Accidental Technologist

Musings about Entrepreneurship, Technology and Software Development

It has certainly been a long time…

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I realized that I have neglected my blog for a very long time. I wanted to write up something so that any readers I had left didn’t think I had simply stopped existing.

What to write about?

Is writing about Ruby on Rails and how to do this or that even relevant any long? Does anyone still look to blogs for solutions to problems we might be facing? I don’t know. I solve problems this way though but maybe I am the rare case. 

Is it time I start writing more about the entrepreneurial side of what I enjoy doing? I’m not sure.

I am here and still existing. 

Subscribe to Posts Via Email

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It seems more and more web sites are offering users to subscribe to updates delivered by email. ?If you would rather have posts delivered right to your inbox instead of visiting the site or relying on RSS, you can now subscribe and forget.

Just add your email to the ?Subscribe to Blog via Email?, submit and confirm your desire to subscribe in the confirmation email and thats it. ?You can unsubscribe any time.

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No More R?sum?s Please

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I’m sure like so many people I used to keep a r?sum? up-to-date but no longer. ?I don’t think with social media and blogging that we need them today. ?The traditional r?sum? was a document which gave a history of the skills you posses, the jobs you’ve held, some banter about where I went to school and maybe a bit about the things I like to do when I am not working.

The traditional r?sum? seems like something I did a dozen years ago but not today. ?Do you? ?I write a blog, it has an About Me page, in fact you are reading it now. ?I also keep a LinkedIn profile updated with new skills and that profile pulls in content from sites such as Twitter. ?The profile also shows the interests I have by the groups I belong, both professional and personal.

So why do I or anyone else for the matter need to keep a r?sum? updated? ?I think all of the relevant information can be had right on the Internet with much more dynamic content than a?r?sum? in Word document format.

I laugh when I approach someone about a project and they ask me for one. ?I mean, seriously, do you really want one? ?Do you really expect me to have one or is this just a test to see if I am hip enough for your project? ?Or is that just a reflex from job interviews of a long time ago.

We can do better, stop the?r?sum? madness now. ?

It’s all in good fun, I know some people don’t even know what LinkedIn is, don’t care about blogs or Twitter but a good number of us do. ?

Homebrew Upgrade Woes

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I ran into an interesting problem recently after updating my installation of Homebrew on my Mac Pro. ? Starting with the update command, which ran successfully:

$ brew update

I then attempted to update my redis installation to the latest:

$ brew upgrade redis

I was greeted with this message:

Error: undefined local variable or method `brew_install' for main:Object

Trying several things on my own to no avail, led me to a Google search result pointing out a known issue and solution. ?It appears there is an issue with a brew_upgrade.rb artifact being left behind after a brew update. ?The following commands from the Homebrew wiki fix the problem:

$ cd $(brew --prefix)/Library/Contributions/examples
$ git clean -n # if this doesn't list anything that you want to keep, then
$ git clean -f # this will remove untracked files

I hope this helps someone with the same problem.

When Will Amazon Stop Running and Face Reality?

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I have been an Amazon Associate for a long time and a Connecticut resident even longer. ?Here is the sad email I received this morning:

Hello,

For well over a decade, the Amazon Associates Program has worked with thousands of Connecticut residents. Unfortunately, the budget signed by Governor Malloy contains a sales tax provision that compels us to terminate this program for Connecticut-based participants effective immediately. It specifically imposes the collection of taxes from consumers on sales by online retailers – including but not limited to those referred by Connecticut-based affiliates like you – even if those retailers have no physical presence in the state.

We opposed this new tax law because it is unconstitutional and counterproductive. It was supported by big-box retailers, most of which are based outside Connecticut, that seek to harm the affiliate advertising programs of their competitors. Similar legislation in other states has led to job and income losses, and little, if any, new tax revenue. We deeply regret that we must take this action.

As a result of the new law, contracts with all Connecticut residents participating in the Amazon Associates Program will be terminated today, June 10, 2011. Those Connecticut residents will no longer receive advertising fees for sales referred to?Amazon.com,?Endless.com,?MYHABIT.COM or?SmallParts.com. Please be assured that all qualifying advertising fees earned on or before today, June 10, 2011, will be processed and paid in full in accordance with the regular payment schedule.

You are receiving this email because our records indicate that you are a resident of Connecticut. If you are not currently a resident of Connecticut, or if you are relocating to another state in the near future, you can manage the details of your Associates account?here. And if you relocate to another state after June 10, 2011, please?contact us for reinstatement into the Amazon Associates Program.

To avoid confusion, we would like to clarify that this development will only impact our ability to offer the Associates Program to Connecticut residents and will not affect their ability to purchase from?www.amazon.com.

We have enjoyed working with you and other Connecticut-based participants in the Amazon Associates Program and, if this situation is rectified, would very much welcome the opportunity to re-open our Associates Program to Connecticut residents.

