Where does my stuff come from?

If you have ever wondered where the casing from your cell phone was made, or how much of an impact throwing away a juice box makes on environment, this video is for you. I found Story of Stuff linked on Damien Rice’s MySpace page. The website shows a very well done video explanation of where “stuff” comes from. Not only where it comes from, but we should think twice about using that stuff.

SPOILER WARNING: This video is not a I-feel-so-guilty-I-am-going-to-live-in-a-shack-in-the-woods kind of presentation. It was produced to let everyday people know that there is a story behind our large amounts of stuff. It does not just appear magically on the shelves at Kroger.

Link: Story of Stuff

Soccer is a google Beta - Football is a Microsoft release (Process vs Result)

Here is an interesting article about how American Football embodies American result-driven, instant gratification mentality, and how Soccer is quite the opposite.
(This article chronicles a Twitter 'tweet thread'...and no I am not going to join Twitter)

Fill in the blanks, everybody: Soccer is ____. Football is _____. Football is American because ____.

Read the article on Buzzmachine

Lessons in managing (from a developers prospective)

If you are feeling stressed about the deadline of your project, it is natural to feel the urge to crack the whip and be on your teammates backs. However, after my recent experience in which I was responsible for making sure our code was delivered on time, I have learned that micro-managing others is not a good approach.

If you are a developer, it is more than likely you know the feeling of having someone watching your every move. I don't know about others, but I don't like it. As a professional, I make every effort to make the most of my time. Having someone telling me to work faster only works the first two or three time....then it becomes bothersome.

So, if you are feeling like you are becoming "that guy" who is micromanaging your employees, try to re-align your outlook with these few guidelines*

1. Challenge yourself to find a 20/80 balance. Use 20% of your time to manage others, and 80% of your time to accomplish your tasks. Take the focus off of making sure your employees are completing your work, and make sure you complete yours!
2. Communicate your concerns/fears to your superior. If you are feeling too stressed out to deal with all the issues/blocks, or you don't think you can meet the deadline: TALK TO YOUR SUPERIOR! It is their job to make sure you get your job done.
3. Following my previous point, don't release your frustration on those below you. Release your burdens upwards, not downward. Those below you will just feel depressed if you unload on them. Those above you can actually help you overcome those issues.

I hope you find this helpful!

*Thanks to Jeff Hunsaker for sharing his wisdom and experience

Star Wars Telnet

If you have a few minutes and an internet connection, then you might be interested in watching the famed motion picture, Star Wars! .....in your command prompt window ;-)

• Start
• Run...
• type this into the command prompt: telnet towel.blinkenlights.nl
• Enjoy!

IE (5.5,6,7,8) version testing de-mystified

As a result of recently passing the 70-528 exam, I decided to start sharing my vast knowledge of ASP.NET with the world (ha). Ok, so really I just wanted to test my abilities by responding to some forum posts on www.asp.net/forums. I have made some good suggestions (IMO) and have sent some links to people with some ideas on how to overcome their problem.

One post that I made recently was in regards to a question about how to best test different versions of IE when dealing with UI issues, such as CSS and javascript. I posted some links about some solutions I have come up with over my 2 years of web development.

• IE 6 VPC: This is a great tool for any developer who already utilizes Microsoft Virtual PC 2007. As we all know, you cannot install two versions of IE on your machine at once. But, if you have two instances of WinXP running on your machine, you can have a different version in each one! Once you have MS VPC 2007 installed, you can run the VPC on your local machine, and test your web app with both your local machines version of IE(7 or 8), and the VPC (IE6)
  Download Virtual HD here.
• IE Developer Toolbar & IE7PRO: If you are running IE7 and want to see the DOM, CSS, javascript, generated source, etc, then you need to download these tools. IE Developer Toolbar was developer for IE by the IE team. This tool allows you to click on UI elements, and see source HTML information. You can navigate through the dom visually and do a lot of other cool things. The other tool is IE7Pro. It allows you to have many useful pieces of functionality that you don't get from IE7 out of the box. Improved tabbed browsing functionality, view generated source, and many more useful features that you might miss if you have been using Firefox recently.
• IETesterThis tool shows a side by side comparison of how a web page renders. You can choose the rendering engines all the way back to IE5.5 up to the new beta IE8. If you use this tool extensively, send me your feedback as I am curious to hear what others think of it.
  Download IE Tester Here

Ok, that is about it for IE testing utilities. Hope this helps you out!

Google CHARTS api

In case you may need a simple charting solution, Google offers a great API for simple charts. Check it out below: All this took was an <img> tag with the source pointing to Google's chart api.

<img src="http://chart.apis.google.com/chart?cht=p3&chd=t:60,30,10&chs=450x100&chl=Code|Dave|Code!" />

Geek Speak > Not as cool as you may think

I came across this article today on Google Reader. It teaches a great lesson for any deveoper who interacts directly with non-technical users/clients.

Much like the elusive African dancing monkey who does a fantastic version of the Electric Slide to confuse their natural enemies; developers have the ability to sway entire debates in their favor by confusing their enemies with technical jargon. After all, who can argue with someone when they have no clue what the other person is talking about?