Live from Bellevue

Just checked in at the Hilton. Everything has been going fine. I got a new Mitsubishi Eclipse as a rental car. I would like it if it wasn't an eye-sore and is a blind spot galore. Some people are bound to like it right?

Pics will come when I get back.

Seattle Tomorrow

I will be flying out of Ottawa International Airport to Redmond tomorrow for my Program Manager interview on Monday. So Scared.

So far the Microsoft recruiters I've talked with are all very nice and they seem to want you to do well. I got my first phone interview by hassling my university recruiter over the period of a few months. I was set up for a phone interview in late August with another recruiter. Since I will be a new grad next year, the phone interview questions were mainly based on which one of the 3 core technical positions I was interested in, which was PM. Questions resolved around conflict solving, design and technical communication. The main question was "What questions would you ask if I asked you to design a shoe prototype for me?" I like to think I did pretty well on that question.

About three weeks later, I got a call from a recruiting coordinator who was responsible to set up my trip to Redmond. My itinerary booked by MS Travel Services will be Ottawa -> Washington D.C. -> Seattle. I have to say that is probably the worst trip ever. I did not realize at first but I will actually be going away from Seattle on my way to DC. My main concern when booking the trip was the times. My first tentative itinerary had my arriving in Seattle at 11:15 PM. And with my interview the next day at 8:15 AM, it was superweak. My return trip will include a 2:45 layover in Chicago at 3:45 AM. :( The good thing is I won't miss any work here at RIM since Monday is Canadian Thanks Giving.

Earlier this week (D -8), I was contacted by another recruiter, a college recruiter this time, with whom I had a little chat with over the phone. She asked me some questions like "why do you want to work for for MS?" and "Why PM?". She also asked about my other interviews and offers and what did I like about working at RIM. She will be the person I will meet with first on Monday morning 8:15 AM. I also took the chance to ask her about the recent news about Microsoft reviewing their hiring plans. She assured me that they haven't had any changes in college recruiting.

Some things I will try to avoid:
Not waking up on time. Tomorrow and Monday.
Get lost on the way.
Phail.

Some sites I have been looking at to prepare for my interview (Basically a compilation of blog posts. You will find more sources within these links):
http://www.philosophicalgeek.com/2008/08/10/my-interview-experience-at-microsoft/
http://www.vishwacsena.blogspot.com/
http://blogs.msdn.com/kintan/archive/2008/08/20/how-to-become-a-program-manager-interview-tips-resources-etc.aspx
http://blogs.msdn.com/jobsblog/pages/zen-of-pm.aspx
http://blogs.msdn.com/techtalk/archive/2005/12/16/504872.aspx
http://www.emicrosoftinterview.com/Technical+Questions/default.aspx

I am a genius

http://www.ignorantopedia.com

lulz!

o_O

The Awesome Working Conditions at RIM Ottawa

If you can't tell, it's rain water.

I just saw the new Indiana Jones!

Yea. That's what I would say if I was working at the Waterloo or Missassauga RIM offices. All RIM employees there were invited to a special screening of the movie. What does Ottawa get? A new building that we should have been in a month ago? A Cafeteria?.

Well the new target move date is August... I personally think August 2009 is when it's really doing to happen. Because we haven't moved yet, they converted most of the meeting rooms here into office space. The lounges/cafeterias were also filled with desks and chairs for new interns to sit. This is Ghey. Fortunately I was moved into one of the meeting rooms (shared with 3 other people) and facing a big window and I don't have to be disturbed by people wanting to get a drink from the vending machine.

WTF

That's nice...

Scientology Protest

Anonymous Scientology Protest, Montreal May 10th 2008

Beautiful day for a protest. The intersection was very busy and we got a lot of attention from pedestrians as well as motorists. A firetruck and a police car arrived but they didn't really do anything. The police man had his lunch in the car.

Best moment: Internet Soundtrack Sing-Along

I Moved

Found a new place to live in for the next 4 months. The only word to describe this place is BALLLIIIIIIIN'. Pics to follow.

From New Place

ReportViewer Hack Sample Code

Download

Things About Tibet and Stuff You Probably Didn't Know About

1. The Dalai Lama received millions of dollars from the CIA to train guerillas to fight against China. The aid stopped after Nixon's visit to China. Not so much nonviolent now?
   
   
2. Before falling under Chinese control, Tibet was a theocracy headed by the lamas. The lamas lived in riches and exploited the poor.
   
   
3. Tibet was a feudal society. The monk class controlled all the wealth and were supported by a class of serfs. Serfs composed the vast majority of the population in 1951. The peasants were taxed up the ass and often mutilated if they got out of line. E.g. Eye gouging.
   
   
4. The monks used to go out to the peasant villages and pick out young boys (9 years old), and bring them into the monasteries to be used as sexual objects and alter recruited into monkhood.
   
   
5. There was slavery. Aristocrats had servants in their homes who owned nothing and had practically no rights. Their descendants were born into slavery and bound to their masters.
   
