A few months ago I was discussing with @kaze about the truncation plague on Firefox OS, and he came out with a sentence that left me doubtful:

according to the desktop metrics I had, French is the least compact locale and Chinese is the most compact one

So I had to check it somehow (in Italy they would call me Saint Thomas for being skeptical).

The basic idea was simple: use Silme to analyze all locales available in Mozilla l10n repositories, comparing string lengths between English and another language.

Here’s the resulting Python script (beware my slowly improving programming skills) and a table with the results (data can be sorted by clicking on column headers).

Sample and Reference

I’m using mozilla-beta as a reference, and comparing each locale against en-GB. Why not en-US? The reason is simple: en-US strings are scattered across the entire mozilla-central repository, so I should do tricks like Transvision in order to create a pseudo en-US string-only repository. Using en-GB leads to less precise results (see below), but for the sake of this analysis I considered it an acceptable compromise.

I’m not checking all folders, only the main ones (‘browser’, ‘dom’, ‘mail’, ‘mobile’, ‘netwerk’, ‘security’, ‘services’, ‘suite’, ‘toolkit’, ‘webapprt’). This still generates an archive of almost 18,000 strings for locales translating all products, so it seems a decent sample.

Caveats and Weird Results

String 1: en-GB 2 characters, locale X 4 characters -> +2 characters, +100%
String 2: en-GB 8 characters, locale X 4 characters -> -4 characters, -50%
Average for locale X: -1 characters, +25% (sum of differences divided by total number of items).

Not sure if this is the best choice, but I couldn’t think of an alternative. Note also that I’m ignoring single character strings (access keys, shortcuts).

In the table you’ll see a global column (average results) and “buckets”, with string groups based on en-GB original length. Too bad these groups are often unreliable because of the “concatenation conundrum”, where one string could be created by concatenating 3 different labels.

Typical example to create a sentence with a link (note that concatenation should be always avoided):

sentence.before = Hey, this is a
sentence.link = very interesting link
sentence.after = .

In Italian this could be localized as

sentence.before = Ehi, questo
sentence.link = link
sentence.after = `e veramente interessante.

Do you see what just happened here? Length comparison based on groups just became less interesting, both averages and maximum/minimum differences.

Anyhow, here’s a good image (graph based on global difference in percentage) that I’d like to call “Why using English as a reference for designing UI may not be a great idea”.

Open link in a new tab/window to see the full image

Why not use Gaia directly?

This sounds like a good idea: we have a real en-US repository, and we don’t have concatenations. But there are some disadvantages as well:

• Most locales already did at least two rounds of QA, so a lot of strings have already been (heavily) shortened to fit in the UI. So data could be less useful and interesting.
• Several locales are incomplete on gaia-l10n. For this very reason I excluded all locales with less than 1000 strings translated.

Here’s the same table for Gaia. And, again, a similar graph based on global difference in percentage.

Open link in a new tab/window to see the full image

Fun facts:

• We know that en-GB is 0.16% longer than en-US, at least on Gaia.
• A simple word as “OK” (2 characters) can become as long as “Kulungile” (9) in Xhosa, or “Ceart ma-th`a” (12) in Scottish Gaelic.

http://www.yetanothertechblog.com/2013/12/27/l10n-string-length-and-verbosity-across-languages/

It's the end of the quarter, just list last quarter I wrote down a summary of what I did this quarter for Mozilla for posterity, here it is

Tools and code

Once again, I spent significant time working on tools this quarter. My activity was focused on Transvision, Langchecker and my FirefoxOS minidashboard.

There were 2 releases of Transvision, 2.9 and 3.0, adding many new features and additional support for Gaia repositories. I also created a #transvision IRC channel on Mozilla IRC server. You can now search strings for 3 locales simultaneaously, check all existing translations for an entity, list all potentially wrong varables in your repo or quickly check  all strings that need some extra QA for Firefox OS.

There were also many improvements to langchecker, the tool that I now maintain with my colleague Francesco Lodolo to track and manage progress of translations for projects using our .lang format. Many views were improved and we added features specific to the metadata used on mozilla.org (page activation and home page promos). We also added checks for UTF8 validity of the source files as well as checks for broken or missing python-style replacement variables in translations. We can also know how much of our l10n user base we cover not only per page but also per string on a page, which allows us to decide when we can activate a minor but visible text change on our pages (recently for example, html meta description and title tag changed for SEO reasons on the Firefox download pages).

As for my FirefoxOS mini dashboard (which syndicates data from the l10n dashboard, the langchecker and also contains some manually maintained data sources), it followed Gaia progresses and now tracks Gaia 1.1 and 1.2 in addition to the master branch.

Community building

This quarter I found 8 new localizers for mozilla.org and key Firefox web parts for the following locales: Afrikaans, Arabic, Basque, Bulgarian, Czech, Slovak and Spanish (Mexico). As usual I tried to focus on helping teams that lack manpower and / or maintain Firefox for a minor language.

I also created / revived IRC channels for these locales to help community building:  Catalan (#mozilla-cat), Slovak (#mozilla-sk) and Serbian (#mozilla.sr).

If we can find 5 to 10 localizers working on key content every quarter, we shouldn't have any problem growing with all of our locales together in the years to come, the thing is that we have to be proactive and look for these people and not wait for them to come to us :),

Events

The only event I went to was the Mozilla Summit, it was great and very productive from a localization point of view, I worked with Dwayne who maintains Locamotion, the Pootle instance focused on Mozilla projects for minor locales (Firefox, mozilla.org content, Firefox OS, Firefox health report) and we worked on improving our collaboration. One of the immediate results this quarter is that now we automate imports of strings for mozilla.org from Locamotion, which takes us a few minutes of work per week  and is faster for both Dwayne and ourselves. We are working on how to make it easier for locales on Locamotion to also follow mozilla.org work as this happens at a much quicker pace than product localization.

I also talked and worked with many localizers either on their specific issues (for example Brano and Wlado from the Slovak team asked me for help finding new localizers) or to check what problems a locale has and how to fix them.

Mozilla.org

A lot of work happened on mozilla.org this quarter. The most visible one is that we now have the home page available in 55 languages, versus 28 at the end of the last quarter. This is a steadily growing number, I hope that we can get the page in 70 locales, the most important is of course maintenance over time. The home page received also several updates promoting various topics and we scaled out l10n work to cover that (end of year donation promo, lightbeam, webmaker, addons). The webdev team implemented a way for us (l10n-drivers) to manage the activation of promos on the home page without code changes thanks to metadata in our lang files, that allowed us to never show mixed language content on the home page and activate these promos for locales as they get done.

