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Yes, finally! After a very stressful and insecure time, with loads of overtime and cash flow problems, holidays have come. Tomorrow morning we leave for a 4 weeks vacation in the U.S.A. First a week New York City, then 3 weeks of cruising California, Nevada and Arizona. Pretty sweet ey? Man, I’m really in need for this break, after my companies bankrupt and all that it brought down on me. I’m not yet feeling the spirit at the moment, but I guess that will come when we are on the plane. Or when we get off the plane at Newark.

Anyway, I will make sure that I return totally relaxed and ready to take on everything again! Including keeping this blog up to date that is. I know I haven’t been writing a lot lately. Well, expect another month of none to maybe a few (when I come across some wifi) posts. I’m sure I’ve got plenty to talk about when I’m back! So, going to turn off my computer now and finish packing my suitcase and get some sleep. Crap, just realized I have to clean the toilet first…

Sjees, I just found out I cannot use any freaking dirty words in a PS3 chat. WTF is that about? I’m not 12! Is there no possibility to turn that “feature” off? I mean, I can decide for myself if I want to see a word like fuck or ass! I read the same thing is the case at the Apple app store. Some blokes wrote an app to receive lyrics, but if it has the word fuck in it, it’s considered not good for you. Apple blocked those guys from the app store, but they added an eastern egg, so you can still see the word fuck. Come on, Apple sells these song in it’s own app store! Pretty lame if you ask me.

Anyway, Sony, if i want to say ass or cunt or fuck or shit, then that is up to me to decide, not to you! Some sentences get blocked, even if they are not dirty. “Oh, what a beautiful day, it makes me feel so gay” is not possible! Gay is not homo here, so why do you block it? I can understand they do not want bad flamewars, but come on! At least let ME decide if I want to turn that on or not…

Sjees, this really pisses me off! Censorship sucks ass. It is a choice. Freedom of speech, even if it is dirty language. If you don’t like dirty language, turn on a filter or don’t read it. Should we ban pr0n from the cable because some people are offended by naked people? Hell no, just don’t watch it if you don’t like it. Gosh, shit like this really pisses me off man! Anyway, sorry if I offended you with my language. You should have turned your filters on. But at least it would have been YOUR choice to *** it and not some provider’s…

I code C# for a living, but Linux is my desktop of choice. I know, those things don’t mix very well. At the moment I’ve got a tux desktop (debian) at work and do my coding in a virtual machine, setup with visual studio 08 and all other necessary win only tools I need to code my projects. Sure, it works, but this virtual machine consumes such a load of memory, it is not exactly very fast… And if there is something I hate, then it’s slow performance. We make extensive use of Telerik controls here. Very nice controls, but only supported at windows. But, the Telerik boys announced this. And that means possibilities and fun!

This does not mean that we will just go and convert all of our projects to mono over night, but we will go and do some testing with it. I don’t find it useful for just our web-based applications, but also for our form based apps. Wouldn’t it be nice, to build some app and be able to run it on windows, linux and apple boxes? I think it is! It would be convenient just in our little development team, because we have one linux luvr (that would be me), an apple fanboi and a windows sucker. With projects build in mono, we can all keep our favo desktop and run the same tools. Nice!

So, I have started a little project, because I need some practice with gtk+ development. I know I’m not overwhelmed with spare time to code this project, but I’m gonna try to release some code soon. What is it? Well, since I have to query loads of data on different platforms, I thought it would be nice to have some query tool, which is able to connect to different platforms (mySQL, m$SQL, XML). One tool, query loads. And run it native in linux. I guess this makes a nice practice project, which might grow into something really useful over time. I’ve started a project here. I know, dingadong is a strange name, but ey, it does sound nice! I’ll post updates at this blog about the progress of this “practice project” and keep you posted about our mono progress. Let’s go mono!

