Forwarded Emails, messages, and whatnots

I do like to hear from you occassionally, but I think it is time I set a couple of things straight. I dont know about you guys, but opening my inbox and seeing it cluttered with forwarded emails is not my ideal way of starting the day. It is bad enough that I get an average of 20-30 work-related emails a day (most of them I really have to respond to), and now I have to clean my mailbox of space-consuming messages with huge attachments in them.

Don't get me wrong, sometimes I do recieve stuff that are worth the read and contain useful info or even the latest sex scandal. But I really have to admit, most of them are garbage. So to make it at least a little manageable, I offer a few things that you should remember:

First, it is very easy to make a "gullible" looking email and send it to someone in the hopes of making it spread. And then you think to yourself, "Why on earth would someone want to do that?" The answer is SPAM.

Have you ever recieved these spam emails advertising about viagra discounts, or some bank executive asking for help liquidating a huge amount of money? Or maybe just the usual advertisement emails from one company to the next? Don't you ever wonder how they got your email address? You dont know? Well let me offer you some insight...

The easiest way to do this, is to spread emails with warnings, fuzzy and chessy messages, or good fortunes. These types of emails usually go around the block 10 times over and by the time it goes back, it now has a rich set of active email addresses from all the headers it passed through.

So if you really MUST forward something, please and have the decency to remove all the trailing email headers. Surely, you dont want to let everyone know what email addresses exist in your address box do you? Great. Neither do I. The best way to forward something is to put their addresses in the BCC list so one recipient doesnt know who the other recipients are. You can put your own email addres in the "TO" textbox. Also, it wouldn't hurt to trim down all the blank ">". Besides, I don't like scrolling 3 miles down before I get to see the actual content, so let's make these rules #1 and #2 ok?

On to #3, do you know how easy it is to fake the email header and make it appear the that message came from a valid or officially looking address like billgates@microsoft.com? It's so easy, my 5 yr old daughter can do it. So don't believe it just because the email looks like it came from whoever is implied. You may also benefit to know that there are NO computer programs that track how many times an email has been forwarded, let alone by whom. So sorry to break it you, but you're not gonna get rich, nor will any money be donated by anyone on the account of you clicking the forward button. Does it threaten to delete your account in Yahoo or friendster? Heck, if I recieve anything like this from you... I will hack into your account and delete it myself.

Point #4. Yes there are a lot of people suffering, but if you're really moved and wanna do something about it, call some social service org or maybe directly donate to PGH Pediatrics department or some other worthy causes. Don't click a button and feel like you've helped someone.

Point #5. If you are one of those insufferable idiots who forwards anything that "promises" something bad will happen if you "don't" - then something bad will happen to you if I ever meet you in a dark alley.

So to sum it up, posting something on the net is as easy as writing something on the wall of a public rest room or in a backseat of a public bus (not that I've ever done that before). So don't be such a gullible schmuck. You are my friend, and I hate to see you like this...

Now forward this to at least 10 people you know in the next 30 minutes. NO! Nothing good will happen to you if you do. But if you don't, I will magically appear in front of your computer screen and beat the living crap out of you, your mother, and your dog. And then I will stand over your bleeding bodies and laugh at your sorry asses. Mwahahahahaha!!!!!

Proof of Concept

In software development projects, vendors or integrators usually pass through a step called POC (Proof of Concept). This is usually still in the pre-sales period and is basically an activity wherein you try to prove or provide reasonable and substantial basis for the technical aspect of the solution that you will be proposing. And although some POCs are paid, others require them to be free. It is of course generally good if you get paid to do the POC, because even if the client chooses not to implement your solution, it's not a total loss.

However, when you do a free POC, you of course try to limit the investment of time and effort that you are willing to put into this task. After all... you don't really want to expose how you are planning to do the whole thing. Furthermore, nobody really wants to work for free.