Key pages in the main menu (products, mission, about, contribute) are all localizable and localized to about the same scale as the main page. Other key download pages (firefox/channels and firefox/installer-help) pages are also now translated anf maintained at large scale. Lightbeam and State of Mozilla sections were proposed as opt-in projects and have many translations (between 15 and 20 languages). I am happy that we were able to scale the localization of mozilla.org in terms of content (more pages, more content for products), number of locales and locale-specific improvements on the mozilla.org platform (better rtl support, better fonts, l10n friendly templates..), and our management tools to allow us to grow.

Another cool l10n feature that happened on the site was the creation of a 'translation bar' proposing you a mozilla.org page in your language if it exists. This was entirely done by a volunteer Mozillian, Kohei Yoshino, many thanks to him for this cool feature that may expand to other Mozilla sites ! Kohei wrote about it on the webdev blog. It is really cool to see improvements brought by volunteers and it is also cool to see that many people in the webdev team are also acquiring an l10n culture and often spot potential problems before myself or flod get to them !

That's all for this quarter, overall an excellent quarter for mozilla.org and tools which improve steadily. On a side note, it is also an excellent quarter for me at a personal level  as my daughter was born last month (which explains why I am less often connected  these days )

http://www.chevrel.org/carnet/?post/2013/12/19/My-Q4-2013-report

http://sietch-tabr.tumblr.com/post/71204511255

Public speaking and Evangelism is now getting a hang on me. I am loving the travelling, the interactions and the feeling of being able to enlighten someone with the little knowledge in my mind's bank. This time it was Bhubaneshwar that I got a chance of visiting.
A student of the CET college, Bhubaneshwar, had contacted Kaustav (a Mozilla Rep) for hosting a Mozilla event in their college. When Kaustav shared the idea of hosting an event in Bhubaneshwar, the offer was too tempting for me to refuse. Bhubaneshwar is a small city in Orissa where there are quite a few renowned colleges. These colleges hosts some of the tetchiest minds of India. The city never had much exposure to Open Source in general. It was a platinum opportunity (golden is surely an understatement here) for us to introduce the Mozilla world to these techy minds. 21st and 22nd of December were chosen as the dates of the event.

The Webmaker table-cloth....shot best

Pre-event preparations:

Kaustav and I were planning for a MDN event in India for quite a long time. MDN is probably one of those rarely touched topics in Mozilla events (speaking of the scenario witnessed in India). After the new look of the MDN site, we thought it was the perfect time to introduce this Mozilla project to the Indian developers. We had never hosted MDN events before...rather the two of us ourselves are pretty new to MDN. The best way of delivering this topic, the crowd's reaction to this topic...everything were our points of observation for this experiment event. We had a thorough discussion with the MDN team (Luke, Ali, Maris) and formed a rough structure for this.
Since MDN was a bit risky factor (the chances of a flop show was pretty high), we couldn't have had only MDN track. We came up with the idea of having a 2 day event, where day 1 could have some Mozilla introduction and Webmaking and day 2 could focus on MDN.

Travel to Bhubaneshwar:

Generally, for most of the Mozilla events, we fly down to the venue...but this time we decided to take the train. The journey from Kolkata to Bhubaneshwar is of around 8 hours by train.
Sayak (Mozilla rep, Mozilla mentor and currently a council member), Nayanika (a newbie in the Mozilla world) and I decided to travel together. The entire 8 hours of this train trip was more like a training and induction session for Nayanika (ya, we had to torture her...after all when two passionate Mozillians meet, that is what they can do best). It was great to see how Nayanika was already aware of most of the Mozilla projects. She has been contributing to Mozilla for the last few months and have also volunteered for a few local events in Kolkata.

Event Day 1:

Me...trying to teach the crowd about Mozilla products

The fun began on the 21st of December 2013. I began the event with an interactive session on the Mozilla introduction followed by a short talk on the different Mozilla projects and the products. Once the crowd had a brief idea about what Mozilla is and what Mozilla does, Sayak took over to turn the 'users of the web' to 'makers of the web' through his session on Webmaker. Kaustav, Nayanika and I did assist Sayak through this session for the rest of the day. We concluded day one by giving away prizes against the best makes of the day. Some of the awesome makes of this day can be found here.

Event Day 2:

The second day was for some 'MDN'ness. Kaustav began the day with a small introduction about what MDN is. Following the introduction, we divided the crowd into two halves. One was being led by Kaustav where he conducted the Code Sprint and I, along with the other group, started the Doc Sprint. There were a few things which went wrong here, like:

• The developers were not exactly at their 'pro' level and thus, Kuma was not a very easy food on their plates.
• We didn't have a list of untagged pages and the task list we had, was a bit too heavy for our target audience.

Post lunch, Sayak took the stage again and this time, it was his favourite topic that he got to talk about - Firefox OS. The session was so great that we had to stay back for an extra hour (after the official end of the event), to interact with the enthusiastic crowd and resolve their queries.

Things surely went wrong and many things could have been done better, but I would count this event as one of our biggest learning, mainly as we are planning 2014 to be highly MDN focused.

Coders...trying their hands on KUMA

Other blog posts of this event: 
1)Kaustav's blog post

http://priyankaivy.blogspot.com/2013/12/maker-party-and-mdn-day-at-bhubaneshwar.html

I'm habitually pessimistic about many things, and this year Snowden reinforced my habit. In the narrow sense of his obligations to the US government, he's a traitor, but to the human race as a whole he's a hero and a role model; he personally is inspiring, but what he revealed is depressing.

I think his most important lesson is that total surveillance is an explicit goal of the US and UK governments (and by extension other governments), and there's no real restraint in how that goal is being pursued, especially for those of us who aren't US citizens. Combine that with the cold truth that we are incapable of securing complex systems, and we're in a very bad situation. We have to start assuming that mass-market computing devices are compromised, or can be compromised at will.

When people talk about the "Internet of things", they're implying the situation is going to get much worse. Every device that is network-accessible and supports updateable software is a surveillance device ... if not all the time, then as soon as someone decides to turn it on. (Let's ignore for now devices that can be programmed to take hostile action against their users!) I am not in favor of the Internet of things in the present climate.

Unfortunately, factors of cost, convenience and cool will keep driving general-purpose, network-accessible computation into every nook and cranny of our world. It may help if a significant subset of customers (I hate the word "consumers", it's demeaning) prefer devices that don't have unnecessary computation jammed into them. I want to buy "dumb devices" --- meaning they are not unnecessarily smart, and don't talk about me behind my back. My refrigerator, clothes, and bicycle do not need network access or upgradeable software, and I don't want them. Of course, if my market segment's population is me, it's not economically viable. Therefore I need a mass movement.