Regards,

The Amazon Associates Team

The sad part of this email is what Amazon chooses to handle this….run. ?This is exactly what they did with a distribution center in Texas at the beginning of the year.

The reality here is states are losing big tax revenue to online businesses and now they want the revenue they feel they deserve. ?I pay my fair share of taxes and don’t really want to pay any additional taxes but it doesn’t seem fair that the local Mom & Pop establishment has to collect sales tax and others do not.

I just don’t agree with Amazon’s actions here and find them spineless. ? One part of the email I particularly funny:

To avoid confusion, we would like to clarify that this development will only impact our ability to offer the Associates Program to Connecticut residents and will not affect their ability to purchase from?www.amazon.com.

Translation, sorry to stick it to you but we still really want your money. ?Thank you!

2011 Conference Season

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Railsconf2010

I mentioned in my review post of 2010 that I planned to spend more time networking, in particular attending conferences. ?I have a pretty solid schedule between conferences and vacation time to last me into the Fall.

I will be attending the first two representing InfoQ, so if you are speaking and want to get together to talk about what you are doing then hit me up.

Emerging Technologies for the Enterprise, April 27-28 in Philadelphia, PA. ?Please take a look at the speaker line-up. ?I will be attending the speakers dinner on Tuesday evening, please find me.

The 6th Annual Emerging Technologies for the Enterprise Conference has become the Mid-Atlantic’s go to conference for developers, architects, and IT executives. Subjects as expansive and intricate as emerging technology and Open Source require a dynamic forum. This conference provides just that, with industry experts providing up-to-the-minute insight.ETE 2011 brings together pioneers across the spectrum to discuss the principles, practices, and products that are transforming IT’s ability to drive the success of the enterprise.

RailsConf 2011, May 16-19 in Baltimore, MD. ?Please take a look at the speaker line-up. ?I attended last year and it was a great event, very well run. ?Being held in Baltimore again it is hard to pass up not attending.

Thanks in large part to the?Baltimore Rails Community who were such a great hosts in 2010, RailsConf is returning to Baltimore again in 2011. Happening May 16-19, 2011 at the Baltimore Convention Center, RailsConf is?the official event for the Ruby on Rails community. If you’re passionate about Rails and what it helps you achieve?or are curious about how Rails can help you create web frameworks better and faster?RailsConf is the place to be.?Learn more about RailsConf.

MicroConf, June 6-7 in Las Vegas, NV. ?I am tentative on this one only because of how soon it is coming and other work and family commitments. ?It is put on by Rob Walling and Mike Taber of Startups for the Rest of Us podcast. ?The event, focused on small software companies.

MicroConf is a two-day conference focused on self-funded startups and single founder software companies. A limited supply of discounted pre-launch tickets will be available soon; sign up for pre-launch below.

360iDev, September 11-14 in Denver, CO. This is my first conference covering iOS topics. ?After watching the session videos from the last event, I decided this was a good one to get started.

360|iDev is the first and still the best iPhone developer conference in the world. We?re not a publishing company pushing books, or a media company selling subscriptions. We?re a conference company, focused on community. Our goal is to bring the best and brightest in the developer community together for 3 days of incredible sessions, awesome parties, good times, and learning. If you don?t leave Wednesday night, with more ideas than you know what to do with, we?re not doing our jobs!

Business of Software 2011, October 24-26 in Boston, MA. ?I wanted to attend last year but the price of admission was too high, but this year an early discount rate made it happen.

In short, BoS is a meeting of minds in an incredible, nurturing, sharing environment where amazing people share their thoughts about building better, more sustainable, more profitable software businesses and getting more out of their lives in the process.

I may end up at some smaller conferences at the last minute involving iOS development or other business of software topics. ?Hopefully some become available after October.

Again, anyone reading this attending, please hit me up as I would love to meet and talk.

Moving Forward and the Acquisition of Expens’d

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I mentioned my lofty goals for 2010 in a previous blog post.  One of the goals is moving some efforts from freelancing work to products which can happen in a couple of ways; either by developing products yourself or by acquisition.  Acquisition is how we are introducing the first product in our company.

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Why Expens’d?

We welcome Expens’d as our first product.  Expens’d is an application for tracking expenses, which sounds a bit boring but is a task many salespeople, consultants, freelances and just about anyone in business needs to do.  I personally think so many applications which are accounting systems also track expenses but do it in a way which is cumbersome and ordinary, we want to change this.

In the weeks and month ahead we will be introducing many new features to the application and changing some that already exist.  Thanks to our users feedback we have some clear guidance on what they want to see and plenty we want to explore.

Why Acquisition?