Earlier today, I sat in a meeting to discuss an impending POC for a possible project. The goal was basically to try to understand exactly what we needed to show the client, and hopefully manage their expectations. As the meeting progressed, a lot of the details got spilled out and we basically managed to open a can of worms. The client had very unreasonable requirements. First, they wanted to subject the POC application to the same rigid testing that they use for QCing modules that are about to be deployed to Production. I immediately interrupted at this point and tried to explain to them the concept of a POC. It is certainly not a fully functioning module.... nor is it even a prototype. They failed to get the point. The juicy discussion went on until I began to hear clues about why they had these kinds of demands. Also, they didn't want us to change anything in the business process. Just move them out of the back-end, but keep the front-end. Long story short, these details came out:

1. The existing system had no technical documentation

This actually isn't the first time I've heard of this, but it still sends a cold shiver down my spine. It is fucking unfathomable. I honestly do not know, how a big software development company ever implemented a project as big as this (only 4 years ago), without following even the simplest development standards. No diagrams or other documentation whatsoever... just the source codes (all 175MB of it). And they are supposed to have already implemented a lot of projects for the Govt and MNCs all over the country and the region. Heck, I even applied for a position in that company once.

The guy I was talking to sounded like he was blaming the original implementor. And although I agreed that they really fucked up the design, my question was:

"Why the fuck did you sign the system acceptance in the first place? They probably submitted some sort of design proposal right? And they couldn't have gone forward without a sign-off from you right?"

Of course I never really asked these to his face, lest I openly expose him to everybody in the room for being the stupid piece of shit that he is. Does he really expect us to comb through 175MB of source codes to figure out what needs to me modified? Two words... KREY... ZEEE! Jeezaz... what kind of system requires that much code? I have worked on really big and complicated projects on heterogenous platfroms and have not seen code reach that big. What the fuck were they writing in there?

2. There are no longer any local support for the current system

This is really something that they have no control over, so this is really a valid point.

3. There are change requests continously coming in

I simply fail to see the real validity behind this one. Almost every software in the world eventually changes and is constantly being updated for modifications that have been requested by users. Does he think he is the only one that has ever dealt with a backlog of change requests?

4. They have existing investments in programmers for that particular front-end platform, 6 teams of 3-4 people.

This one is political in nature. If we change the front-end, the entire department composed of 6 teams lose the business justification to exist. They will have to hire new people, or train them in the new platform. Now although this is technically a valid point, you have to realize that the framework itself is flawed and has been a cause of major headaches for the past 4 years. And yet when it came time to migrate them out if the back-end, they chose to keep the front-end.

This really didn't surprise me at all. This guy was talking like a lot of programmers do. They complain a lot about their workload, but they don't want to bother changing the way they do it. And to a certain degree, this actually becomes a sort of bragging right to other programmers. It gives them a sense of pride to talk about what kind of hell they are going through for a particular client or project. This goes on until it becomes a comfortable niche. And even as they toil heavily and write codes that hack the existing codes, they subconsciously love the fact that they are actually doing it this way.

To explain this in paractical terms, let's say Program A was severaly flawed in it's design and is now generating problems for client X. Most of the times, rather than properly correcting the design, they will write codes that actually go around the poor design, gradually adding and compounding "hacked codes" into Program A. We acceftionately call them "permanent workarounds". After a couple of years, nobody knows which is what and everything is so cluttered that it's often easier to just scrap the whole thing and start from scratch. Sadly, this is a common practice that I see too often in a lot of software companies even today.

5. They wanted to roll this out in 2 months.

This was another jaw-dropper. I don't know how many times I've heard about this one. Often, the schedule is not dictated by the readiness of the solution but by something else. 2 months is fucking insane. And I am not gonna go kill myself and work long days and on weekends during November and December.

6. They have a limited budget.

But really... who doesnt right? Every fucking client is working with an approved budget. Again, most of the times these budgets were drawn without considering the scope of the requirements and they end up fucking screwing themselves up their own ass.