One interesting product segment is cars. The computerization of cars is truly terrifying, and there is some great work detailing how modern cars can be subverted. I would pay a decent premium for a car that lacks any kind of over-the-air communications. A potential problem is that safety regulations require new cars to have sophisticated computers, and sooner or later a computationally secure car may become effectively illegal, if it isn't already.

I don't know what to do from here. Does this movement already exist? If not, I hope someone starts it, since I'm rather busy.

http://robert.ocallahan.org/2013/12/we-need-dumb-device-movement.html

Merry Christmas to everyone :-)

And here, for your delight, is what happens when you let a 2-year-old decorate your Christmas cake. It’s “Attack of the Killer Father Christmas”…

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/HackingForChrist/~3/lq7krkrwuR4/

So you've been using Vim for a while but you feel that you are missing some of the features of modern, hip editors. Or maybe you never used Vim but you're curious to try it out. Either way, this guide will help you get started and by the time we're done you'll have a complete development environment that is accessible anywhere through SSH, quick to start and with a small footprint.

Installing Vim

You need a version of Vim that's at least 7.4. It should also be a full version, not the minimal kind of Vim that Ubuntu ships with by default.

Speaking of Ubuntu, its repos are outdated right now so you should use a PPA like this one. You can use homebrew to install MacVim on OS X. I haven't done this on Windows so you'll have to look into it yourself.

Vim Package Management

I feel that one of the most useful features Linux distros have is the package manager. It allows you to easily look for and install packages that enhance the core functionality of your software. Editors like Sublime Text have this as well with the help of plugins. Guess what, there are package management plugins for Vim too.

We'll be using Vundle. To install it, run this command (you'll need git):

git clone https://github.com/gmarik/vundle.git ~/.vim/bundle/vundle

Now that you have Vundle, I suggest having a config file to store the list of packages you want to use. This will become helpful when you want to duplicate the same Vim setup somewhere else.

Make sure you include it into your .vimrc file. You can prepend "source ~/.bundles.vim" to your .vimrc file and all should be well.

After we set up the bundles file, we can install and/or update all the packages in there using this command:

vim -u ~/.bundles.vim +BundleInstall! +q

I usually have an upvim alias for it.

Packages

Let me share a list of packages that I find useful in my Vim setup. You can install all of them using Vundle. I usually keep them in my .bundles.vim file and just run the upvim alias whenever I change something.

CtrlP

Bundle 'kien/ctrlp.vim' link

Provides fuzzy file and symbol matching, similar to what TextMate and Sublime Text have. Really fast.

vim-bad-whitespace

Bundle 'bitc/vim-bad-whitespace' link

Highlights trailing whitespace.

detectindent

Bundle 'ciaranm/detectindent' link

Automatically detects indent settings from files.

NERD Commenter

Bundle 'scrooloose/nerdcommenter' link

Really easy commenting/uncommenting.

NERD Tree

Bundle 'scrooloose/nerdtree' link

Project explorer functionality.

Syntastic

Bundle 'scrooloose/syntastic' link

Syntax checks, linting.

Tagbar

Bundle 'majutsushi/tagbar' link

Displays a sidebar with the symbols in the current file (functions, classes etc.)

Easybuffer

Bundle 'troydm/easybuffer.vim' link

Easy way to see and switch between open buffers (files).

Zenburn

Bundle 'jnurmine/Zenburn' link

The Zenburn color scheme.

Ack.vim

Bundle 'mileszs/ack.vim' link

Friendly way of using ack from within Vim. You need ack installed to use this.

Vim-powerline

Bundle 'Lokaltog/vim-powerline' link

Smart statusline.

Gundo

Bundle 'Gundo' link

Helps you use the undo tree Vim provides.

YouCompleteMe

Bundle 'Valloric/YouCompleteMe' link

Smart, fast, fuzzy autocompletion engine for Vim. Please check the docs, after installing it with Vundle there are some extra-steps to do.

Tern for Vim

Bundle 'marijnh/tern_for_vim' link

Great autocompletion + "intellisense" support for JS. Please check the docs, after installing it with Vundle there are some extra-steps to do.

Here's my .bundles.vim:

Extra tweaks

All the packages we talked about have great intro pages and documentation, but maybe you don't want to spend so much time on everything. I suggest starting off with my vimrc and change what doesn't fit your preference.

However, there are some settings that I find really useful and I'd like to mention here.

First, you can use Vim's cc functionality to display a column in order to keep your line length in check. I use set cc=80.

You can use Zenburn as your color scheme with colors zenburn.

By default, CtrlP changes your cwd when selecting a new file. You can change this behavior with let g:ctrlp_working_path_mode = ''. Also, I want it to search both among open buffers and files on the HDD, which is why I use let g:ctrlp_cmd = 'CtrlPMixed'. Finally, I really like Sublime's go to symbol keybinding (CTRL+R), so I also use map :CtrlPBufTagAll.

If you choose to install DetectIndent, you need to turn it on:

" first two lines are up to you
let g:detectindent_preferred_expandtab = 1
let g:detectindent_preferred_indent = 4
autocmd BufNewFile,BufReadPost * :DetectIndent
autocmd FileType make setlocal noexpandtab

I bound my leader key to comma: let mapleader = ",". This is useful for me in the NERD Commenter and NERD Tree keybindings:

map / NERDCommenterToggle
imap / NERDCommenterTogglei

map n :NERDTreeToggle
nmap m :NERDTreeFind

NERD Commenter lets you comment/uncomment parts of your code and it's compatible with Vim's selection modes. NERD Tree's find functionality helps you locate the current file in the project's tree.

I use F8 to toggle TagBar and bring it in focus:

nmap  :TagbarToggle
let g:tagbar_autofocus = 1

Last but not least, you might want to check out the Vim Cheatsheet I wrote some time ago.

Good luck!

http://www.mihneadb.net/post/vim-up-and-running

I participated to many barcamp/camp/unconference (more information on the Wikipedia article) style events, and I even hosted some of them. I was happy to see at the last I’ve been to, that many attendees were brand new faces, and new to the concept. Too often, organizers think that attendees will know how it’s working , but it’s not always the case, so I thought it would be a good exercise, and maybe a good reference for camps’ organizers, and attendees, to make a list of my non-written “rules” for these events.

