ask Shaffer -- if you dare.

Like I said up before, I got to do a little light reading recently, so I thought I'd rap out a little review on each. Coder to Developer by Mike Gunderloy I saw this book and was intrigued by the topic, "Tools and Strategies for Delivering Your Software". I was also diggin' the price, at $20 a value in today's book world. I still own Mike's book on VB6 and ADO , it was one of the few books at the time that got me through learning ADO when all I really knew was DAO (way back in '98?). Because of that book, I thought I'd give this one a try. At work we are in the process of (hopefully) re-engineering our processes so it seemed like a good fit. It's a very good read, not too heavy, not too light. I saw some reviews on Amazon that took issue with the .Net centricity of it. While that's true, I don't think it's oppressive...it has many "agnostic" ideas that would work in...

A lot of people have inquired about my dad and offering best wishes. Thanks to all. It really means alot. But I think I'm ready to tell the whole story. I think it's quite a story, but I'm a little biased since he's my old man and all.... One night, my mom and dad were sitting around watching the tube, a nightly ritual in their house. At the commercial break, my dad decided he needed to get up from the couch so he did, but noticed something on the floor while he was getting up. So (like most of us do) he did about 13 things all at once, getting up and bending down to pick some catalog up off the ground. He had just been working out (doing a little light walking on treadmill) so he was a little winded. So these attributes combined, collided and in the process of getting up and bending down, he basically passed out. He stumbled a bit and fell into a corner of their family room. My startled mom was on him in a second. She gets over to him and rolls him out flat (he's c...

So where ya been? That's the question that has literally been tearing up my email and phone lines. Yep, it's been a while. But I've been a busy beaver. Here are just a few things that I've been involved with since Thanksgiving: My dad got very sick and had to go to the hospital. Heart stuff. My mom was certain he was gone. So I've been a little distracted there. But thank God, he's at home and doing great. Work has been crazy. Been working on trying to lob out the first Windows Forms application this place has produced. I was brought in late to the game, so much (if not all) the "design" had been done. Or rather, most of the code was done and there was never any design. So I've been trying to cope with that. Work has also been wacky. We are in the process of make a fairly significant paradigm shift, and I've been an agent of change. The new boss is planning to impose a strict "all Java" rule on all new development. That means all ASP ...