They so damn are! Aftraid to enter their name when registering a domain, but post every single bit of thier personal information into their facebook profile. And even place a marker on their home, their office and the place they usuallys stop by to drink a couple of beers in some google maps app.
Apr. 04, 2008 // 09:50 | Comments (0)
Today, on the 1st of April, I, Aleksei “rusty_angel” Miheev, declare: the spring is finally here. There are lots of signs around. Those are the most notable:
Apr. 02, 2008 // 02:12 | Comments (0)
Well, yes – I'm back. I've always been here, but there really weren't that much time, so I couldn't sit, organize my thoughts in a way suitable for a blog post and write it. Later I got some time, but lost that habbit of blogging in English.
However, recently this blog was approved to TLA, and now I somehow feel obligated to start writing again. Right, I wouldn't mind getting a few extra bucks.
OK, so what's up? I still work in that web hosting company, I've got some of my projects hosted there, they are mostly local audience-oriented, so I won't mention them here now.
And I got back to freelance, too. It's casus inoperabile, I guess. It's my life, really. Freelance is much more challenging and.. just interesting. There's always something I do for the first time.
For example, recently I was optimizing a slow torrent site (yeah, I stuck to torrents), and I did it well, it's running smoothly for a about month already instead of crashing every night, but I didn't change a single line of code anywhere but /etc/my.cnf. Before that I always searched for weaknesses in scripts and queries (and there always were some), but this time I only tuned mysql. It feels just great! The company that hosts Matt's (he's a really great guy) server just doesn't believe that, so Matt had to ask me to describe what exactly did I do for them.
Also, I had first real-life experience with PostgreSQL recently. I used it a little in past and liked it, but GOD, it's custom aggregates are awesome! And tsearch was a big disappointment: it has everything I was trying to implement by myself for some time already. It's great. just great.
There isn't just work here now. I'm finishing my education this summer, so I'm wokring hard on my diploma project. I hate it. Really. I'm not into those things at all, I'm a system programmer, I have nothing to do arc furnaces. Writing a research paper on those things is painful. But I can't stop half-way, and neigher I can stop three months before the end after six years. So I just do it.
That's all for today. Real stuff would be later. See you, guys.
Mar. 30, 2008 // 12:22 | Comments (0)
No matter, how bad restaurant is, Jack Daniels is always Jack Daniels. Thus, friday evening was damn good
Dec. 02, 2007 // 00:32 | Comments (0)
As I have already mentioned, I got a “normal” nearly full-time job recently. I work in a web hosting company (Russian) now. And I promised to write an artcile about how is it after a month of been employed. So, here st it.
I'm few days late, though.
It is hard to distinguish pros and cons right now as I'm all into this new job. It's new, it's interesting, it's (somewhat) challenging, it fits me perfectly. Hm.. Okay, let's state that was a pro.
On the other hand, it's in office. It means I have to be clothed (and I mean clothed, so robe and slippers ain't an option) to work, I have to move myself from home to office in the morning... That turned out pretty hard, I've never been and early-riser, so I didn't have enought sleep first two weeks and still I feel that if I could sleep more, I'd feel better.
I can't make coffee or tea in the office as I used to make them. Actually, there's no way to make fine coffee there (can't stand instant coffee), the tea I make there is acceptable, though.
It's harder to take a break in office, and you have to go through from morning to lunch and from lunch to evening. It's okay now, though, as I even forget about lunch sometimes (that will surely pass later). Opposed to this, it's easier to concentrate: “home freedom” gives you too many chanes that you'll reading blogs or playing Chromium rather than working. I was sick a couple days ago and had to stay home and tried to work from here as I used to do all those years. And what? Routine tasks took two times more than they usually take when I'm in the office. And I missed our issue traking system and lots of things I just got used to already. And most of all I missed the ability to turn my head and ask co-worker a question instead of emailing it.
BUT. I have weekends now. I can do anything (or nothing, which I prefer) after 6 AM. And I know what will I be doing next day. After three years of freelance it feels marvelous! I guess I'm getting fat-old-stability-loving-guy.
Also, I can learn now. First, new work means new challenges, and I have to improve some of my skills, which were pretty weak before. I never had time and need to get beyond just general understanding of perl, bash, sed and awk. I barely understood how MySQL replication actually works. I knew nothing about PAM, NSS and postfix.
And I can actually learn: read books and manuals on things I do not use in my work. Just because I've got free time now. Finally I'm reading Dive Into Python and I like this language and will try to build my next own project with Python.
I don't have to pay attention to my time management anymore. No need to explain anyone, why do I have to work when they want to see me. Less interference between work and my (yet inexistent, though) private life.
And the last thing for now, I guess, is pro office work again. I can get enough resources when I need. I cat ask for a test server, so I don't have to manage virtual machines and virtual network. I can ask for software, though I never needed it yet and I doubt that I'll be need of something non-free in future.
Uhm. The very last: I know now what is TGIF really about, and I don't like it very much actually.
You see, there are much more pros for me now. Actually, this job is a good balance between freelance and what is usually ment by office work.
Nov. 24, 2007 // 15:59 | Comments (0)
Well, yes, it's Novemeber, time for me to catch some cold. So I stay at home instead of been in office, take pills, drink a lot of hot tea with lemon (I hate tea with anything but water!!!) and... keep working.
I am trying to set up MySQL authorization/authentication with PAM and NSS. There'll definitely be an article on this, as I couldn't find enough information on this. There is a bunch of HowTo's available, and the task doesn't seem to be too hard, but I have problems with it now. Either those howtos aren't enough up-do-date or pill made me dumb.
I didn't tell you the best part yet. I didn't tell you anything good at all, actually. This site is one year old now! I ordered hosting from BlueHost.com on Nov, 20 last year. Now I have my VPS and I was busy moving the blog here from BlueHost and transferring the domain to GoDaddy, so it could have been unavailable for some time. Also, I missed November, 19 when I promised you to report about the first month of non-freelancing. This article would follow today later.
Right now I am accepting congrats. :)
This year shown me that I can be interesting, that I have things to write about (hope, next year will give more such things), that I can get a PR4 for a new domain, and hit the Reddit's top. There are things to remember, definitely.
Thank you for been with me all this time.
Nov. 22, 2007 // 11:24 | Comments (0)
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