Well, I’ve been to the UWV this morning. This is a government institute, who is going to pay the salary my employer owes me. This is quite a sum of money actually. Two months plus holiday money, including holidays not spend. This is well over three months worth of salary, so really hope it will work out well and I do not have to wait for this forever. Yes, I consider myself being lucky that I pay so much taxes now. Sure, I hate taxes, but ey, if it was not for the taxes, I would not receive jack now… So, just for this once: hooray for tax!

So, what is that light about? Well, several people here are working very, very hard to start up a new company. Well, actually it’s the old company, but with a new name. Or however they make it happen. And me is one of the people being asked to join them. Yay! So, why is it “some” light? For the very simple reason that the company does not yet actually exists… I hope to hear about this really soon and be able to sign a contract!

So, just working on in the meantime, waiting for some certaintees…

Yes, I’m very moody since yesterday. Why? Because my company is bankrupt… I got the news yesterday, and it feels shitty! I mean, check out this post. I really luv my job here. It’s a great company with great colleagues. And awesome work. But now it feels like it’s all over… I feel really depressed and I will enter a period of great uncertainties. I mean, what is going to happen now? Will I receive my wages? How long can I stay? Can the company go on in a slimmer form? And will there be a place for me in it? This raises many questions. I guess I’m a bit too emotional at the moment to see thing in the right perspective. Man, this SUCKS!

I wanted to make a bid on a house this week. Finally my girl and me found a house we both really liked, but now I’m about to lose my job, we cannot afford it… Sorry about these emotional ramblings, but I just don’t know what to do! Sure, everything will work out eventually, but now I feel beaten down. It is such a waste of so many cool people and a great awesome team of 300+ pleeps… Well, we’ll see what happens. Nothing more I can do then wait I guess…

Sometimes I really miss them. Those 80’s. It was a great time! Big hair, ugly suits with too big shoulder pads, bad sunglasses, weird music and lousy tv. And, no internet! Don’t get me wrong, I like the interwebz. Hell, I luv it! But sometimes the interwebz just kinda overload me. Too much info man! You know, back in the interwebz-less days, you had to pick up a paper to get the news. And all that news in there was at least a day old! Now, I know the latest news in less then a minute. Sure, it’s kinda cool to know everything, every minute of the day, but it doesn’t have any charm, does it? We all connect, but we will never actually meet. Well, most of us won’t. Ok, back in the 80’s you could have some pen-pal, who’d never got met in person, but that was more special. A letter would take ages to get somewhere. It was a nice surprise to find one when you got home! Now, everything you send your friends, will reach them split second!

Now, don’t get me wrong, tech rulez! But it is so less charming then it used to be. Mobile phones, another thing that was not present back then. If you would meet up with some friends, they all would be there in time. Nowadays, everybody runs late, because they can pinpoint you any minute. No fun! And when you wanted to call a girl you liked, you had to talk to her parents first, because you had to call her fixed house phone… Now that was exiting! Today you just text some hot shit, because you know only she will read it, no parents involved.

Anyway, it makes me feel overloaded sometime, all this information without any charm to it. Just guess this is one of those days it does…

Yeah, I do need to quit! Smoking that is. I know, I’ve been posting about this shit many times… And I agreed with myself that I would quit smoking after my birthday party. Well, as you can guess from the title of this post: FAIL! Why is it so hard to get rid of those damned cigarettes man? I’ve been smoking for about 18 years now. 18 years of building an addiction. That is not something you can set aside very easily. Apparently…

Anyway, did not quit quite yet. Guess I have to switch something in the brains. I did get the necessary stuff to help me. Not nicotine patches or gum, cause I think those will only make you a junkie longer, but without the smoke. I got some books. Not about quiting with smoking, just books to read. The few times that I actually tried to quit smoking, I noticed I had more time on my hands. Don’t ask me why, for some odd reason it just seems so. One thing I think is important when to get rid of an addiction, is to break with your habits. I think, that if I take the time to sit down and do some reading, I won’t be thinking about my ciggies…

Besides the books, I got myself a PSP and some new PS3 games. Smoking and gaming is not a good combo, because you need two hands to game. Ok, it depends on the game you play, but trust me, the games I play need two hands. I know, it sound like ridiculous precautionary measures, but I think those might be doing the trick! All I need to do now, is get the right mindset. Anybody out there carrying the force and want to do some mind tricks on me?

