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Category Archives: The Company

New Job

Don’t worry, I’m still working for The Company.  But I’m no longer a systems tester.  I’ve moved from the testing team to development.  That’s right, I’m finally a programmer.  The wait has been 3 years.  I graduated in 2005, and wanted to start programming right away, but The Company has such a good reputation that I figured I would settle with a good company in a job that I wasn’t thrilled with.  Testing grew on me over time, but still wasn’t what I wanted to do.  

I started on the new team officially on Monday, but I still have a tiny bit of work left as a systems tester.  I’ve been waiting for this for a long time.  I’m not worried about another day or two of testing.  

Granted, testing is a part of any programmer’s life.  No competent developer would ever write code without testing.  However, given the opportunity to be creative and analytical, rather than strictly analytical, I don’t mind the testing required of me at all.

Company Values

I was at a regional corporate meeting for The Company. I discover that there is a table in front of the meeting where a local private school is giving out informational brochures. I ask what this is about, thinking they were simply advertising, and find out that The Company is donating money to provide merit-based scholarships for needy families. So far, no problem.

Then I find out they have a half-hour slot in our meeting. I’m beginning to be suspicious. Why would they want to spend that much time telling us about what The Company is doing for them? As it turns out, they are wanting employees to donate funds individually also. So it was advertising.

They talk about the merits of their school. The area they serve has the nation’s lowest high school graduation rate, which they tell us is around 23%. This is inline with a USA Today article that reports it as 21% two years ago. But their students have a 95% graduation rate. Impressive.

Then, they go on to talk about their curriculum, which is deeply grounded in Christian beliefs. I’m not atheist by any means, but if I were, I would be highly offended. Consider that, as a technology consulting firm, nearly half of the people in attendance were Indian, and many of them are not Christian, but Hindu.

The Company has committees specifically for the purpose of maintaining diversity and inclusion. Whatever manager’s decision it was to host advertising for such a non-inclusive group like a Christian school was simply wrong. It’s almost hypocritical, to think that diversity is valued and encouraged, and yet we’re required to sit through a presentation like this. I was outraged.

Please don’t take me the wrong way. If I had the money available and this had been presented in a different manner, in a different setting, I would consider donating. However, these people should be presenting to churches, not companies.

Sunburned

There was this iconic speech to a graduating class in the 1990s that received a lot of radio play. “Wear Sunscreen” was the only advice the speaker was sure of. I’m here to tell you it’s true. Please wear sunscreen.

I did not wear sunscreen yesterday. Softball season is upon us, and I’ve joined several others who work for The Company in a local, co-ed league. We had practice yesterday, and I came home red as a beet.

Today at work, I came across a coworker from India who moved to the US about the same time I moved to the north. She had not seen a sunburned person before. She was asking me why my skin was pink. I was shocked that there are people that do not know about this. I tried to describe the pain, and how it changes when it heals. She told me about an Indian festival called “Holi” where people paint their faces all different colors. But, when they wash their skin, the next day, it is pink. That was the closest thing to a sunburn she had ever seen.

Treo 755p, Sprint, and Palm

The Company provides all its employees with nice corporate discounts for everything from airfare, to electronics, to cell phone services. I thought the cell phone service discount was very convenient, so I signed up at the provider with the best discount, Sprint, right away. I’ve been working for The Company for about two years, so naturally, my service contract expires soon.

I was left with a decision. Should I switch service providers, and get a new phone, new service, new everything, and spend a little more? Or should I stick with the very reasonable 25% discount and use Sprint’s $150 credit towards a new phone, when I extend my contract another 2 years?

Most of my coworkers have service with Verizon. I took a close look at their network coverage and data speeds, and decided their coverage wasn’t any better than Sprint’s in my area. The only thing to consider beyond the coverage area was the phone and the deal I would get. Basically, Sprint’s phones are cheaper. Most of the phones were more expensive, by amounts of $50 or more on some phones. So I stuck with Sprint.

I also looked at AT&T, but their data network, in my area, is not as good as Sprint’s or Verizon’s, so the iPhone will have to wait another 2 years. Maybe by then I can save up enough money to afford it, or one of its successors.

Before I even went shopping, I decided I wanted a PDA phone. I wanted a phone with the best connection capabilities, the best signal, the best battery life, and the ability to browse the web at a connection speed faster than dial up. Sprint had several phones that looked appealing. The Mogul, for instance, was their top-of-the-line PDA smartphone. The Moto Q was the most affordable of all the options available, but, sadly, both stores I checked were out of them. I wanted a phone that very day.

At first, I didn’t understand why the Treo was so much more expensive than the Q. But then the sales rep let me play with his, and I began to understand. The Q was Windows CE, and the latest Treo model was Palm OS. I have owned a Palm OS device in the past, so the familiarity on that front was appealing. Also, the Treo simply could do more than the Q.

So, I got a new Treo 755p, and was so happy, walking out of the store, with my brand-new, working phone. I might could have gotten a better deal online, at Sprint’s website, but that would have been slow. I might could also have gotten a better deal getting a phone off ebay, but I didn’t want to have to deal with the hassle of unlocking the phone myself, and dealing with all the phone calls to make that happen.

I have been quite pleased with the phone so far. The battery life is amazing, considering how much I use it. I am constantly checking my email, browsing the web, and of course talking to my friends on it.

My main, and rather large, complaint, so far, is the data connection to my PC. The Palm Desktop software used to backup data onto a PC is not compatible with either of my computers. On my desktop I run Windows XP x64, which I may have mentioned in a previous post. My laptop runs Windows XP Media Center Edition. I talked with support on Thursday, and they basically told me that I had to reinstall windows on one of my computers. Unbelievable! I am so mad about that. The main reason I went with a PDA phone to begin with was to store appointments, contact information, etc on it. And what person in their right mind would trust all that data to a device that they are unable to backup?

My only other option is to install the backup software on a laptop that I use as a file server on my network. I rarely use that machine except when I’m not at home. But it seems to be my only choice, so it better work. The problem with that machine is that there is no working screen. I have to use an external monitor or a VNC connection.

Here I thought Palm was a good company. Windows XP x64 has been around for over a year now. That’s more than enough time to develop software (much less tweak already-existing software) to run on a new OS. They don’t even support Windows Vista 64.

The computer industry will shift to a pure 64-bit environment at some point. Just like the shift from 16 to 32 bit in the mid 1990s. How long can Palm afford to stay purely 32 bit? I certainly won’t be buying another Palm product any time soon. In fact, I’m considering trading in my current phone for a Moto Q. I don’t need to watch TV on my phone. The touch screen is a luxury I can live without. Maybe I can deal with Windows CE crashing occasionally, as long as I know my data is safe, backed up somewhere on my PC.

OK, I’ve decided. I’m going to the store tomorrow to see how easy it would be to switch phones, if that’s even an option.

Promotion

Last week, my supervisor at The Company informed me that I was getting a promotion. I had been expecting it, so it was no surprise. However, it was nice to get the news officially. There is a raise associated with a promotion. My supervisor had said to expect a raise somewhere between 10%-20%.

But I got an email yesterday from Human Resources. My raise is actually considerably more than what she predicted. It ended up being 40%.

So, I’m happy, to say the least.

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