tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-356979302024-03-08T14:14:19.126-05:00The Only Boss You Can Ignore!Rants, Raves, Reviews and Recitative about technology and my constant discoveries.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10220167296173687018noreply@blogger.comBlogger58125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35697930.post-53588701388916764142013-05-30T11:30:00.001-04:002013-05-30T11:32:03.349-04:00Do you have a “Calling” or a “Job”?I am almost done reading “The Happiness Advantage” by Shawn Achor. In it he talks a little bit about how people view their jobs. Regardless of the job, whether it is a janitor or a CEO, if you view your job as your “calling” then you have a tendency to be more successful at it (success is based on your own criteria). So I started thinking about what I do and why I feel I am successful at it. Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10220167296173687018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35697930.post-58350176496123673402013-01-09T15:11:00.001-05:002013-01-09T22:44:20.596-05:00Iteration 2012, a RetrospectiveWill 2013 bring more of the same or will it be something completely unexpected? Well, it will probably be both. Every year we ask ourselves these types of questions. And every year we reflect on the past year. As humans, we have this need to substantiate our existence. The end of one year and the beginning of another offers us the opportunity to reflect and make changes. A retrospective. In the Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10220167296173687018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35697930.post-2810881091216965852012-07-26T10:09:00.001-04:002012-07-26T10:10:27.529-04:00Auditing ExtendedPropertiesSo yesterday I was coding a User Story about reporting audit information for the project I am working on. This project basically extends the ERP application called Macola (don’t get me started). What we are building is an extended properties application and we are auditing each change to an extended property for SOX compliance. So we are using a class called (funny enough) ExtendedProperty.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10220167296173687018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35697930.post-74555923067674648432012-05-14T12:50:00.001-04:002012-05-14T12:54:18.306-04:00T-SQL Conditional WHERE ClauseI started the day today with great ambition. I am tasked with removing hard coded SQL and change to use stored procedures. I made it through several stored procedures and was fat, dumb, and happy. Until… I was stumped with a problem I was unprepared to solve. The problem occurred in converting a bunch of case statements in the hard coded SQL. The code looked something like this (changed forAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10220167296173687018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35697930.post-35601707425786215102012-04-13T16:52:00.001-04:002012-04-13T16:52:52.054-04:00Back In Time: NUnit AgainSo I have been tasked with implementing unit testing in some legacy code that uses Visual Studio 2005. For various reasons this code base is not ready to be converted to the newest version of .Net. That being said, it is a sizable chunk of code and really needs to be refactored and tested. There are no unit tests for this codebase. So now is the time to add them. Since we are Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10220167296173687018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35697930.post-24978446912723946742012-02-02T18:30:00.001-05:002012-02-02T18:30:33.398-05:00Strong Management in Agile Development Deflect and Prevent DistractionsI remember in High School listening to Bill Cosby when he did the bit on parenting.  How he compared parenting to being a hockey goalie, I think.  The parent needed to deflect one tantrum after another or something like that.  It has been a long time since I listened to a Bill Cosby tape.  That was funny stuff back in the 70’s and 80’s. Little did I know then that what Cosby Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10220167296173687018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35697930.post-23384503395776447012012-01-17T16:20:00.001-05:002012-01-17T16:20:13.725-05:00I am addicted to Woot!last week I discovered something that I am not proud to say has me addicted. www.woot.com! It is amazing! Woot offers one item a day for sale at some great % off the price you would pay at some other online retailer. The sale ends when they run out of merchandise or they reach the end of the day. (Midnight) I haven’t bought anything yet because this is the reason Dave Ramsey stays in business. Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10220167296173687018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35697930.post-59441965709048309132012-01-11T16:09:00.001-05:002012-01-11T19:25:17.167-05:00New Buzzword in Software Development–Craftsmanship9PAUXZYJ7299 There is a new buzzword in the Software development industry.  This buzzword is “Craftsmanship”  There is a Manifesto. There is a conference SCNA. There is a website.  There is a new Academy. And there are many followers, one of whom I had the pleasure to be trained by back in 2006, Uncle Bob Martin, and one I have lunch with every now and then, Jared Richardson. Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10220167296173687018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35697930.post-82620195678006358582011-11-11T08:55:00.001-05:002011-11-11T08:55:21.756-05:00Veterans’ DayEvery year I like to thank those Veterans close to my family and me: Retired: Roland F. Chapman (Grandfather -b1910-d1987 - Navy) Robert D. Boss (Dad - Navy) Michael J. Boss-Hill (Brother – Air Force) Stephan J. Hill (Step Dad – Navy) Fredrick R. Chapman (Uncle – Army) Mark Hanson (Uncle – Navy) David Bishop (Navy) Charles W. Hobbs (Navy) Dawn Meiers (Navy) Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10220167296173687018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35697930.post-33229724250432479362011-11-07T12:35:00.001-05:002011-11-07T12:35:24.140-05:00Software Environments: Separation and Configuration is KeyI just left a meeting with several folks from the server group, the web services group, and my applications group.  The discussion was around environments and promotion of software through these environments. Let me tell you, there are some very different ideas out there regarding this process. I thought I would let you know how I prefer to make this work so that there is the best Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10220167296173687018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35697930.post-2110969569963039842011-10-28T12:12:00.001-04:002012-02-03T17:19:59.410-05:00ASP.Net – Code Behind and the TimesIn 2001 Microsoft gave us ASP.Net.  The successor to what we now call “Classic ASP”. This brought the full power of the Visual Studio IDE to web development. Allowing us to write “Code Behind” in our favorite language, either Visual Basic or C#, for WebForms development inside Visual Studio. This was a significant improvement to Classic ASP and to the developers ability to quickly produceAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10220167296173687018noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35697930.post-17513966667057874502011-10-24T15:54:00.001-04:002011-10-24T15:57:14.047-04:00When you can’t get where you want to be.Many times in my life I have wanted to be somewhere in my career or in my family life that may have been just out of reach. It is during those times that I have had a significant amount of growth and have met some of the long lasting fiends in my life. Back in 1995 when I was a theater electrician working in the Fox Theater at Foxwoods Resort and Casino, I knew I wanted to be a computer Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10220167296173687018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35697930.post-86529268244947183852011-10-17T14:26:00.001-04:002011-10-17T14:26:55.864-04:00Estimation: why can’t we get it?In software development shops across the world there is absolutely nothing more frightening to software developers than estimating a task. The fear stems from the unknown. The phrase “I don’t know what I don’t know” comes to mind. The pressure of giving an estimate for a task in terms of amount of effort can be very heavy. Somehow telling someone how long it will take to get this task “done” hasAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10220167296173687018noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35697930.post-89006610328002859982011-10-07T08:59:00.001-04:002011-10-07T08:59:35.069-04:00Visionary and TV Commercial GeniusSteve Jobs passed Wednesday night and he left a void in technology that will not be soon matched. On the web, on twitter, on Facebook and even at Disney tributes are still being posted. He was an amazing man with an amazing story.  How did he affect me and my life? in 1984 I watched the super bowl. I was 17 years old. I watched a commercial with a big head speaking to a zombie like crowd Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10220167296173687018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35697930.post-36010428328422792572011-10-04T09:28:00.001-04:002011-10-04T09:30:43.568-04:00Retrospective: Does it help?In the world of Agile Development there is this practice known as a Retrospective. A Retrospective is when teams get together to reflect on what happened during the iteration that just completed. it is a time for the team to answer a few questions about their process, the result, the engineering, anything that may need to be reviewed by the team for approval or improvement.
If the team is Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10220167296173687018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35697930.post-85612008528184220152011-09-27T14:38:00.001-04:002011-11-07T17:28:26.616-05:00I am officially a twitSo, I have now joined the world of twitter. Yes, I know that I should have done it a while ago, but I didn’t. There is no real reason for me to not have done it sooner. I just didn’t. What are some of your excuses for not doing things you know you should do?
So, Follow me on twitter. @rdbossjr Now all I have to do is figure out how to create a follow me button on BlogSpotAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10220167296173687018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35697930.post-74459189328036605392011-09-22T15:56:00.001-04:002011-11-07T17:27:37.767-05:00Can Agile work from the bottom up?Many organizations have tried to implement “Agile” in their development process. Some have been extremely successful. Others have failed miserably.
