- Today is the anniversary of the release of the original Star Wars. You have to find time to watch it today!
- Today is Geek Pride Day. -- I have a list of rights and responsibilities to follow.
- Today is Towel Day!
A towel, it says, is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have. Partly it has great practical value. You can wrap it around you for warmth as you bound across the cold moons of Jaglan Beta; you can lie on it on the brilliant marble-sanded beaches of Santraginus V, inhaling the heady sea vapors; you can sleep under it beneath the stars which shine so redly on the desert world of Kakrafoon; use it to sail a miniraft down the slow heavy River Moth; wet it for use in hand-to-hand-combat; wrap it round your head to ward off noxious fumes or avoid the gaze of the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal (such a mind-bogglingly stupid animal, it assumes that if you can't see it, it can't see you); you can wave your towel in emergencies as a distress signal, and of course dry yourself off with it if it still seems to be clean enough.
-- Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
So make sure you keep your towel close at hand today! You never know when you'll need it!
And as for Geek pride day, here is a list of rights and responsibilities I found on Wikipedia:
Rights:
- The right to be even geekier.
- The right to not leave your house.
- The right to not have a significant other and to be a virgin.
- The right to not like football or any other sport.
- The right to associate with other nerds.
- The right to have few friends (or none at all).
- The right to have all the geeky friends that you want.
- The right to not be "in-style."
- The right to be overweight and have poor eyesight.
- The right to show off your geekiness.
- The right to take over the world.
Responsibilities:
- Be a geek, no matter what.
- Try to be nerdier than anyone else.
- If there is a discussion about something geeky, you must give your opinion.
- Save any and all geeky things you have.
- Do everything you can to show off your geeky stuff as though it were a "museum of geekiness."
- Don't be a generalized geek. You must specialize in something.
- Attend every nerdy movie on opening night and buy every geeky book before anyone else.
- Wait in line on every opening night. If you can go in costume or at least with a related T-shirt, all the better.
- Don't waste your time on anything not related to geekdom.
- Befriend any person or persons bearing any physical similarities to comic book or sci-fi figures.
- Try to take over the world!
The point is, it was only a bad thing in middle and high school if you were a geek. As soon as you hit college, you found out real quick it was a great thing to be a geek. You had a whole new playground to work with. Bigger computer labs, bigger libraries. There was more opportunities if you were a geek.
Embrace your geek factor today! I'll be enjoying myself by watching a great movie, being myself, and possibly re-reading a great book. What are you going to do?
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The Force may just be a plot device in a series of movies, books, games, toys, clothing, wall coverings, etc. But if you just consider what it is that really does binds it all together. And consider what binds us as humans together, maybe that would be enough for us all to treat each other as equals. Find some way to communicate with each other with just a little less negativity. I may just be one person, but I see our similarities far more than the differences.
"Search your feelings, you know it to be true."
While the quote comes from the villain in one story, it turns out he had redemption in the end. It has to be that his story of redemption can help us find something worth redeeming in even our most difficult of enemies.
There is so much we could do if we all saw the commonality instead of the differences. Just think about it.
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]]>If you have any questions, and you want to post them on Experts Exchange, look me up!
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]]>For many years, IT management has preached standardization -- within IT and across the corporation. Yet at the same time, we have largely failed to standardize IT skills within our own organizations or across the industry. Certifications can help there, but for much of IT's history, such credentials have often been overlooked or undervalued in the hiring process.
That's changing.
Some employers are beginning to require certs for a wide range of jobs, and they often adjust salaries accordingly. With so many job seekers to choose from, employers need to quickly identify those who have the skills they seek. Granted, technical certifications do not guarantee that applicants will have the people and political skills that it takes to succeed in a corporate environment, but they can help employers triage résumés. And they're helpful in avoiding the costs and productivity losses associated with training new hires. For new college graduates, a certification in programming says, "I know about more than the theories and models we learned about in school."
Outsourcers also favor certifications, since they add credibility to project proposals. So if your department gets outsourced, certs can influence whether you are offered a job with the outsourcer or become unemployed.
Nonetheless, many older employees eschew certifications, asserting that their college degrees and job experience are sufficient. That's unfortunate, because even experienced IT professionals benefit from certs that demonstrate their understanding of the latest developments in a particular area. Because most certs are awarded for three to five years and require continuing education, being certified demonstrates that an employee has taken the initiative to stay current in an ever-changing field. That's a trait that's important to most employers. And as technology continues to proliferate, specialized technical expertise will become increasingly valued.
