Category: Life

Well, I did it. I got the job as a geophysicist. I’m cautiously optimistic at this point, as I’m not entirely sure what I got myself into. Nevertheless, it will be a part of my life I look back to with a smile I’m sure. I suppose its a bit of a godsend, as I was really unsure what to do past the September mark. There was a point where I was seriously considering returning to school to pursue an education in computer science.

I’m glad that things have turned the way they have. In other news, I’m moving out of my place. The situation demanded it as such. Living with two roommates has been a wonderful experience, but I certainly do look forward to moving into a bachelor’s (or 1 bedroom.)

So what’s in store for me? Apart from the new job, and the whole moving business, I have my university field camp to accomplish. It’s a weeklong affair that once done will allow me to get my degree.

Rice Tea has been going on as usual. I’ve sent out a few interview requests to individuals with law enforcement backgrounds for some help, but I’ve had no responses. Eh well. I’ve also updated the site for the book- it now automatically groups the updates into small expandable batches to cut down on the page’s consumption of vertical space.

I’ve also been working on a 3D filesystem explorer over the last little while. It’s a project that I’ve been working on bit by bit, as part of a challenge that was set at the last 2600 get-together I attended. It displays files/directories as entities within a solar system. Directories are planets, files are asteroids, and the current directory is the star. Clicking on a planet (directory) transforms it into a star, and a new solar system is formed around the directory. Clicking on a star goes up one directory level, turning it back into a planet that’s part of a greater solar system.

I’m doing the file system explorer in Ruby. What a wonderful, simple, fast, language that is. It’s high level, but it runs extremely well on my 300MHz PII. I come from a background where all I did was recursive imperative code (in C, PHP, etc.), and this was a great introduction to object-oriented programming. With zero experience, you can get up and running on that thing within seconds if you have some programming experience.

So the issue of the post-university question mark has perhaps been resolved, in the form of an aereal surveying company.

With the news of a possible job there, I’ve taken a few drastic changes in my life. For one, I’m moving out of my current place – where I live with two roommates – into a bachelors. I’ve given my roommates a month’s notice, and needless to say, they really aren’t pleased. I’ve also offered to pay an extra month’s worth of rent if they didn’t find a replacement, which I believe to be fair.

This being said, I haven’t even secured the bachelors yet. I gotta get a move on that. As do I to secure a long-term job, aereal company or not.

Flying blind boys, flying blind.

In keeping with my promise, I’m be releasing an update to the book. Just as I’ll do each and every Friday from here until completion.

I’ve also created a site where you can grab both the current and earlier edits. See what’s changed in the space of a week, or go back in time to revisit certain segments before they were re-edited.

You can check out the new revisions-tracking site here:
http://book.maelys.bio/archive.php

…and as usual, you can always download the latest revision here:
http://book.maelys.bio/latest.php

Well, here’s the front cover for the book:

First off, H4CK3R5 has a new name: Rice Tea. It avoids any kind of potential cease and desist letters I might get from a not-too-happy MGM.

Now last time I talked, I said that I had completed the second revision of the initial draft. In the time since, I’ve tweaked it to my liking. Enough for me to get into writing the true brunt of the project.

To that extent, I present to you my new plan: each week, I will release on my blog the latest iteration of this project. Every Friday night from now until completion. You’ll then be able to download the book to that point and share your thoughts.

That said, do keep in mind that I will likely edit older chapters as I go on, for the sake of making sense. Near the end, major revisions may even be made to earlier segments of the book.

Download the first release here (PDF).