The camp will be as successful as the participation of the attendees

The foundation of camp is the attendees: we aren’t talking about a conference where you sit, and listen to one speaker. It’s a group conversation, and everyone is invited, or should I say, highly encouraged to participate, and share his opinion on the topic.

There are no stupid topics, questions or comments

Don’t be afraid: nobody is there to judge you. People may disagree with you, but nobody is there to ridicule you. So add any topic you want to discuss on the post-it, or share any opinions you have, whether you are an expert or not on the subject.

The moderator is there to facilitate the discussions, not to overtake it

This one is one of my pet-peeve: the moderator is there to… moderate the discussion. Usually, organizers tend to give this role to someone who is well-known, and quite often, well-knowledgeable on the overall topic of the camp event: some mc tend to take too much of the floor space. If you want to do this, step down, and let someone else facilitate the discussion.

This is not the place to have a discussion between two people

I have an argument. You have an argument. We disagree. We do back, and forth on our different statements, and guess what? The rest of the room gets bored! We aren’t alone in the room, so we shouldn’t make a discussion between the two of us. A good moderator should manage this properly.

Be respectful in all circumstances

Like in everything else in life: if you want to be respected, respect others. As I said before, you may disagree with someone, but it will never be a reason to act like an asshole.

If a topic runs out of steam, the facilitator should start a discussion on the next one

This is also a rule for the moderator: if a topic becomes boring, nobody has something to add, it’s just a discussion between two people, or all the opinions come to the same conclusion… move on! Most of the time, there are too many topics for the time we have, so it won’t be a problem to cut this one before you wanted to.

Having a side discussion is disturbing for others

I think this rule is a duplication of the respectful one, but for whatever reason, people  don’t seem to think it’s a lack of respect. While someone is speaking, don’t start a side discussion or continue to argue with the last person who shares with the audience, it’s really annoying.

To facilitate the discussion, raise your hand if you want to talk

I would also be able to add this one in the respect bucket, but this behavior of certain people really annoys me. I totally agree; we aren’t at school, but it’s an easy way to have a healthy discussion with all the attendees, and facilitate the job of the moderator. It’s his job to manage who will speak next: of course,  he may have not seen you right away, but you turn will come! There is nothing more frustration while it’s your turn to speak, that someone just interrupt you. Everybody is equal: your opinion isn’t more important than the one from the other attendee.

Those are the rules I came up with from my own experiences, but overall I felt those helped different camps to work well. Anything that I’m missing or doesn’t make sense?

--
Camp style events non-written rules is a post on Out of Comfort Zone from Fr'ed'eric Harper

http://outofcomfortzone.net/2013/12/23/camps-non-written-rules/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=camps-non-written-rules

A few weeks ago I had the opportunity to embark on a two week vacation to the Philippines with my boyfriend, Genesis. His family being from the Philippines it was a natural first destination to Asia for me. As luck would have it the adventure started well before we were due to depart.

Our original itinerary included a week in the northern island of Luzon and a week on the southern island of Palawan. Each would offer us a different experience: Luzon with an exploration of Philippine civilization and Palawan with it’s natural beauty. Having booked our vacation back in September we had no idea what the future held. Unfortunately the Philippines would have to endure horrible devastation at the hand of Typhoon Yolanda (aka Haiyan), Palawan being directly in her path. While I’m confident they will recover and be stronger than ever, my sympathies go out to the people affected.

Not wanting these events to impact my vacation I decided to turn the week in Palawan into a week exploring various locales around Luzon. As luck would have it Luzon was unaffected by the storm, giving me the opportunity to explore the wonderful history and culture of the Philippines.

Day 1: Departure

It was Friday, our bags were packed, and we were on our way to the airport. I was so excited for this trip. Arriving at the airport, balikbayan box in tow, we discovered our flight was delayed. We’d have to wait until 1:30 in the morning to board but I was not deterred. Nothing was going to diminish my excitement for this vacation.

Sunrise over the Pacific Ocean

Some time later, after a couple movies and a few hours of sleep, I was pleasantly rewarded with an amazing sunrise. We were a couple hours the other side of the international date line and inching our way closer to the Philippines.

When we landed we were greeted by some of Genesis’ family who had hired a van for the remainder of our trip. Stepping out of the airport in Manila at about 7am local time I recall feeling like I had stepped into the midday sun of a Canadian summer.

Market in Manila

After clearing the airport traffic we stopped at a market for some breakfast. We bought some fresh red snapper, crab, shrimp, and squid which they cooked for us. It was an amazing breakfast having spent 14 hours on a plane, and looking forward to another 8 hours to travel by van.

Later that evening we arrived in Solano, Genesis’ hometown. Coincidentally it was his mother’s birthday so we were welcomed with a bit of a feast. After eating and a visit with more of the family it was time to turn in.

Day 2: Bayombong

Our second day in the Philippines was spent exploring the provincial capital, Bayombong; but first a traditional Ilocano breakfast complete with dried fish, banana, veggies, rice, and pandesal (fresh from the trike vendor).

Saint Dominic Church

Following breakfast we spent the bulk of the morning exploring the market in Solano, getting fresh food for that night’s supper. It was a bit overwhelming at first, so many people and so much food, but I soon settled in to my surroundings. After the market we traveled into the provincial capital, Bayombong, visiting the local museum and Saint Dominic Cathedral.

Day 3: Waterfalls and Parrots

On the third day Genesis, his brother Adonis, and I ventured out to visit a nearby waterfall. Traveling by trike, one of the more common forms of transport in Nueva Vizcaya, we headed up a dirt path into the hills near Solano. After about 30 minutes along the rocky, muddy path we reached the trail head. From here it was a short hike across a rickety suspended foot bridge to a waterfall view.

Unfortunately we weren’t able to hike any further since a recent rain made the rocks far too slippery to attempt climbing. On the plus side this hike gave us a bit of an appetite. Upon returning back to Solano, we picked up Genesis’ mother and his aunt to go out for lunch (yes, more food). I thoroughly enjoyed the presentation at this restaurant; the carrot parrot was a nice touch.

Carrot Parrot

Day 4: Banaue

On the fourth day we traveled to Banaue, a town famous for its rice terraces. This trip gave me the opportunity to travel by another popular form of transportation in the Philippines, the Jeepney; often wildly decorated world war 2 era transport vehicles. It was not the most comfortable form of transportation but it was extremely affordable, only costing a few dollars per trip.

Jeepney to Banaue

After a few hours winding our way slowly up the road into the mountains we arrived in Banaue. Dismounting the Jeepney we walked around the village and up to the view point of the rice terraces. Unfortunately we arrived following the harvest and were welcomed by a thick mountain rain, cutting our trip to Banaue a bit shorter than expected. Even still I found the view stunning and well worth the trip.