For me, the question isn't whether you should get a certification; it's which certification you should pursue. Certifications have proliferated over the past five years. In 2005, Microsoft offered six technical certifications; today that number has increased to 46, and technical certification holders have nearly doubled, to 2.9 million. Other organizations, such as the Business Architects Association, the International Institute of Business Analysis and the Institute of Management Consultants, offer specialized certification programs. Many universities are also beginning to offer certifications.
There are even certs in IT management. The Project Management Professional (PMP) and ITIL Service Manager certifications are widely recognized and have a significant impact on hiring decisions. In fact, most of the federal government's RFPs for project managers list PMP certification as a requirement. Government contractors speculate that the PMP cert will soon be mandatory.
But all certifications are not created equal. The PMP, ITIL and Microsoft certifications will continue to be widely recognized. Over time, however, some of the lesser-known certs will likely be merged, making some obsolete. Meanwhile, when choosing between such certifications, select those that are ISO 17024-certified.
It's natural for certifications to grow in prominence as an industry matures and places more importance on professionalism. And the trend will continue. Many current IT managers are unfamiliar with the broad range of certs available, but as younger employees rise to management positions, certification will likely become a basic requirement, especially for more senior positions.
How many certifications are on your résumé? If the answer is none, you need to change that. The time is coming when the word certified will be a synonym for employable.
Bart Perkins is managing partner at Louisville, Ky.-based Leverage Partners Inc., which helps organizations invest well in IT.
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I thought this article was something worth discussing. I've been thinking seriously about getting my certificates in MS SQL products. Perhaps with the economy like it has been , we should all take them more seriously.
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After several months of consideration, I've changed jobs. I'm now at Wachovia in the university area. It's much closer, My commute is just 12 miles now! I'm contract so there isn't as much pressure to work long hours. And even with the additional protocols, I find more freedom in the ability to fully utilize the features SQL has to offer.
I grew quite a bit with my last position. I worked with hierarchical relationships, rather than simply one-to-one and one-to-many relationships. I worked with GUIDs extensively for the first time. I also worked with multi-lingual data extensively for the first time. I was also called upon to teach more often than I have in previous positions.
I've found that I enjoy teaching more than I thought possible. So, I'll be publishing some blogs concerning the techniques I've used recently, and those I am currently using. It's my hope that I can help more people become more versed in Microsoft SQL! So, if you have any questions about how to do something in MSSQL, please, ask away in the comments
Posted via web from slowder's posterous
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]]>It cost me my house, I didn't need something that big for just me. I was able to re-affirm my bike, so I'll be able to continue paying on that and keep it. Unfortunately the little things about credit are gone. I can't take advantage of those same as cash offers...oh well, I'll just save up to get stuff.
But the problem comes when the unexpected happens. My personal laptop died two weeks back...Replacing something like that would have been easier with credit... but I can deal, with a little help from my friends.
I'm feeling like the old 1999 me. The enterprising version of me. The one with a vision and a plan. The creative me. The me I enjoyed being. I've been working on a new side project for a couple months now. It was an idea I had just after leaving Hinrichs-Flannagan. After talking to friends and friends-of-friends, it turns out there are a ton of people who need it. So, again with some help from my friends, we're building it.
I have learned from my previous experience in running a company. I've also learned from everyone around me, for good or bad. In some ways I am wiser.
In some ways, I'm still foolish.
I think the only way I'll know if I was wiser this year than I was last year, is to wait until next year...
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]]>When she started a page on facebook to get the word out, I had to help. I set her up with HelpBags.org. It was the least I could do to help her cause. What I'd ask each of you to do, is hit the site, and consider helping. Even the smallest of items can do a lot of good. You might be surprised, but the ziploc bags are a help, I've heard the homless say so.
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]]>Maybe I should start the next batch now, so I can keep this going... hrm... perhaps I should finally attempt a stout....
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]]>My sister has been interested in brewing for a while too, so I invited her over to learn how to do it. Here are some pictures from our efforts. In about a week, I'll transfer the batch to a secondary ferment-er, and then a week after that I'll bottle it!
Stay tuned... The best is yet to come!
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