OK, so let's recap here. They want us to come up with a fully functioning module for their POC, which will be subjected to the same rigorous testing that they do for changes that they are about to deploy to Production. Note that the modules are interdependent. This will require us to put in a huge amount of effort specially because we were only given 3 weeks for the POC (notwithstanding the fact that next week only has 2 working days). Oh, and they will not pay for it. And then we are not supposed to change the front-end platform to protect their dumb ass investment, which is basically 175MB of code that is such garbage, that it is actually giving them a fucking headache to maintain. We have to be able to complete this and roll this out in 2 months, and be able to give them considerable leeway in the terms of payment and the actual professional fees. Hmmmm... what do you think? Looks like we have a winner right here...

Stupid...

I just lost a 2000 word post because I didn't paste it in Notepad before I clicked the Publish Post button. Stupid asshole! My session expired and blogger asks me to relogin... BOOM! Post gone.

I can't believe this happened to me....

Movies

I just found out that they have now began filming Rocky VI. The 59-year old Rocky Balboa is gonna go back to the ring and slug it out with a heavyweight champ? Good grief! Sly defend's the story's premise by saying "You're never too old to climb a mountain, if that's your desire." Heck, you can jump in front of a speeding bus, if that's what you want. But that really doesn't make it such a cool fucking idea does it? It is really beyond me how they think this applies to letting old farts box in the ring. What can I say? Only in Hollywood.

Don't they understand the Rocky franchise died at the last ice age? But I guess that's what you get for patrionizing Sly's boxing reality tv show. Now the old geezer thinks he can string a comeback out of his dormant career. What's next? Another Rambo? God help us!

Recently saw the movie Wallace & Gromit with the wife and daughter. I must say that for a movie made out of play-doh, it was more entertaining than other films with real actors in them. Also saw the Corpse Bride which was also OK, but this required a little bit more effort to explain some of the characters to my 5 yr old daughter.

Interesting how these animated and other "kiddie" flicks turn up to actually have very mature content in them. Sometimes, the story lines and character development are far better than most of the adult drama or action films that we have.

Case in point, Transporter 2. What the fuck was up with that? I was a big fan of the original movie. Sadly, the sequel never lived up to even half of the original one. The movie was filled with impossible moves, plots, sub-plots, and stupid scenarios. I felt like watching professional wrestling after watching UFC, you just can't enjoy it. A friend defended it by saying it was one of those dumb action movies that you just sit through and enjoy with a pop corn. Granted that the story was idiotic... I still didn't enjoy the dumb ass action!

A History of Violence was a good movie. Haven't seen movies like this in a while (except of course for Sin City) and it was a nice break to see that kind of character development and building tension in the silver screen. An interseting depiction of how society views violence and how quickly things can get complicated. Thumbs up for David Cronnenberg's film.

Software sweatshops

I suppose it would be OK to rant about the menial day that I am having right now at work, but I guess that wouldn't really be too entertaining at all. Besides sitting all day and answering emails to give the semblance of 'working', the only substantive thing that I have today is a business meeting at Figaro later around 5pm. It's something about an upcoming project that would look nice in my resume, except that it is actually a goverment project and I hear that it's not something to look forward to. I really am used to dealing with corporate monkeys by now... so maybe government monkeys are just a different species. Different yes, but something probably farther on the left in the evolutionary chart of Darwin.

I am afraid that I am getting too used to slacking around. When you've been through tough shit, I guess it feels really great to get a breather. But not as long as this one because you really reach a point where you just stop enjoying doing nothing. I miss the action that I used to suddenly find myself into. I miss getting the phone calls from a client being pissed off about how the vendor is handling the escalated issues. I miss nervously writing sensitive emails that are so carefully worded that it took me 90 minutes to draft. I even miss the times that they put my balls in a fucking vice at a steering committee meeting. Of course, I'm laughing at all of it right now having already weathered through the storm, but ask me again when I'm in the same spot then it's gonna be a different reaction I assure you.

I remember my boss pulled me aside one of those days after hearing one of my engineers make a comment that went something like "Sigh... I guess I'll see you in hell again next Monday." We were doing QA then, and was racing against the schedule to make the system ready for UAT. My boss told me "I just heard Amy say [excerpt above] .... morale is low, and you should definitely project a more positive attitude about this." Of course I explained the overall situation but eventually told him "OK. Don't worry about it. I'll handle it."

