kernology - where laurie and learning meet
Six Weeks Later 03/20/2011
 

WARNING: This post is from my point of view. Your point of view can be very different and have no resemblance to mine. If this is the case please feel free to write your own account of the events.


Six weeks ago my life came to screeching halt due to an important deadline at work and if the deadline was missed...well it would not be good.

The project I am working on is broken into various teams: Production Support, Network/Hardware, Web Application, Communications, Database, and Release & Control. Then there are the few other people who do system architecture, misc. support, and project leadership/supervision.  

Note: I am on the "comms" team with 3 others - or 4 people total. Remember this as it will play an important role as we go forward.

The deadline that had to be met was a module for the web application. This consisted of several web pages, a huge amount of middle layer code and quite a bit of database work comprised of stored procedures and table modifications.  The web team has 5 members and the Database team has 4.   

It became rather clear to some of us that the deadline was not going to met and not by just a few days, the deadline was going to be horribly missed. I had the impression that almost no code had been laid down. 

One of the developers on the comms team decided that we needed to do something - like resolve the situation. He spoke to the project lead and was given the blessing to proceed with his idea.  What was this idea? Oh, how about we and I mean the web team, the comms team, and db team figure out what had to done, in what order and by whom. The comms team would put their work aside and work with the web and db teams to get the front, middle and back end work done. What would this take? How about working 9-12 hours per day at least 6 days per week for the next MONTH.  

Let me say that (almost) everyone bought into this plan. It was hard work, it was a crazy time, we all worked crazy hours - arrive at 6 am; leave at 7 or 8 pm; some worked Saturdays and others on Sundays and some worked 7 days in a row. Many of us were exhausted. I would get to work around 7 am work through lunch and head home at 6:30. I got home at 7:30, had dinner and was in bed by 8:30 or 9 pm.

But we made the delivery date. We rolled the code and pushed it on Friday night at 5pm. We tested the app to make sure it worked and pages did not crash the app. We finished up at 6:30 pm as as we were leaving, I noticed who was left - The four people from the comms team, 2 web team members, 1 production support team member and 2 project leaders. Not the web team lead. No one from the DB team. Not the system architect. 

Someday, IF we meet and you ask the right question(s),  and we have the time I will tell you all about the ups and downs; the good and the bad that went on during this time. In the mean time you can read between the lines.

Now, I just want to return to my life, it will have me - 'cause it left me 4 weeks ago as I did not give it the attention it needed - that and clean up my house which is a big mess.
 
Sad News Today 07/07/2010
 
I learned today that a colleague and friend at work has passed away from pancreatic cancer.

When I first started working at this position I reported to Dean and after the project was over and I was reassigned to another task, Dean and I remained friends.  We liked to talk about various subjects and there was a real connection there.  Dean had been in the Navy and then returned years later as a civilian. We would joke about how much time he had until he could retire. First it was 1 year, x number of months and days. Recently it was down to months, days and hours - I think it was less than 9 months.

About a month ago Dean said he was not feeling good. Then he started to loose weight and finally he said the doctor thought he had cancer. Due to the HMO he belonged to, getting into see an Oncologist and getting a biopsy was a long process. The biopsy was performed on June 25.   

Earlier in the week I gave Dean a bottle of Glendronach Single Malt Scotch - 15 Year Sherry Wood Finish, I might add. It is my favorite and through many discussions with Dean I had found out he liked a good Scotch too. I said that he might not want the present but that he would like it!

I did not find out the prognosis until yesterday as I was away all last week at Metals Week. Yesterday, I spoke to the other guys who work for Dean and they said it had been diagnosed as stage 4 pancreatic cancer which had also spread to his liver.  He was not at work yesterday and the guys would check up on him today.

I just got the word that he passed away sometime between yesterday and today. 

So Dean, I am going to raise a glass (or several) of Scotch to you and you wish good.
 
 
This has been a long and frustrating week for me.
I spent most of my time building sample/test code in little silo's so I could figure out how to get things to work. Then every few days I would agregate all the things I learned into the actual project code I am responsible for.  And then there was yesterday

Despite the wonderful potluck and having a nice time bonding with my team mates, at 3pm another "gottcha" was revealed and I just wanted to throw it all away - I am beginning to think that the path we are going down (and which I have been on for the past 3 weeks) with SSIS is more trouble than it is worth. Using SSIS is supposed to make life easy so we don't have to write tonnes of code each time we want to import a new file type. I could have written that code  and been done with it (over these past 3 weeks) and had a lot less stress.

So we are having a meeting around 10 am and I am going to try to be nice but I am putting my foot down, pulling out my virtual epee, and going to fight to abandon the path we are on!

And how are you doing??