   
6. Serfs were taxed for a variety of things. Getting married, birth of a child, a death in the family, planting a tree, keeping animals, religious festivals or dancing in the street.

In general, Tibet was a shit hole.
Source for most stuff:
http://www.michaelparenti.org/Tibet.html

EPMSync Errors

"object reference not set to an instance of an object" When clicking on Edit Mappings:
queryString = String.Format(CultureInfo.InvariantCulture, "SELECT ID FROM sfATTRIBUTES WHERE AccountID = {0} AND InternalName='WORKFLOW_STATUS'", accountId); command = new SqlCommand(queryString, connection);
int WFAttributeID = (int)command.ExecuteScalar();

Error is thrown when ExecuteScalar returns null. Make sure you set the Portfolio Server Account Id properly and that query does in fact return something.

"The given key was not present in the dictionary" When clicking on Edit Mappings:
The default EPMSync.config that came with the installation already contained some Field Mappings. Delete everything between the tags and it should work.

EPMSync

Dammit Al

Damn you Al Gore! Where's that Global Warming you promised!

QA Server Down

Our QA server has been down since we tried to restart it and it didn't boot back up. It took 5 hours and counting for someone to go find it and switch it back on...

Also the vending machine's out of Cokes... sons of bitches

Why I Will Never Buy an Apple Product

Other than that Apple products are generally grossly overpriced and shitty, their marketing department just caters to the lowest common denominator.

For some reason, the PC goes to upgrade without knowing if all his hardware is compatible with Vista. I guess Mac users aren't smart enough to figure it out so MacOS is backwards compatible with all the on hardware. Building this backward compatibility into a Mac is pretty easy since there are only a handful of hardware that you can find in a Mac.

Getting a virus is now Windows' fault now? Who's clicked on the flashing banner? Who clicked on the entirely normal looking email attachment? I guess some people just don't have the common sense to own a Windows machine. This ad just says "Hey, you don't need to be smart to use a Mac!"

Itunes? Worst piece of shit ever made. Talk about bloated. What if I just want to listen to my music without connecting to my Ipod(which I've never touched) and finding out about the artist of the month.

So Ilife comes with every Mac huh? I don't need that shit. Sounds like bloat to me.

Mac don't have to restart, I get it. And PC's do? Since when?

Is it necessary to have Sarah Jessica Parker, who I would do regardless of her penchant for Apple, endorse a Mac? It is because people who buy Ipods and Macs buy them for the social status and "[celebrity] uses a Mac."

Usually, the product that uses celebrity endorsement is usually shittier. E.g. Pepsi vs Coke.

What is this supposed to say? "PC don't like to play music"? Retarded

Macs are BETTER AT MUSIC. Can you give a more retardedly generic statement than that?

Linux Lies

Lower Cost - Lie. Everything can be free if you want it to be.
Stability - Lie. I have never had to restart my Windows because "something crashed". If something crashed on you in Windows, you did something wrong and it was your fault.
Security - Lie. Again, if your Windows' security is compromised, it was your fault. Don't blame the doorman if you invite thieves into your house. When was the last time I had a virus? 1996. When I was 11. So if you are older than 11 and your computer's virused up the ass, congratulations, you are an idiot.
You Have All The Software You Need - Lie. Most open source counterparts of proprietary software are shitty. OpenOffice? Shitty. GIMPshop? Shitty.
Choice - Lie. No matter what distribution you choose, you end up with the same shit. Their differences exist for the sake of being different. I hate people who are different for the sake of being different. Bastards.

Save Report Parameters with Report Viewer

To save a report as a Linked Report with different parameters would be a very nice feature to have in MS Reporting Services, but for some reason Microsoft decided to implement this in their default report viewer.

I first tried to modify the ReportViewer control but you can't really add any custom functionality to it. So I had to add a floating button at the approximate position on the Report Viewer toolbar.

1. Create basic page with a Report Viewer control. Download the ReportViewer control here and install it. Open a new ASP project in Visual Studio and add the control to default.aspx by dragging it from the toolbox > data section. Change the mode to server report and enter the address of your Reporting Services server.

2. Add the floating button. By using CSS, we can add an additional button to the webpage and make it blend with the rest of the tool bar.

<span ><blockquote style="color: rgb(0, 153, 0);">//HTML<div class="floater">
<input value="Save Link" id="save" class="button" onclick="Effect.Appear(document.getElementById('popup'))" type="button">
</div>

//CSS
.floater
{
vertical-align:middle;
float:right;
right:20px;
top: 40px;
width:50px;
height:50px;
position:absolute;
}

You get the point. I used scriptaculous for effects. Clicking the button with reveal a hidden div with a textbox to enter the name of the new linked report. Saving will call another .aspx file to save the report with a xmlHttp call.

3. Function to save a linked report. I implemented this using AJAX and a different .aspx. I didn't really like to have the page refreshing. I'll explain further later on. First, we have to create a linked report. This is fairly easy to do with

CreateLinkedReport(NEWNAME, PATH, REPORT, props);

This creates a linked report called NEWNAME in PATH and it will be a copy of REPORT.