Of course as the PM, I am tasked to keep the team together and be the constant strength when everybody else seems to exhude weariness and fatigue. But I know my people and I always make it a point to know how they respond to pressure. They may make those comments, and we really do joke about stuff like that but they know and understand that this is the way it is. When push comes to shove, we will have to put in a lot of extra effort, and they know that I don't take this lightly.

A lot of lay people have the natural idea that IT guys are used to working extra hours and through weekends. And although I understand what they mean, I usually like to qualify this to everyone involved. As a consultant, we provide solutions to clients and will obviously do what it takes to deliver on our promises. When it's crunch time, we don't have problems working the extra shifts. But the problem is if this becomes a trend in the way the company executes projects, then it becomes more a liability. I always spill this out to potential employers on interviews who ask me about working extra hours. If it is a pattern for each and every project, then there is something seriously wrong with how they scope out the resources. This isn't a software company you're running here, this is a sweatshop. Of course, it has probably ruined my chances of getting hired... but that was exactly my point.

Recently, I was interviewed for a management job at a BPO company. The guy told me that I would need to build this system for a client within only 2 months with X number of developers that I would still have to hire. My immediate response was to try to asses if this predicament came by accident or if it was really how they usually worked on projects. I was automatically calculating the phases, 8 man weeks would only give me 2 weeks to iron out the design, 3 weeks for coding, and 3 weeks for testing.

What made my jaw drop was his repeated rhetoric on how it had to have zero bugs. Based on this statement alone, I could already resonably conclude that this guy did not come from a development background... despite an earlier statement that he did. Who can accomplish such an unrealistic task? Holy Crap! This guy is full of it. Nobody writes a bug free program. Even Microsoft, Oracle, IBM and all the other big software companies cannot write such pristine code. No software manager can certify with 100% certainty that the delivered solution is 100% bug free. You are only assured by the amount of testing that you conducted, and you obviously cannot use the word "thoroughly tested" with just 3 short weeks. I would've enjoyed the great challenge, but the idea that my prospective boss was unappreciative of real issues in software development scared me.

Being a technical PM, I do understand what kind of bohemoth it really is we are faced against and I just find it hard to look my engineers in the face and tell them to cheer up. How can you tell the group to be positive about it when you just sequestered their weekends? It is bad news, so let them just recieve it as the bad news that it is.

I guess I just have a different approach. Others would probably say that I have to work on my "can do" attitude but I disagree. I dont mope around and wear a plackard saying "We're doomed!" It's not like they hear me openly telling everybody that we're all fucked! Whenever I'm faced with this, my natural tendency is to asses what I myself wanted to hear, if I was in their shoes. Sure, I'm no longer the one who is actually churning line after line of code and running it through a barrage of tests in hopes of trying to keep the dumb ass mistakes to a minimum.... but if I was, the last thing I wanted to hear was a manager giving me those patrionizing pep talks. Ugh!

Facing the music

Last saturday I was finally able to withstand 2 games of full court basketball without pussying out and asking for substitution. It was great. Felt good to know that stamina has picked up a little bit and now I feel that my game is starting to get back to what it was back in the day. Still can't jump high enough to reach the ring with both my hands, but the shooting has definitely improved. The only thing I need to watch out for is to not give in to the temptation of playing competitively again. If I can do that, I think I can continue to enjoy being able to exercise and play... without the injuries.

After resting for about 2 hours, off I went to my friend's bday drinking celebration. Been friends with this guy since highschool and his place was were we would usually drink (more on that some other time) till the wee hours of the morning. But that was years ago. I knew that I couldn't go drinking head to head with these guys anymore because I really don't drink that much anymore... well ok, I don't drink that much when I'm that far away from home. Besides, I was really still physically tired.