I have worked with 4 organizations in the last 10 years that have implemented some form of agile development. They vary in their success and they vary in their implementation. Each company having its own values and culture affecting the Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10220167296173687018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35697930.post-6049354682860482412011-09-20T14:51:00.001-04:002011-11-07T17:26:31.198-05:00Math in Middle School and High School. How important is it?Microsoft did a survey of College Students and parents about Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM). STEM, over the course of the next decade or 2, will be where most of the worldwide higher paying jobs will come from. Are your Middle Schools and High Schools preparing your college bound child well enough for them to succeed in STEM?
According to the survey, the answer to the Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10220167296173687018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35697930.post-78386882096725869782011-09-16T13:47:00.001-04:002011-11-07T17:29:21.306-05:00Windows 8 – How does it fit?I have had a few emails from friends who have installed Windows 8 and are skeptical to say the least. With all due respect to them, I believe that Microsoft is working two angles with one OS here.
Some have said that the corporate world will not accept Windows 8 with the Metro UI. I think Microsoft knows that. They have, after all, been the dominate OS in the business setting. This Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10220167296173687018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35697930.post-26469376133687495002011-09-15T13:43:00.001-04:002011-11-07T17:30:11.157-05:00Windows Server 8 – feel the loveFor those of you looking at Windows 8 as I am, there is a lot of excitement I think. There is some excitement in the background as well. Something that could affect us all as much, if not more than Windows 8.
Windows Server 8 is here too. No we do not have a Developer preview to download, nor any bits to play with. [Update: Some folks got it today] But some folks were invited Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10220167296173687018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35697930.post-37527047150244958012011-09-14T21:18:00.001-04:002011-11-07T17:33:31.445-05:00Windows 8 – Initial Thoughts (part 2)Interesting turn of events. I couldn’t see any of my other PCs on the network. I know I was connected because I could get to the Internet. So I tried adding the Windows 8 box to my Home Group but it wouldn’t let me. Windows 8 only allowed for me to create a home group not add to an existing one. Not sure why.
So I decided to try and find the Workgroup and see if I could add it to my Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10220167296173687018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35697930.post-79449942608944054142011-09-14T20:39:00.001-04:002011-11-07T17:31:17.731-05:00Windows 8 – Initial ThoughtsSo I have finally installed Windows 8 on a Virtual Machine. I am pretty pleased with how things are going. The first thing I discover is that pressing the Windows key on the keyboard goes right to the Desktop. This is the Desktop like Windows 7 with everything exactly like this Windows’ predecessor. Or is it? I press the Windows key again and I am back to the Metro Start screen.
ThenAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10220167296173687018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35697930.post-33250085322062442952011-09-14T20:09:00.001-04:002011-09-22T21:30:21.960-04:00Installing Windows 8 Developer Preview – Second AttemptSo after not being able to continue my first attempt at installing Windows 8 Developer Preview, I have moved to a different tactic. I am using Oracle VM Virtual Box. I created a new virtual machine with a 40GB hard drive. I started it up with my G: drive as the start drive.
I am immediately brought to this screen. A standard LTK (Language, Time Keyboard) screen.
I believe I am Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10220167296173687018noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35697930.post-80643068105612958872011-09-14T17:48:00.001-04:002011-09-14T17:54:58.062-04:00Installing Windows 8 Developer Preview – First AttemptSo I really wanted to get started with Windows 8 so I can move forward with investigating the new Metro UI.  If you want to do the same you can download the Windows 8 developer Preview at Microsoft’s Dev Center. There are a couple of options that you will be presented with. Windows Developer Preview with developer tools English, 64-bit (x64) Windows Developer Preview English, 64-bit Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10220167296173687018noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35697930.post-66364399332537824422011-09-14T08:59:00.000-04:002011-09-14T09:01:20.951-04:00What is ‘Metro’?Yesterday Microsoft introduced us to Windows 8.  If you want to download the new bits, you can here. The  screen shots have been shared millions of times across the net so I wont show them to you here.  But what I want to talk about is the new Design Language that Microsoft is focused on.  It is called Metro. This Design Language is not new to you if you have been programmingAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10220167296173687018noreply@blogger.com