Author Archives: brad

In journalism class, I learned that 030 means “end of story.” I’ve recently reached my own 030 in one area of my life. I’m not going into details here, though. You want to know, you come and ask me, because I’m not falling for that again.

Anyway, I’m back and publishing again. Thanks to everyone who contacted me to find out what was up. Things are fine, now, and mostly back to normal. Let’s just say that I’m constantly amazed by the people of this world.

If you’re reading this, you know that I’ve moved my weblog off of truetech.org. I’ve turned that into a WordPress weblog that I’m sharing with Tom and Dave. So we’ll see where that goes.

Well, it’s getting late, and I’ve been working on my new template for a while now, so I’ll leave you with this: Youth minister smites dodgeball opponent. Discuss.

Performed by Tripod. I was laughing out loud at this.

And we’re outta here… that’s all she wrote, folks. REAL World 2006 is is over and done.

I started off this morning by attending RBScript 101 by David Grogono. I must make a confession: this was the third time I attended a REAL World session on RBScript. In 2004, it went right over my head. In 2005, I figured a repeat of the session would cause it to sink into my head, but instead, it went right over again. This year was the first I’ve heard David present it, and it finally clicked. And it’s way cool.

The second session I attended was Database Reporting by Burke Squires. Burke did a nice job with the presentation, but I guess I was hoping for something more in-depth. But then again, I’ve been using On-Target Reports and rolling my own for a couple years now, so this session probably wasn’t aimed at me.

The morning wrapped up with Aaron Ballman’s Windows User Interface Design, which isn’t as much of an oxymoron as some might think. The session was very detailed and informative, and the participants were asking some great questions, which led the session to run over by a fair amount. But it was lunchtime, so that was cool, and most of us stayed quite willingly.

Following another great meal (not BBQ, but oh well), I finished up with REALbasic Fundamentals 201 with William Yu. A lot of was review for me, but I got some good ideas for exception handling.

Most of us sat in on the Feedback Session at the end of the conference. One of the things I really love about REAL Software is how open and responsive they are. Geoff Perlman and most of the REAL Software team gather in front of everyone to listen to what we all had to say about the conference. There were some good suggestions, like a day of hands-on pre-conference workshops next year, but all in all, the suggestions were for pretty small things, which I think speaks to high quality of the conference. We also got to watch the results of the code competitions and the impromptu bridge-building competition.

After the Feedback Session, a bunch of us (and I mean a bunch!) went to Stubb’s for some BBQ. Finally! We all managed to squeeze around four or five tables. I sat with Geoff, Dave, Dave, Christian, Gerard, and Will, and I think I can speak for all of us when I say that we had great food and a great time.

Thanks to REAL Software, especially Janet, for another great conference. It’s nice to be part of such a friendly and helpful community, and I think a large part of that can be attributed to REAL Software and their team.

I’m looking forward to REAL World 2007.

The second day is at its close, and it was good.

The first session I attended this morning was Technical Q&A, featuring Jon Johnson, David Grogono, Aaron Ballman, and Mike Bailey. After a slow start, during which it seemed no one had any questions of their own, but were rather expecting just to listen to everyone else’s questions, which was my own plan, David said that no question was too easy, and that even Aaron learned something new about REALbasic this week and was still very excited about it.

So I raised my hand and asked Aaron what he had learned about REALbasic this week. He replied, “Sort with.” And then he talked for a few moments about some of the cool things you can do with it, like sorting dictionaries. Very cool indeed. Something to try when I get a chance.

My second session was Using RB in a K12 Support Setting, which was the session I was presenting. I was really nervous going into the session, because it was completely non-technical, and I wasn’t sure what kind of audience it would attract or what kind of reception I would get. As it turned out, the session went pretty well. I got some great questions and we had some very interesting discussions, some of which continued even through lunch and dinner. I ended with a live demo of Kodiak, which seemed to go pretty well.

After that, I attended Design Patterns in REALbasic with Aaron Ballman. I had attended Joe Strout’s session on the same topic two years ago (or maybe it was last year?), but I was curious to see what spin Aaron would put on it. He did a great job and gave some excellent examples, not just of how to use various patterns, but why.

Lunch was wraps. I don’t like wraps. I simply can’t abide the things. So I had chips and a cookie. Lunch of champions.

After lunch I sat in on Mars Saxman’s Debugging Principles and Techniques. No one is more qualified to teach about using the REALbasic debugger, since he wrote it. It was a great reminder of some down to earth, common sense techniques.

I then attended two non-technical sessions: A Practical Approach to the Perfect Product Launch by Gwen Palmer and Sales 101 for Developers by Matt Quagliana. Gwen does marketing for REAL Software, and Matt does sales, so these guys know what they’re talking about. They were both very good, and very enlightening. I came away from each of them with some new ideas on ways to promote Tangelo.

And now I have to be honest. I was disappointed in dinner. It was good enough, but there was no big Texas BBQ. I nearly wept.

For more insights on REAL World 2006, check out some weblog posts from Aaron and Ian (whom I was able to meet in person). I’m trying to convince Dave to write something up, too.

Oh, I did find out that when the hotel says the rooftop hot tub closes at 11:00 PM, they mean it.

Well, the first day has come and gone. The day opened with a nice continental breakfast, followed by registration. I also went to a brief speaker orientation, where I got my nice new polo shirt. Once everyone was settled in and signed in, we were treated to Geoff Perlman’s opening keynote.

And he had some surprises in store. One of the bigger announcements was the formation of REAL Software Europe and REAL Software China. He also spoke a great deal about the huge strides REALbasic in the Linux market. I knew they were doing well there, but I didn’t realize just how much progress they were making. It’s a market that’s growing, and it doesn’t show signs of stopping or slowing just yet. Our conference bags also contained free copies of Novell Linux Desktop, so maybe I’ll see if I can pick up a cheap hard drive to throw in my PC so I can try Linux again (I’ve tried it several times before, but it’s always seemed like more trouble than it’s worth, but it’s been a while).