We also used to have a band in highschool so when I got there, they already had everything plugged in and laid out ready to play. Guitars, bass, drums, and even a mic stand. I haven't really picked up a guitar in years but what better alibi for not getting pissed drunk than to just play and jam the whole night? Besides, they're not gonna make sure you're drinking your bottle of beer when your busy playing right? And so we did a lot of the old school stuff, and basically everything else that we could play... even daring to try on the newer songs. It's nothing worth a grammy nomination, but we didn't sound that bad either. Really. We had a blast and I actually didn't feel tired at all.

I have to say, it really made me realize how much I missed playing some music and just goofing around. Also made me realize that I shouldn't have completely stopped playing the guitar. Maybe I can't do this everyday anymore, but being able to do it once in a while should be more than enough now. Besides, I've long accepted the fact that we probably will never end up in the cover of Rolling Stones magazine.

And so starts my new inspiration to play the guitar once again. Not to get laid more than the average guy this time though, but just for the pure fun of it. We'll see what we can do about those riffs and licks. I'm sure these rusty hands still have some juice left in them.

Petnames galore

Now I'm not the nosy type of guy and have always really been the "I dont give a hoot" kind of person. Whatever works for you. That's me. I don't enjoy being intrusively inquisitive about people's personal tastes or preferences as much as I detest being subjected to it. But something happened this afternoon and I felt I needed to at least comment on this one.

I was quietly enjoying my lunch earlier today until I suddenly choked on a piece of beef when I overheard the woman on the adjacent table at the cafeteria ask his boyfriend:

"Do you want some water, HoneyBunch?".

I literally had to cough the stupid piece of meat out of my throat. And it didn't happen with just one cough. These arent the fake coughs you try to make when you're trying to clear your throat of a little itch. Those are more like "eherms". These were noisy coughs.

After almost choking to death, I casually leaned over to look at the next table. Obviously, I demanded to see who almost caused my daughter to be orphaned at 5, or more appropriately, I wanted to see these people who would so casually share their cheesy petnames with the hearing public. I was surprised. They were actually an attractive couple. I'd say about early twenties.

What made this really standout, besides the obvious absurdity of the word was the fact that when I was in college, I had a classmate named Tony (not his real name, inorder to protect him from reliving the college embarassment should he get to read this blog) who was actually using the same cheesy petname. We found out about it accidentally of course. He was taking money out of his wallet for a pot session when he unintentionally dropped a picture. He didn't seem to notice it until another friend picked it up and saw that it was a pic of his girlfriend. At the back were written:

Dear Honeybunch,

Keep this as a remembrance.

Love,
Munchkins

Needless to say, we were literally laughing our ass on the floor. And when I say laughing our ass on the floor... Louie was pooping in his pants. Tony was of course embarassed and was red beyond recognition. Maybe it was because he accidentally drank the glass full of gin mistaking it for water, but I don't really remember. It wasn't a really big deal then actually. He was just the butt of jokes till we graduated and nobody ever called him Tony again after that so it was really nothing. Did I say pot? err... I think we used the money to buy food. Yes, it was food.

Anyway, it was mind boggling to find out that someone was actually using those - Honeybunch and Munchkins. I mean, I'm not alone here right? God knows what other petnames exist out there. One would think you would only hear about that in cheesy cartoons or some other fictional stories/tv ads that have been made up, just to be funny. But here was an actual living proof that people really used it. What made it worse or better (depending I guess on how you look at it) is a reaffirmation that someone else today was actually using it also. Can you imagine the odds of running into 2 people who actually used Honeybunch to refer to their bf/gf? I should drop this keyboard and buy a lottery ticket right now.

OK, so enough of making fun of them. The laughter has subsided except for the occassional smirks here and there. Like I said, whatever works for you. But really... cheesy petnames are really not for the general public to know, or hear about. It's like whips and chains, you don't really wanna announce it.

