a weblog of whereabouts & interests, since 2010
Thursdays at the project office go by quickly. I have to jump at it when the project manager’s draft report comes out at noon, requesting our updates by 2 pm, because shortly after that, we make for the airport, and the workday is essentially done.
So! January, February and March of 2015 have come and are how gone. It’s already April and the weeks are rushing by remorselessly as we approach the middle of the year – and our targeted system go-live date of late July. We are preparing for the third of four cycles of integration testing*, and we’re now reaching the point where we jettison some of the unfinished parts of the design. I have worked on many of these SAP implementation projects, and that is just the way it is. Time to face reality for some parts of the solution. Not going to make everything happen, not going to have perfectly cleaned up data. We are rapidly running out of time.
*I see some software bloggers say that the ubiquitous term integration testing is actually very troublesome and hard to pin down – and that it really should be called high-value testing. One can only select a very few typical scenarios to test in a limited time. I think I agree with that.
‘Land of the fruit and nuts*, that’s
California for you’, said a co-worker in his attempt at a little joke a long time ago. So I remembered that as I bought this little chocolate bar at Wholefoods here in Walnut Creek (a town itself named after a nut) on Tuesday night.
*Fruit being an insult meant for gay people, and nuts one meant for hippies and crazy people. So it’s pretty offensive! .. and I will not again let it slip by without saying so.
I made my usual run out to San Francisco on Monday morning. Check out the Google self-driving car that were in front of us as we left San Francisco airport, driving north on highway I-80 to San Francisco. It’s full of gadgets, and it did have a driver in attendance, but his hands were not on the steering wheel. The car made a lane change past a slow vehicle – automatically, I assume – signaling correctly each time before it changed lanes.
[From Wikipedia] The software controlling the car is called Google Chauffeur. Google’s robotic cars are each fitted with about $150,000 in equipment. That’s a 64-beam laser mounted on top, continuously generating a detailed 3D image of the car’s environment.
My favorite – and fancy ($50) – Logitech wireless mouse 
has inexplicably run into trouble with my new computer. So now I’m packing the $10 wired mouse for my work week. I’m a mouse guy : no touch screen or touch pad for me, thank you very much. And check out the ‘mouse house’ that the scientists working at the CERN Hadron Collider has set up for old retired mice. (The Large Hadron Collider is starting up again after two years). Time to smash some particles again!
Happy Easter! The sidewalk artwork is in front of my house. (No, I am not the artist : the bunnies were drawn and by my neighbor’s daughters. Looks like the one on the right is incomplete).
Yes, it was Easter on Friday but I had long had my bi-annual eye check-up scheduled at the ophthalmologist .. and so off I went. It’s a longish affair, since the assistant does a preliminary check, and then she put drops in to dilate the iris of my eye (which takes awhile), so that they can better peek inside (with a very bright light!).
So afterwards my eyes were very sensitive to light, and I had to keep the afternoon sunlight from flooding into the kitchen and bounce off the countertop ! And so all of this gives me an excuse to post the limerick about relativity and a lady named Bright that has reportedly been around since 1923 –
There was a young lady named Bright
Whose speed was far faster than light;
She set out one day
In a relative way
And returned on the previous night.
Iran was in the news today with the announcement that a framework agreement about Iran’s nuclear program had been reached (details still to be worked out, due by June). So I wanted to use Google Maps to check out the scenery in Tehran a little bit but alas – there is no detailed ‘Streetviews’ available. The map is dotted with posted photographs, though. Check out the gorgeous pictures of professional photographer Omid Jafarnezhad, with this link here .. as well as these pictures of people in Iran in an article in the New York Times.
We’re not used to heavy weather – thunderstorms with lightning bolts here in the Pacific Northwest. So tonight I thought a few times Whoah! that was close!, as the night sky outside lit up several times with white light, and the sound of thunder followed a short time later.
