Book Review: Packing for Mars"One of the things I enjoy about work is seeing the various cultures that evolve. Some companies are rigid, some are fun, some very loosely organized, etc. It’s almost magic how it happens, and it’s rarely all done on purpose. Each manager has a style, each employee has a work rhythm, and they get combined […]
Read more "Corporate Culture"It’s been a few weeks since I wrote my early thoughts on my goals for this year, and you can tell it’s a struggle when it takes me to the second week of February to get them finished. Why such a struggle? I think it’s because I’ve lived in nearly a constant state of change […]
Read more "Work Goals for 2011-Part 2"
SQLAndy 