To save the parameters of the report, the best way is to run the report first and use ServerReport.GetParameters to get the last used parameters. You have to call GetParameters from the instance of your ReportViewer control.

ReportParameterInfoCollection ic = viewer1.ServerReport.GetParameters();

You will have to add a web reference to the Reporting Services web service. Click Project > Add Web Reference... and enter http://[server host]/Reportserver/Reportservice.asmx?WSDL. GetParameters gives you a collection of ReportParameterInfos. However, we need an array of ReportParameter objects to use SetReportParameters to set default parameters of the linked report.

4. My Reports. Usually users will want to put their linked reports in their "My Reports" folder. each of these folder has permission settings that only allow the user to add reports. We will need to impersonate that user in order to put a new linked report in the folder. Add this line to your web.config

<system.web>
<identity impersonate="true">
</system.web>

and take off Allow Anynomous Access in your IIS settings.

For more information about any of the methods used, read MSDN. More info about AJAX on Google.

Clinton Gets Support from the...

"... New York senator Clinton countered with strong support from Hispanics, nearly two-thirds of whom supported her.

She was favoured by older voters, with those over 65 giving her most of their votes, and had a clear lead with less-educated and low-income people."

It seems the lower you are on the socio-economic ladder, the more likely you are to vote for Hillary. Latinos, old people, poor people, and high school drop outs for free hand outs!

Snow also other stuff

As soon as I got on the road last Friday, snow decided to fall profusely. The only way I could see through the snow was to turn off my headlights and let daytime running lights light up the road and not the falling snow. In driver's ed. they tell you to not turn on the high beams when it's foggy, you shouldn't do it when it's snowing hard either. You'll see thousands of snow flakes rushing at you at 70mph. Although you should go try it next time, it's really fun to see. Just don't do it when there are other cars next to you. Also, don't reach into your pocket for your BlackBerry and take a picture while driving.

And now what I didn't like about the State of the Union Adress:

1. Way to put blame on the congress and take focus off yourself.
2. Terrorists don't "despise" freedom. Terrorism is the expression of one's freedom. Example
3. Way to blame the ineptness of the government on the "empowerment" of citizens.
4. That's an ugly tie.
5. One year ago, people imagined that Iraq would be done.
6. Way to give false hope to defeat Al Qaeda.
7. If it were up to dubya, there'd be more troops in Iraq. "You will have all you need to protect our nation" means you will receive more reinforcements.
8. More military spending! Hooray!
   
9. Seems like the US is at the same point as they were back in 2001.
10. Way to try to portray Iran as a totalitarian state. Iranians vote for their president and congress like Americans do.
11. Buy crops from developing worlds but things made in USA are best? No?
12. "...enrich uranium that could be used to make nuclear weapons..."
    
13. Hiring preference for military spouses in the federal government? Good thing no one really does any real important work there.
14. Laura Bush is scary looking.
    

IW I: Internetz Warz I

The Internetz fights the first e-war that pretty much united the entire series of tubes. This unprecedented conflict eclipses the magnitude in participants and stakes of any previous sckirmishes(e.g. eBaums). Scientology.org has been up and down all night long as Anonymous & Company got past Prolexic's DDoS protection to directly attack their web server.
To join the good fight against evil go to: http://www.partyvan.info/index.php/Project_Chanology

For great justice! For teh lulz!
bomb: dangerous cult dangerous cult dangerous cult dangerous cult dangerous cult dangerous cult

Mundays

Week number 3 at RIM greeted me with a slap in the face with a -20C (-4F) temperature. :(

Go Gawker!

THE Tom Cruise Video

I don't see what the big deal is about this video. I still love Tom Cruise. The Church of Scientology is trying to make Gawker take the video down but Gawker is not backing down. Way to stick it to them!

Interns Outting!

Went out last night to catch Charlie Wilson's War for $4.20, which is an acceptable price to pay for a movie, but not if I've seen it already. Damn peer pressure. It's not like I had anything to do at night apart from UO and watching TV. The movie was OK. Interesting characters don't make up for a snoozer of a storyline. The movie had no beginning and had a very unsatisfying end. It didn't feel like anything was actually accomplished during the movie. Afterwards, we went to the local pub at the deserted Kanata Centrum and found out from the waitress that there was in fact nothing to do in this city. Hooray!

Don't Do it Britney! It's the coward's way out!
Montreal 3 New York 1
The Clones!

BB Post

Got my BB this morning. Posting on it as we speak. The work environment is ok I guess. Though they only gave me a 17" LCD to work on which is way less than what I'm used to. Things around here move slower than what I got used to at a small company in the past, I have been waiting for a copy of MS Business Intelligence Studio for almost one day now and I won't expect it to get done today.

BTW To do a factory reset on a BlackBerry, enter your password wrong 10 times