I have had the idea of a carefully crafted expense tracking application on my mind for a very long time but failed to set aside the time to pursue it.  When I found out Robert Dempsey of Atlantic Dominion Solutions was going to shutter Expens’d due to other interests, I jumped on the chance.  Expens’d had a great start with a good feature-set and knowing Robert, had a great code base.  This would get me part of the way there.

This is a huge advantage when building from scratch wasn’t really an option due to some time constraints.

The Future

I see many great things that can be done in this market.  Things that can make the task of data entry much more streamlined that can be extended to other applications.

Readers can follow what is happening with Expens’d on my company blog which will be updated as new features come out.  Thank you and stay tuned.

2010 – The Year Ahead

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2009 was a very interesting year, a year of some realization and a year which helped lay the foundation for the year ahead and hopefully the future.

I decided to document here a bit of what I have on my mind for 2010, not New Years Resolutions, I hate those and never do them. I have gained a fair following of loyal readers over the years and think of you as family, so I thought I would share with my blog family.

Freelancing

As I said in my previous post, I have been freelancing for many years and in 2009 I realized the ability and desire to continue with freelancing as a full-time endeavor was difficult. I will not be pursuing freelancing full-time in 2010 and as the year progresses I see the time spent freelancing to be less and less.

I will continue to work with selected clients as I have a vested interest in their success. In time I imagine their need for my services will be less and less.

I will be open for consulting opportunities with the possibility of part-ownership in a product and/ or for projects that need help figuring out difficult problems in areas I have expertise in but not limited to .NET to Rails migrations as well as scalable ecommerce systems.

Products

Even before I was in college I have always wanted to have an idea for a product, develop it, successfully market it and support it. I have been involved in a product company in the past but not my own individual ideas. I am sure this sounds self-serving, and it is, but there comes a time when we need to decide what is important and do it.

So, my goal is to primarily be a product company by the end of 2010. The company is Still River Software Company, LLC, which has been the umbrella I have been providing freelance services for the past 3.5 years.

Things are progressing nicely in a couple of exciting areas, so new product announcements will be coming soon. Very soon, but not just yet.

Blogging

I have not blogged a lot lately, been too busy with the business side of life. I will be blogging here, mainly about technology trends and my usual odd opinions about some aspects of technology and may begin to add some business writing as well which covers certain aspects of running a software company.

I will also be opening up a new blog for Still River Software which will discuss very company-specific information, including product releases and such. I will announce it here when it’s ready, please check it out.

Conferences

I have not attended as many conferences as I hoped to in 2009, the ones I did attend were developer-related, mainly Ruby. In 2010 I intend to attend more conferences but probably more in line with running a business or software company more specifically. I hope to see you there.

So, I hope the ride is nice and I hope I can report back great success at the end of the year, I certainly expect it.

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43

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Today is my 43rd birthday.  I have since my late 30?s, really disliked thinking about being another year older, I mean, it?s really only another day older than I was yesterday but acknowledging the fact that an additional year has past put me in a somber mood.  Maybe it is the realization of middle-age that makes one think about their place.

In prior years I spent the day reflecting on the past 365 days and wondered if I had made the best use of my time and taken advantage of the right opportunities.

Reflection

This birthday is no different in as much as reflecting on the past year but taking a different view of it.  I realized that I am damn lucky!  I have a great family, I work from home and do the work I choose to do.  I get up everyday and don?t take the dreaded commute to the cubical farm.  I get to see my family every morning a take my daughter to school.  I know many people wished they could have this life because I dreamed of it myself when I was commuting and wasn?t home when I wanted to be.  It is easy to miss too much.  I have reached aspect of my life that I can stand and be proud of.

I am truly happy and at a peaceful point even with the state of our economy and the climbing costs of everything.  Keeping our head above water and moving forward, certainly means success.

Inspiration

I read a lot of blogs, some I read every detail and some I don?t.  I find myself looking for something different now than I used to, so the sources of information have changed.

I find those people that are taking the same path I am taking or are where I want to be are the ones I find so much value in.  My goals are not to be rich or famous but to provide for my family, feel good about the work I do and help others find what inspires them.  It?s not always easy to be able to explain things as one might, therefore some source of inspiration.

It is so true, passion and inspiration mean so much.  I know too many people who have a 9 to 5 ?job? they never really enjoy.  I think something we spend so much time doing, we should be happy doing it.  It doesn?t have to be working for yourself, it can mean anything as long as it adds value to your life. 

Projection

It seems part of my career always seemed to be chasing something that I knew existed but I wasn?t exactly sure I would know when I got to it.  I can honestly say that I know what that goal is and I have a fairly good idea how to get there. 

I won?t go as far as lay out the path to the next goal but I do have it laid out in my mind.  I will blog about it here when I feel comfortable talking about it, but I will say that things will change for the better.  Stay tuned, good things to come.

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