Town of Banaue

Banaue Rice Terraces

Day 6: Road to Baguio

The sixth day marked the end of our visit in the Cayagan Valley, today we were off to the mountain city of Baguio. The road to Baguio is one of the most scenic roads I’ve ever had the pleasure of traveling. As you leave the Cayagan Valley, the road winds westward up into the mountains, reaching elevations of 1400 meters. Along the way we came across Ambuklao Dam, a hydroelectric facility on the Agno river in Benguet province. Having been on the road for a few hours we decided to stop, stretch our legs, and take in the view.

Ambuklao Dam

After the break we continued on our way. The road continued to snake ever higher until we finally reached the city of Baguio. Much to my surprise the climate here was completely different than what I’d expected from the Philippines; 23C and minimal humidity; a stark contrast to the 35C and plenty of humidity we experienced days before back in Solano.

Mines Park Lookout, Baguio City

Baguio City

After checking in to our hotel we went to Wright Park for a picnic and walked around the tourist attractions in the area. Unfortunately after a couple hours we would have to say good bye to Genesis’ family. It was time for them to head home and for Gensis and I to carry on with our vacation. The departure was a bit emotional but I’m grateful I was able to share some of my introduction to the Philippines with his family.

Day 7: Exploring Baguio

On the seventh day, being our only full day in Baguio, we wanted to explore as much of it as possible. The first stop was to the botanical garden where we got acquainted with some of the native plants, artwork, and peoples.

Baguio Botanical Garden

Of course the trip wouldn’t be complete without a trip to the SM shopping mall and a stop a Jolibee. As luck would have it, it started to rain soon after we finished up at the botanical garden. The mall provided the perfect distraction to wait out the rain. Once it let up we went to visit the Baguio museum where we got to learn the city’s history and culture.

Baguio Museum

Following the museum we continued on to Burnham Park, named for the American architect (Daniel Burnham) who designed several buildings in Baguio as part of the Philippine Commission in the early 1900s. We strolled around the park for a while before heading back to the mall for some more shopping and a movie before we turned in for the evening.

Burnham Park

Day 8: The Road to Laoag

Following a good night’s rest and a traditional Baguio breakfast of dried fish, rice, and egg it was time to pack our bags and catch a bus to Laoag. The ride itself would take us west through the mountains to the coast and then north to Laoag through several (very old) cities and towns. As with our drive too Baguio the view going down the other side of the mountains was absolutely stunning.

Mountains west of Baguio

After a couple hours of our bus winding down the mountain we were nearing the coast. At this point the road veered north, worming its way along the Philippine coast, teasing us with sights of the sea several times along the way. It would be several hours before we reached the historic city of Vigan. Unfortunately for us this was just a stop along the way. The bus would stop here for a few minutes to transfer some passengers before continuing to our destination of Laoag.

Gateway to Vigan

A couple hours later we arrived on the outskirts of the city of Laoag. From here it was a short ride on a trike through the countryside to the coast.

Fort Ilocandia

As luck would have it we arrived at our destination, Fort Ilocandia, just in time to watch the sun set.

Sunset at Fort Ilocandia

After a quick stroll around the grounds of Fort Ilocandia it was time to turn in for the night.

Fort Ilocandia Fountain at Night

Day 9: Laoag City

We had a pretty lazy start to our ninth day in the Philippines. We slept in, had breakfast, went for a long stroll along the beach, had lunch, and then went for a swim. Following that we decided to spend the afternoon exploring Laoag city. It was a short ride from the hotel on the coast to the city.

Laoag Bell Tower

One of the main tourist attractions to Laoag is the Sinking Bell Tower. The tower is believed to have been built in 1612 by the Augustinians and leans slightly to the north. It’s location is fairly central to other historical architecture like the St William’s cathedral, Ilocose Norte capital building, and court house. I can’t help but be reminded while visiting these places that the Philippines is a country with deep roots in Catholocism and they’ve done well preserving their roots.

After spending a couple hours exploring Laoag it was time to head back to Fort Ilocandia where we were treated to another amazing sunset.

Sunset at Fort Ilocandia

Day 10: Relaxing at Fort Ilocandia

On our tenth day in the Philippines we decided to stay close to home and just relax; I think we needed a bit of a break from all the travel. After breakfast we went down to the beach and watched some local fishermen bringing in their nets they had set out the previous evening.

Following this we went for a swim in the ocean. I was really quite surprised with how warm the water was. This wasn’t my first time swimming in an ocean (I swam in the waters off Prince Edward Island when I was a kid), nor was it my first time in the Pacific (I took a dip in Hawaii last year), but it was my first time in the South China Sea and it was the warmest natural body of water I have experienced to date. We spent a couple hours playing in the waves, trying and failing to keep from swallowing the water. Once we achieved optimum sodium levels we decided it was time for lunch.

On our way to lunch we discovered Fort Ilocandia was home to a small zoo, we decided this would be a good way to spend the afternoon. Their zoo was home to several animals; not least of which were crocodiles, monkeys, and a pair ostrich.

After a walk with the animals we wanted to explore more of what Fort Ilocandia had to offer. Unfortunately some of the more exciting activities (like snorkeling and hot air ballooning) were only open to groups of four or more. Being off-season we basically had the hotel to ourselves so these activities were not accessible to us. It’s a bit regrettable that we weren’t able to enjoy these activities but perhaps we’ll have better luck next time, or come with a larger group next time.

The rest of the day was spent relaxing by the water.

Day 11: Paoay City

Our eleventh day in the Philippines we decided to get back to exploring. Following breakfast we hired ourselves a trike with the goal of seeing Paoay City. The main attraction in Paoay, like many other cities in Ilocos Norte, was an opportunity to take a step back in time and witness some centuries old architecture. In the case of Paoay this would mean a visit to St. Augustine’s Cathedral, a church built in 1710.

St Augustine Cathedral, Paoay

St Augustine Cathedral, Paoay

After strolling around the grounds of St Augustine’s cathedral we were escorted by our trike driver to the Ferdinand E. Marcos Presidential Center. The visit itself was a bit somber as I would learn this to be the final resting place of Ferdinand E Marcos, former president of the Philippines. That aside, it was interesting to see the way homes used to be built in the Philippines; an interesting mixture of cement, local wood, and windows made from translucent capiz shells.