Anyone who hears about our very own cheesy petnames (not that I admit to using any) will obviously comment with revulsion about it being totally corny. Maybe some people don't go as far as naming their partners after small donuts, but I guess given the right (or wrong) circumstances, I can consider a possibility that one would actually consent to being aptly called a munchkin or a honeybunch. Maybe you two were drunk and you agreed to be called Munchkin, if she gave you an underwater blowjob. Maybe you two were supposed to be in Puerto Galera but something happened and you had to cancel your trip. Maybe it's because you are a Doctor who's on call and now all the time you have left is a small stop over at a 24 hour convenience store and the only edible food they had left were donuts. And because you've been so hungry for an hour or so, the donuts tasted extraordinarily good. In fact, they tasted unbelievably fantastic. So you tell you're partner "Wow, try this one, it's really sweet, almost as sweet as you", to which she replies "Awww... you will always be my munchkin" and so starts the petname tradition.

[Believe me, I was gawking when I was thinking of this example myself. But I had to do it to explain my point so give me a break, ok?]

As you can see, I am a very understanding guy. I hope you people can appreciate the amount of leeway that I give in trying to understand that case in question. All points taken, just try not to spill them over to others. No ones gonna find it interesting or romantic. Maybe some chics will, but guys will NOT. Trust Me! You will never hear an ounce of approval from guys on cheesy petnames. We are NOT interested to know about what you call each other. Ok.. ok, maybe only so we can make fun of you.

Otherwise, the only reason guys approve of doing this first hand is on the condition that nobody else gets to hear it OR more appropriately because it will probably get them laid. But then again, everything we do is in hopes of getting laid.

Heck, my brother and his ex-gf used to call each other "Papi". Or was it "Puppy?". Well, that's all I have to say about that.

Finding the right words to say

Havent been able to post in a while. Not really because nothing blogworthy happened during these past weeks, but more because the 3 conditions of the blogging framework never really came up - 1) Me doing nothing, 2) Me sitting relaxed in front of my PC, 3) Me doing nothing. All three must exist!

There have been some recent developments in my tenure at my present company. I have been actively looking for a "better" job for quite sometime now. "Better" is really a very relative word since a lot of things are really ok here right now. I dont think it's very entertaining to go through my entire list, but there are a couple of things that really stand out:

• First, is the way my bosses handle their relationship with me. I've been with several companies already, and this is the first time that I've really been able to talk to my boss... not talk as in business talk, but real talk as in a colleague to another.

  
  

• Another first for me, is the fact that they actually let me do my job. Most bosses treat you like a megaphone, and you are only good for being an extension of whatever whim or wish they might have. If there is a problem, this is what you do. Something came up, execute these steps. You aren't worth anything more than a button that they can push.
  
  They, however really understand the word "empowerment" to the very core. If there is a problem, I handle it the way I see fit... and they support me all the way. In other words, my opinion really weighs a lot since I am the one that is at ground zero. Of course there are consultations with them, specially if there are major issues, but as the Project Manager, they really make it a point that I really am the owner of the project.
  
  

• I have also been friends with them during my current stint here, and have actually gotten along very well with all of my other colleagues around the region. Whenever we converged in Singapore, we would go out and have drinks and everyone genuinely seemed to enjoy spending after office hours with everybody. My bosses have actually been impressed since a lot of the technical engineers are the eccentric types and usually prefer retiring to the recluse of their apartments and watch anime until I came in and started succesfully herding everybody out.

It is with a heavy heart that I will be leaving my company. I've been trying to organize my thoughts on how I plan to inform them, but I havent really been able to form the usual coherent and eloquent composition that they are so used to hearing from me. The only thing I know is, there really is no tip-toeing my way around it so I should just be upfront with it and say it. I can't really lie to them and tell them a convenient reason... I owe them the truth. Nothing that would insult or piss them off of course, something accurate but still a bit neutral. What else is there to say? I feel that it's time for me to move on... That's it. *sigh*

Rule of thumb dictates that I wait for a good offer from another employer before I blow the whistle, but so far the offers I've been getting are shite to so-so. More importantly, my boss has been asking me to do some stuff with "long-term" implications (which obviously I cannot do), and they are beginning to wonder why I have not been complying. I can't keep mum about it while I blatantly ignore my responsibilities, I have to tell them now. I guess the good offer will have to follow...