alex.polvi.net

(and Winter term wrap-up)

Here are a few stats from Winter term:

• Working at OSL: 189.0hrs
• Studying: 144.0hrs
• Physically in class: 180.0hrs
• Sleeping: 546.0hrs
• Total time available winter term (12 weeks x 7 days x 24 hours): 2016hrs
• Eating, playing, or trying to provoke change (Total - sum of “stuff”): 957.0hrs
• GPA: 3.85
• Submitted to FOSS: 3 patches in 3 months (goal: 1 every 3 months)
• Number of posts: 45blogs (goal: 12)

Goals for Spring term

• Go camping!!
• Help create a platform for learning for EECS
• Figure out my living situation in CA for summer
• Figure out my living situation in Corvallis for fall
• Work my tail off at the OSL
• Good grades
• Get back into climbing

I am excited. School is exciting. Far, far, far, too exciting.

Bring it.

Woooo woooo! Although I did not hear any whistlers while camping, we still had a good time. Hiking, sleeping, eating, eating, fires, chili, peace and quiet made for a grand adventure I have heard horror stories of groups of friends going on trips then splitting into groups and hating each other. This, luckily, did not happen. We were the happiest of happy campers. At least on the outside.

I am very happy we convinced Will that starting a fire with a road flare was not a good idea.

While at the parents for spring break I took photos of all of my Mom’s weird art. Check out the whole gallery here

Recently big blue approached me, offered an internship, I accepted, and it was done. We were to be working on Xen doing proprietary value added components. They told me it was pretty much a three month paid interview to see if I was worth hiring once I graduated. I was getting a chance to do some serious low level development and that excited me.

About a week after I accepted with IBM the Mozilla Foundation contacted my boss, Scott, saying they wanted to hire me over the summer. He forwarded the note to me and I replied to Mozilla with:

This situation really puts me in a pickle. In one hand, I have been offered (and verbally accepted) an internship at the IBM Linux Technology Center doing kernel level programming. In the other hand there is this offer… where I would be able to interact with the community directly, instead of through a large cooperation. The community stuff is what I really really enjoy.

I honestly expected them to reply with, “Lets try again next summer”. But instead it was:

It would be great to have you come work at the Foundation this summer. I think I can do a bit better than the offer you received from IBM.

After Mozilla sent me the official offer this situation turned into a genuine hard decision. Do I honor my commitment? Or do I take the risk, blow off IBM, and see what happens? I asked this question to everyone with ears. I asked professors, co-workers, friends, and family. The responses were mixed. As I asked people I noticed more and more that I wanted them to tell me to go to Mozilla. The scale really tipped once my brother pointed out the obvious and told me to just follow my gut. So I did.

After telling IBM about the situation, and sleeping on it for many nights, I told them this:

It’s been a long week. I have come to the decision that it would be more beneficial for me to work with the Mozilla Foundation. For that reason I request to be relieved of my commitment to IBM. Thank you again for the very generous offer.

Then I waited for a reply. After a week of not hearing anything back I got on the phone. Had to call about 5 times, but I finally spoke with my would be manager. I knew at the end it was my decision and I did not need to follow up with him. I was simply trying to make it right. When we talked he did not make the situation any easier by saying, “Well, as long as you are comfortable starting your career like this.” There was no possible way this situation was comfortable, but I made the decision.

Back at the OSL I was told that while they support my decision 100%, I should really take some time to nurse IBM. Well, I disagree. IBM is no baby that needs nursing. Losing an intern (bottom of the food chain) THREE MONTHS before I was even going to start did not even cause a bump in the road for them. Sure, I may never be offered a job from IBM again; however it does not really bother me. I will continue to be professional with IBM but I will not go out of my way to give anyone a back rub (just as before this situation). By the time I graduate I should be at full pace with my own ventures.

The whole situation was a real eye opener. I had to put some serious thought into my future and am very glad to have such a safe, win win, decision. IBM made me a great offer, and I am very very grateful for that. Maybe in 10 years I will be kicking my self over this, but I doubt it.

So far I have learned that most things work out for the best. Furthermore, I have grown to trust my judgment. Even though I will never know “what if” I truly feel Mozilla will be far more beneficial to my future.

In exchange for some sysadmin work, I requested a weird plant. This is what I was given:

A Pachypodium geayi

I was thinking it needs a name. But then again, it is a plant. Maybe if a good one comes along I will give it a name.

Trying to get shwag at the recent career fair, I dropped my resume off at the Microsoft booth. Keep in mind that my resume has a Linux penguin on the top right corner. Sure enough, within the week they emailed me asking for an interview. I thought to myself, “Eh, what the hell? Might as well see what they are up to.”