Ferdinand E Marcos Presidential Center

Our next stop on the journey was a bit more exciting. Our trike driver took us back up the coast to a place somewhat off the beaten path. It was here that I would enjoy probably my most thrilling experience on this trip, riding in the back of a 4x4 across the Paoay Dunes.

It was quite windy that day, but as our vehicle danced playfully across the dunes, sand blasting in our face, holding on for fear of being catapulted, I found myself forgetting about all the worries in my life. I could think of nothing else but the fun I was having. I was living in the moment.

Paoay Dunes

After our joy ride was over, and a few minutes to calm ourselves down, we were off to our next destination. We drove back out to the main road, following it around Paoay lake for several kilometers until we reached the far side. Here we reached a rather large house which I would soon learn was one of the many homes of the Marcos family. This home in particular was set up as a museum, not only of the former president’s life but of the people of the Ilocos region.

Malaca~nang of the Norte

We wandered the grounds of this amazingly beautiful property for quite a while. As luck would have it, upon leaving we met a local man who knew the area well and offered to be our tour guide. We decided to hire him for the next, and what would be our last, two days in Ilocos Norte. Upon our return to Fort Ilocandia that evening we were gifted another amazing sunset.

Sunset over South China Sea

Day 12: Pagudpud

On our twelfth day we ventured north along the coast toward Pagudpud. The driver we met the day before escorted us the entire way, showing us some sights we may have missed if we had tried to go it alone. Our first stop was a salt mill just off the road to Pagudpud.

Salt Milling

It was interesting to see how they made the salt, something I had perhaps taken for granted before visiting the Philippines. After farming and milling the rice grain the waste product is the grain casing. Instead of throwing out this casing they use it as fuel for fire. The fire is used to heat salt water from the ocean to its boiling pont. As the water boils the sodium content distills into salt crystals which are then farmed our of the water. It was really interesting to watch this process unfold before my eyes.

The next stop along the way was a very old lighthouse perched on top of a rocky hill just east of the coast. The lighthouse was constructed and first lit in 1892 and still functions today, marking the northwestern most point of the Philippines.

Cape Bojeador Lighthouse

We continued our journey up the coast to the town Burgos to visit the Kapurpurawan rock formation, a limestone monument scuplted by the elements over thousands of years.

Kapurpurawan Rock Formation

It was a little bit of a hike to get down the hillside to visit the rocks but it was well worth the journey. The geology was unlike anything I had seen in the Philippines and I had found myself, for the second time, challenging my assumptions of this being a country of beaches and palm trees. The first time of course was seeing pine trees and experiencing temperate weather in Baguio. The hike also presented me with an opportunity to make a new friend.

I found this little guy trying to cross the pathway. After capturing this shot I helped him safely to the other side.

Further up the coast we stopped by a wind farm. It was somewhat unexpected but unsurprising at the same time, as the coast in these parts was really quite windy.

Philippine Wind Farm

It was rather curious to see a country without the financial capabilities of Canada embracing this technology.

We carried on to our destination, soon arriving in Pagudpud. As we drove further along the coast, coastline turned to mountains and we found ourselves in a bit of rain but that did not deter us.

Welcome sign in Pagudpud

The road continued and eventually lead us back out to the coast where we came across a sleepy little resort. We decided this would be a good place to stop for some food before heading back down to Laoag for the evening. We walked into a small roadside restaurant where a woman cooked us up some fresh tuna and prawns.

Pagudpud Beach

After a healthy dose of seafood we made our way back “home” to rest up for our final day in Ilocos Norte. Our driver, Mario, to return in the morning.

Day 13: Vigan

Our thirteenth day in the Philippines was also our last day in Ilocos Norte. Since we didn’t get to see much of Vigan on our first way through we decided we wanted to see it before we left. The trip to Vigan was a few hours round trip so we had plenty of time to fit it in before flying to Manila later that evening.

Old City of Vigan

We arrived in Vigan shortly before lunch and spent much of the mid-day walking around this old city. I was yet again amazed to see the preservation of their rich history and ways of life. Many of the buildings, built hundreds of years ago, still standing despite decades of pummeling by nature. Many of the people still practicing crafts using the traditional techniques taught to them by their ancestors.

Pottery Factory in Vigan

Filipino making a Vase

I felt so grateful that I was able to see this city on foot and to meet the people of Vigan. Unfortunately I was unable to stay for long as we had to eat then return to Laoag so we could catch our flight to Manila.

Much later that evening we had landed safely in Manila and after quite some time in Manila’s infamous traffic we checked into our hotel.

Makati

We were only in Manila for two nights before we had to head home. I found Manila to be quite hectic in contrast to the much more relaxing lifestyle I had experienced throughout my journey around Luzon. We spent much of our time walking to and from restaurants and shopping malls. Much of my experience in Manila reminded me of why I left Toronto (too busy, too noisy, too smoggy).

Don’t get me wrong though. I enjoyed my time in Manila. It was just different, and a bit of a disorienting.

That said I still look at my time Manila as positive experience. After all, it gave me the opportunity to visit with Adonis (Genesis’ brother) and I able to experience a filipino hilot massage, complete with hot banana leaf across my back.

Back to Reality

This whole vacation has been an amazing journey. It has been a feast for the eyes and the mind; and at times just a feast.It was relaxing, busy, enlightening, and rejuvenating. I feel like I was able to have an authentic Philippine experience with a dash of frivolity. Perhaps the best part was being able to share some of that with Genesis and his family.

In the end my time in the Philippines was successful. I came back to my life in Vancouver re-energized and enlightened, something I hope to achieve in all my vacations.

I’m already looking forward to returning to the Philippines someday, perhaps next year. There is so much more this country has to offer and I can’t wait to experience it.

If you want to see more pictures of my trip, I’ve posted a photo album on trovebox.

https://ashughes.com/?p=86

We’ve been doing asynchronous code all wrong

The more I learn, the more I realize that old ways of doing things just aren’t capable enough.  For instance, JavaScript developers are taught to write asynchronous code using callback functions:

function asyncDriver(callback) {
    controller.goDoSomething(var1, var2, function whenDone(result) {
        controller.doSomethingElse(var3, function whenThatIsDone(result) {
            controller.etc(var4, callback);
        });
    });
}

This code is ugly, and hard to think about.  Wouldn’t it be nice to write:

function asyncDriver(callback) {
    var p = Task.spawn(function() {
        yield controller.goDoSomething(var1, var2);
        yield controller.doSomethingElse(var3);
        let result = controller.etc(var4);
        throw new Task.Result(result);
    });
    p.then(callback, reportError);
}

Why, yes, it would!  This is what Promises and Task.jsm bring to us.  It makes really messy code easy to read again.  The yield statements here force the function to pause in the middle of its operation, under the assumption that each value yielded is a Promise object.  When the promise “resolves”, the function continues with the promise’s resolved value.  A sequence of nested asynchronous functions becomes one function which looks synchronous (but is really still asynchronous).