I have an appointment with the cardiologist thursday, and it would be nice if I could tell him that I’ve given up smoking. Maybe he would care less, but it certainly would make me feel better. How amazing must it be to tell some dude “no, sorry dude, I don’t smoke” when asked for a light? It might sound ridiculous to a non smoker, but for a smoker it is kinda awesome to be able to say a thing like that. And how amazing would it be, to get out of the car and go straight into the office, without standing outside in the cold, looking like a loser, just to have some zips on a ciggie? Gosh, how relieving would it be?

All those tiny things will make my live so much better! Mmm, maybe I’m getting into the right mind set here! Anyway, tips are VERY welcome

Yeah, I know, I seem like some distro install junkie… I have tried a whole bunch of them and sticked with openSuse the last time. I have used it satisfactory for quite a while and I still run it at my laptop. But I did not update it at my laptop… I made the mistake to update my desktop to 11.1. Well, that was NOT such a good idea! I don’t know what they were thinking at Novell, but it was a big FAIL for my desktop. Now, I don’t want to throw mud around, and really like openSuse prior 11.1. So, maybe it was me that made the update work out crap like this, but to me it was exit opensuse for my desktop. I will keep it at my laptop tough, because I don’t want to reinstall that one (for now).

Anyway, since I got fed up with the unstableness and wacky KDE 4 interface, I decided to reinstall my desktop again. This time I smacked up Debian 64 bit on it. Gotta say: nice stuff! The new version is out only since feb. 14th, so brand new! Hope this one is will stay with me for a couple of years, because i need another hobby then installing distros i guess…

I dunno why, but i feel like crap lately. I’ve had to cancel going to a party saturday because my hearth did not function properly. I have this little dysfunction that makes my hearth not go in the correct rhythm. And if the rhythm is off, well, you feel like crap. I think I just worked too damn much and did a bit too much in my spare time. Really need to relax a bit, cuz not only the hearth is not doing well, also my brain feels like a big ball of cotton. Not much is coming out lately… And that sucks!

So, gotta set back a bit here, or it might go into the wrong direction! And I don’t want that to happen! So, if I cut back a bit, I hope to feel good by the end of the week again. I should, cuz I celebrate my birthday at the end of the week. And feeling like crap at your own party is too lame… I know, not an interesting post here, but ey, had to get it of my chest!

Being a coder I write loads and loads of code. But besides being a coder, I’m also human. And being a human, it’s merely impossible to remember everything I wrote. The mind doesn’t work that way. Well, mine doesn’t… Sure, I can remember loads of stuff, but that usually has to do with “experiences” and not too much with code. Or passwords, another problem…

So, it is advisable to store the cool codes you’ve been writing somewhere. I mean, it’s kinda silly if you’ve spend a fair amount of time solving some problem someday, and have to solve the same kinda problem another day, but you cannot remember how anymore. That is frustrating! So, store it! Well, that is what I do anyways. I’ve been using evernote for this purpose for quite a while now. Hell, I store everything there! I just luv that app! Anytime, anywhere I can access my information. And searching around there is very good as well.

The thing with evernote is, that I use this for all my “private” data. Sure, I could share my snippets notebook, but I found some other service to do that. Well, not that I write such hot code, but ey, I like to share. Somebody out there could benefit from it, if it was only one… Hell, if nobody shared their code, my job would have been harder. Many minds make great work, right? If nobody shared their code, writing code would take way longer I guess. So, found snipt, which is a service dedicated to store snippets. I share my snippets here. Not much there yet, but will add more and more.

Why use snipt and not use my own webspace for this purpose? Well, those snipt guys already wrote it, so why spend time on something those guys did a hell of a job already? Exactly! So, check it out and see if it could be of any use to you. I go back to coding, got bugs to fix here…