Last Friday they called for a phone interview. Brandon had already done the same thing, so I sort of knew what to expect. During his interview they asked a few different brain teasers, so that is what I was expecting.

The interview took about 20min. He proded me about everything I knew related to software. The questions were pretty slanted toward development. They were really interested in what apps I have written, how large, what language, etc. When asked what my best language was, I responded BASH. Soon after that he wrapped up the conversation. He told me upfront they would not hire me. Still trying to figure out if that is a good or bad thing…..

This was my fourth term with the Computing Resources Committee (CRC). Even though we barely met, I was able to continue to learn about the structure of computing on campus.

At the most recent meeting we met with the software licensing manager for Oregon State, Lena Ferris. Coming from such an open source software point of view this was a very interesting discussion. She explained the entire system from purchase to development. One particular part that I found interesting was when she mentioned approaching ASOSU regarding purchasing a campus wide license for Microsoft office. She said that ASOSU was more interested in using open source alternatives and opted out of purchasing. She went on to almost make fun of the decision. It is possible that I just took what she was saying wrong, but it did seem like she was more on the side of the vendors than for OSU. Open source software helps everyone, especially cash strapped organizations like OSU. They will be receiving an email.

Right now I see the committee lacking purpose. Most of the meetings have been bouncing around from topic to topic, and never really making any decisions about anything. At times I feel as if the committee is yet another group keeping on eye on campus spending, in particular, spending on technology. The purpose, I have gathered, is to make sure that faculty are informed about any technology related change.

Next term I plan on continuing to serve on the CRC and the Technology Resources Committee. It is empowering to be a student member on such committee, and I hope to see more students getting involved.

The OSL is having an open house showing off all the cool things we are doing. Everyone should come and see what we are up to!

Thanks for the idea Randy!

Today was a hard hitting day for open source, Oregon, and what I know about it. Woke up at 6:30am to head up to the Innotech (yes, like office space) conference. Brandon and I were supposed to be lackeys for Scott while he moderated a panel between IBM, Novell, OSDL, and Microsoft. The panelists ended up bickering a lot. This was the first panel (of this type) I had seen, so I am not sure if bickering is a normal thing. None the less it was good entertainment.

The real fun came when I went and found the OSL booth at the actual conference. The booth was split between College of Engineering, and the Open Source Lab. It was almost like it was Open Source and COE at last. Ironically, our (OSL) half of the 8ft tabled attracted waaaay more traffic then our (COE) other half. I know, I know, its not a competition, however I think we proved a point. One of the key factors to having Open Source in COE happen is to have people clammering at the doors of COE absolutely begging for it. This is happening. A person walked directly up to Chris Bell and said something to the effect of “Thank you so much for providing open source in education. You guys are on the right track.” I smirked.

So yeah, the conference is was fun. I found out about myself that I really enjoy telling people about open source, and generally advocating things I enjoy. At the core of all this I feel that I simply enjoy getting people excited about what I am excited about. Just so happens I am excited about a world revolutionizing movement in my discipline.

Once I got back from the conference I spent a few hours doing communications homework. Killed sometime doing that, then started reading the news online. I quickly searched “Open Source”, just to see what was up, and the first hit was about LaVonne Reimer in Beaverton. That reminded me, I was supposed to be meeting with her! I went and met up with LaVonne and Cheryl because they stayed at Weatherford tonight! This was _very_ interesting. If are you are unfamiliar with LaVonne, then you are a minority. She is the director of the brand spanking new Open Technology Business Center. They are all fired up about open source (as they should be). We discussed open source, running over children, cheating Harvard students, and some sort of skate board motorcycling. Very very enlightening. I am going to continue to meet up with them in the morning.

Such a conversation really makes me appreciate the value that Weatherford has brought. I was able to sit one on one with big players in my industry, and let my voice be heard. For most students (at least in my hall) the value seems to come from the drinking and screaming that is oh so fun at 1am. I am encouraged to see a program that is strong enough to create collaboration, even in such a hostile environment. The more I think about it, the more I hope to stay at Weatherford.

I suppose it will all work out in the end. Just be passionate about something in the mean time.

Alright, need to plan my week. Going to be very busy.

Monday:
Locate room for lug meeting this Friday
Finish clean up work at OSL after mass host migration
Hopefully hear back from IBM regarding confidentiality agreement
Study: MATH night. Look over first few bits of COMM review

Tuesday:
Study: MATH, poke around on phyiscs problems, look over little more COMM

Wednesday: Physics practice, followed up by more COMM note taking

Thursday: PHYSICS!

Friday: Chill out

Sat: Probably waste doing something worthwhile, study in the evening

Sunday: Study for whatever finals I have the next day.