This was what I used to write a JSONStore module for addons to use as a replacement for preferences – a way to store data and settings, and get them back when you need them.  There are some bugs, and this is just one of many ideas being floated for addon settings.  Discussion on the new module is ongoing in bug 952304 – it’s not part of Mozilla yet and won’t be for some time.  Use at your own risk.

But that’s not the whole point of this post.  I’m going a step further.

Promises, meet transactions

Promises are great when dealing with asynchronous operations… but if they fail and you want to roll back what has already happened, what do you do?  Being able to undo an operation is pretty important in a few environments, especially editing multiple files at once.

Now I like Mozilla’s native transaction manager API.  It works well for what it was designed for.  But it wasn’t designed for asynchronous operations.  Nor can I use the transaction manager in a chrome worker thread, because I can’t access XPCOM from chrome workers.  (There’s good reason for that, but it’s really unfortunate in this case.)

The transaction manager API has a couple other flaws:

• Transaction objects don’t have any method for getting a human-readable description of what actually happened in the transaction.
• If a transaction listener vetoes something, there’s no way for other transaction listeners which had already approved an operation to find out it was vetoed.
• The transaction manager has limited ways of indicating its current state when things go wrong, not just in performing an operation, but in rolling the operation back.
• If you’re dealing with multiple kinds of editing (DOM operations, source code changes), there’s really no good way to coordinate those.

As Tim Allen would say, “No power.  So I rewired it!”

I don’t have answers for these issues yet.  I think I’ll have to implement my own transaction manager API to improve upon all of the above.  But a design like that isn’t necessarily easy… I’d love to have help, especially if you think you might need something like this yourself.

One thing’s for sure:  when this new API and implementation is ready, it’ll have a lot of tests to go with it.  So, lend me your thoughts in the comments, please!

https://alexvincent.us/blog/?p=794

Today, I started my official break from projects for the Holiday Season although there are still some tasks I do regardless of what time of year it is much of my contributions to various open source projects slow down around Christmas. Each year I remind those in the United States that there is a great opportunity for them to make a tax deductible donation to open source projects that are 501(c)3 non-profits and this year I will do the same.

And finally you can find my Wishlist right here and a special thanks to one reader who sent me some wine already!

Mozilla

Mozilla is the organization and community that paves the way for a truly open web and defends internet freedom. Mozilla also produces the popular Firefox and Thunderbird open source projects and a number of other projects like Webmaker andWebFWD.

Donate to Mozilla

Oregon State University Open Source Labs

Oregon State University Open Source Labs (OSU OSL) is where some of the largest and most popular open source projects receive their web hosting and other vital web services that allow them to operate. OSU OSL hosts servers for Kernel.org, Apache Software Foundation, CentOS and Fedora just to name a few.

Donate to OSU OSL

The Ada Initiative

The Ada Initiative is an organization dedicated to advancing women in open source software, open data and open culture. The Ada Initiative hosts a number of events such as AdaCamp to move towards their goals.

Donate to The Ada Initiative

Yorba

Yorba is the community and organization behind the Shotwell Photo Organizer used by many Linux Distros and the Geary email reader.

Donate to Yorba

Apache Software Foundation

The Apache Software Foundation (ASF) has been around since 1999 and was a spin off of the Apache Group that was tasked with creating the Apache HTTP server. ASF is dedicated to supporting open source projects through supplying hardware, communications and other assets.

Donate to the ASF

Debian

Debian is an association of individuals who have made a common cause to create a free operating system also named Debian. The Debian Operating System is used on Desktop Computers and Servers worldwide and has also been used as an inspiration for other Linux distros such as the ever popular Ubuntu.                                                                                                                                                                                  Donate to Debian.

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/BenjaminKerensaDotComMozilla/~3/gKeXd4odr8E/happy-holidays-2

I just uploaded version 1.0 of the CCK2 to AMO. Until it is approved, you can get it here.

I decided that while I was getting some feedback, I’d get more if I just released it. It’s not a polished as I wanted, but it’s working in all my testing.

The main feature that didn’t make it is preventing click to play for individual plugins. I did add a feature that allows you to enable all plugins for a given domain, even in current versions of Firefox.

Please let me know what you think. I feel like I’ve addressed a lot of the feedback I’ve received over the years.

Thanks for your support.

http://mike.kaply.com/2013/12/20/cck2-is-here/

Assuming all goes well, Firefox will soon be shipping with our first support for Android’s ActionModes for text selection. We previously allowed text selection via some special context menu options when people long pressed on selected text. This replaces that implementation with a nice new UI:

If you’ve got an add-on that adds something to the selected text context menu:

1. You’re likely broken in Nightly and Aurora builds right now and
2. you can easily update your add-on to show in this menu as well.

Some astute developers have already updated themselves, but adding support is pretty easy (updated MDN docs here). We’ve added two methods to the SelectionHandler

1. let actionId = SelectionHandler.addAction({
       label: "My addon",
       id: "my_id",
       icon: "resource://myaddon/icon", // You MUST include an icon to be shown in the ActionBar,
                                        // otherwise you'll always be put into the overflow menu.
       action: function(aElement) {
           // do something when clicked
       },
       selector: {
           // Just because this is being shown, doesn't mean there is a selection.
           // We may just be showing the cursor handle to let you move the cursor position.
           matches: function(aElement) { return SelectionHandler.isSelectionActive(); }
       }
   },

2. SelectionHandler.remove(actionId);

Text selection has had an exciting life in Firefox for Android, and is likely going to go through another transition as we land better platform support for touch friendly handles for not just Android, but also Firefox OS, and Metro Firefox. But this is a good move for the UI. We implemented it as a compatibility layer, so it should be available for all Android versions from Froyo to the newest KitKat devices.

http://digdug2k.wordpress.com/2013/12/20/action-modes-for-android/

webmakerteam:

Webmaker 2014 Like the rest of Mozilla, 2013 has been a busy year for the Webmaker Product team. In 2014 we’ll build on this year’s work to increase our impact.

Continue reading

http://brettgaylor.tumblr.com/post/70626520407

Like last week, this is a very rough approximation of RelEng related work that completed this week. Because this is the last week before vacation, we haven’t landed much in the past couple of days, and some regularly scheduled release work was postphoned.