After the keynote, we broke for lunch, then started our sessions. The first one I attended was Developing Slick UIs by Bryan Lund of Radical Breeze. He talked at length about the little UI details that give an application the “wow” factor. And I must admit, several aspects of his advice shamed me into rethinking some of my interfaces.

Then I attended Taming Complexity, by the esteemed Joe Strout. Joe shared some great tips on managing projects, such as using design patterns and using consistent naming conventions.

The third and most interesting session of the day was Jon Johnson’s Updating Your Application to Cocoa. This is a great thing that holds tremendous promise. Jon was practically giddy as he demonstrated some cool stuff coming down the pike. And afterward, he gave me some good news, but I won’t share any details.

I also had some interesting talks with Will, Joe, and the other Dave. All in all, a great first day.

Looking forward to tomorrow, although I’m a bit nervous about my own session.

Dave and I flew out of Philadelphia this morning around 11:30 and finally landed in Austin, TX, around 4:30 this afternoon (taking the time zone difference into account). Our flights were painless and relatively quiet, which was nice.

After we arrived at the hotel, I checked in with my family, then headed off to the Speakers’ Dinner. I had a great cheeseburger and some great conversation with Will, Aaron, Jon, Mike, and Thomas, among others. I started to get tired after a while, so I wandered out of the restaurant, but as I got closer to the bar, I found Dave and a bunch of others crowded around Thomas, who was giving an impromptu session on version control.

We went back to our room, where I had a brief videochat with Jen. After she went offline (and presumably to bed), Dave and I surfed around for a while before heading up to the rooftop hot tub.

And now for a good night’s rest, before the good stuff starts tomorrow morning.

I’ll admit, I’m intrigued by personality tests. I enjoy taking them immensely for some reason (probably because I’m twisted or something).

Rob sent me this one and it looks interesting, because it’s collaborative. Check it out. If you start your own, let me know in the comments.

Good news. As of today, I only need to work at Etown for another 22 years before I can retire. I started at Etown eight years ago today: February 23, 1998.

I started as Technology Specialist II. This is a fancy way of saying that I did frontline helpdesk kind of stuff: plugging in printers, restarting computers, and other deskside support.

After a short while, I was asked to whip up a database that we could use to track our tech support requests. That was when I discovered the joy of FileMaker Pro. I took that FileMaker project and ran with it, getting more and more involved in database work.

Then I took on a 4D project which shall remain nameless, which was to revolutionize the way we looked at curriculum. It did not, at least not much. But it did succeed mightily in getting our teachers fired up and pissed off. When Mike came on board in the summer of 2000, he brought with him a far greater knowledge of 4D than I have even now, so I was only too happy to give him that project.

By then, my title had become Assistant Director of Technology, and I was taking care of the servers, routers, and stuff like that, while still trying frantically to keep up with the day to day grind of tech requests. It was beginning to wear quite thin.

In 2001, I attended the FileMaker Developer Conference in Orlando, and I realized that databases were where my interests really were. Over the next couple months, I invested heavily in FileMaker Pro development, only to realize that FileMaker’s limitations were no longer something I could work around. I began searching for a better tool.

That was when I discovered REALbasic. I did the tutorial, twice. I did all the sample projects. I read Matt Neuberg’s book cover to cover twice. I read REALbasic for Dummies cover to cover. I subscribed to the REALbasic mailing lists and read every message, trying to take it all in.

But I needed a database to work with. I didn’t want mySQL, because I have some misgivings about the GPL, and mySQL AB’s licensing seemed to be deliberately hard to understand. I couldn’t afford to get into any of the commercial players. Then a CD arrived in the mail at work. It was a copy of PostgreSQL, another open source database, with a BSD license. Perfect.

While all of this was developing, Etown was deciding to make student achievement data a higher priority. Mike was ready to step away from the aforementioned 4D project (as well as PowerSchool, which we had also taken on). So when the district decided to hire an official Data Manager, I was able to walk right into the position.

I’ve shared before here, I think, how the products we were using simply weren’t cutting it, especially when it came to looking at achievement data. I was able to fall back on REALbasic and PostgreSQL to save the day in a number of ways.

So in eight years, I’ve gone from helpdesk grunt to database administrator and programmer. Not bad for an English major who couldn’t get a teaching job!

Bill noted that I should really include the Great Thin Mints Debate in the Greatest Hits links on the sidebar. I agree, look and I have rectified the situation. After all, it was, quite possibly, one of the defining moments of this weblog.

And rectify is a funny word.

10. Websites that don’t work correctly (or at all) if you don’t put “www” at the front of the URL. Come on, aren’t we past this by now?
9. The dead 60 GB Toshiba hard drive that we removed from my wife’s 12″ PowerBook G4 this morning. But I’m digging the 100 GB Seagate we installed.
8. The proxy server at work that blocks Homestar Runner. Seriously.
7. The media frenzy over Cheney’s hunting accident. Can we please let go of this?
6. Episode 38, Level 4 in N. I don’t think it’s possible. And yet I keep playing. I cannot stop.
5. The delay in the Star Wars live action TV series. All I can say is that after all the waiting, the show had better be all Boba Fett, all the time.
4. The pointless ranting and raving on the NUG. Enough already! Back to the code!
3. Comment spam in Movable Type and/or phpBB. What’s the point? Can there really be money in this? I mean real money?
2. The fact that I probably won’t win the grand prize in the iTunes contest. I mean, what are the chances, right?
1. The lazy and the quarrelsome. Again.