• Emergency responses/bustage fixes:
• buildapi-web2 RabbitMQ queue is high
• TryChooser is showing “N/A” for all queues
• AWS builds are falling way behind
• Integration Trees closed, high number of pending linux compile jobs
• Regularly scheduled work:
• Please set the software version and OS version of Mozilla Central to 1.4.0.0-prerelease
• Need automatic hsts preload list updates on esr24
• Migrate mozilla-beta and comm-beta during 09-dec-2013 merge duty
• Create custom updates for TB ESR users to 24.2.0
• tracking bug for build and release of Firefox and Fennec 26.0
• tracking bug for build and release of Thunderbird 27.0b1
• tracking bug for build and release of Thunderbird 24.2.0
• General automation changes:
• Migrate 5 win64-rev1 machines to win64-rev2
• disable all builds and tests on v1.2F branch
• Deploy release-runner ssh key to release-runner instances
• kill firefox-release-stub bouncer entry
• Allow |-p linux64-valgrind| to be specified in trychooser
• b2g 1.2f branch is using the wrong gaia
• Disable MacOSX & Linux 32-bit builds/tests on mozilla-b2g18 and mozilla-b2g18-v1.1.0hd
• switch buildapi from old to new rabbit instances
• Check for content length when downloading files and retry if not the same
• Setup in-house buildbot masters for mobile testers
• Regular database cleanup
• Turn off the B2G builds marked as REMOVE on https://wiki.mozilla.org/User:Asasaki:B2GBuilds — proceed turning off Unagi per :stephend
• Enable mochitest-metro tests on Aurora for Windows 8
• Create branch uplift patches and test win64-rev2 release builds in staging
• run pretty name tests for the package-tests target
• AWS spot instances should always automatically retrigger when disconnected
• Build/test platform changes:
• Update sixgill RPMs again
• Other:
• slaveapi shouldn’t assume that a slave has a master
• change v1.2f to allow commits from level1 users
• don’t try to ssh reboot a slave that isn’t pingable
• slave_health “time since last job” column doesn’t sort correctly
• In partner facing http://git.mozilla.org/?p=releases/gecko.git delete obsolete “aurora” branch
• For locales no longer developing on m-c, generate custom updates to migrate users of those locales from m-c to mozilla-aurora

http://hearsum.ca/blog/this-week-in-mozilla-releng-december-20th-2013/

Two months ago, about 1800 Mozillians met up in three cities for the Summit. In the weeks leading up to the big event, a small group of Mozillians created a web app to help people navigate their way around the event and also interact in some fun ways. I drafted this blog post back in October, though I am only now getting around to publishing it.

The mobile experience at the Summit – photo by Viking Karwur

The app was created by a team of designers, engineers, and product folks: Harald Kirschner, Jen Fong-Adwent, Bill Walker, Lee Tom,  Andrei Hajdukewycz, Giorgos Logiotatidis, Matt Brandt, Justin Crawford, Barry Munsterteiger, and myself.

The app was heavily used at the Summit – over 1700 Mozillians visited the app an average of 10 times each (20,000 visits total).

So, what does the app do? The app has four views

• Schedule: a daily list of events
• Random tips and bits: general information for participating and getting around the event.
• Healthy Dialog: a breakfast conversation activity where each day Mozillians are matched into groups, which are identified by icons and colors.
• 3 Questions: a response form asking about your current mood, anything you want to share with your fellow Mozillians and input box for recording who has had a positive impact on you.

Designing the app

We worked with the Summit planning team to learn how an app could best support the Summit. It quickly became clear that having a dynamic schedule was going to be the critical feature. Since session information was going to be added and changed up until the event, we needed any easy way for a dozen organizers to be able to update the schedule and have those changes shown to participants quickly. We used a Google Spreadsheet for the schedule content, and then the server and app pulled information from that spreadsheet every few minutes.

To help the Summit experience team, we also wanted to get a sense of how people were feeling and reacting to the Summit sessions. The 3 Questions form gave us a lightweight way to do that, by asking people to respond at least once a day. We also planned a big surprise based on how people answered the third question, “Who have you recently met that had a positive impact on you?”

Why we built an app

While we initially looked at some white-label event apps, we chose to create our own so that we could integrate it with our own technologies (Persona, Mozillians.org API) and provide the Healthy Dialog and 3 Questions activities. Ultimately, the app was a great way for us to dogfood and improve our own services.

Technologies

• Mozillians.org API for people information
• Persona for sign-in
• AngularJS for web framework
• node.js for REST action
• redis for data structure server

Impact

The Summit app gave us the ability to quickly update the schedule for all three cities and get the latest schedule to participants in minutes. We also used the responses from the 3 Questions form to give a prize to the Mozilla volunteer in each Summit city who had the biggest positive impact.

At the closing ceremony, the Fox presented an award to those three people. The award is a trip to any Mozilla Space in the world for a few days, to visit and meet our community there. Congratulations to Cliff Argwings, Vuyisile Ndlovu, and Irvin Chen for making the greatest impact on us (we can’t wait to hear about your trips!).

Cliff receives his award from The Fox in Brussels – photo by Doug Belshaw

Hack on it

Check out the source code on Github and play with it. A forked version of the app was used at the Mozilla Festival, and there is potential to use this at other Mozilla events or any event you are organizing.

Give feedback

Did you find the Summit app valuable? What worked well? What you improve for next time?

http://dailycavalier.com/2013/12/the-summit-app/

This book is a great update on the 1984esque vision set into our current Facebook / Google / Buffer world.

Although it isn’t a perfect novel, it is filled with irony and helps us see the frog boiling world we are building. Plus, Dave Eggers is awesome.

Note: my link is an Amazon Associate referral link as I’ve got to keep my Conversion Rate and Retail raw high.

Please Zing this review!

https://ozten.com/psto/2013/12/20/book-review-the-circle/

Creative Commons: http://j.mp/JPFq23

This year I got two book writing offers, but the technology/topic didn’t interest me enough to make the deal with the editor: those opportunities make me think that I would like to write a book. Why not? I like to write. I like to share. I would like to develop more about a topic that I’m passionate about, so I’ve decided that with or without any editor support, I’ll write one at some point in my career.

The problem is that since I made that statement to myself, I’m always thinking about it, and the first topic that came to mind wasn’t about a technical book… It was about personal branding! It makes total sense, as I like to share my opinions, and experience about this subject. Without going crazy about it, I would like more people to understand that it’s important in today’s world, so the unavoidable conclusion was to write one about this topic. There are many books about the topic out there, but as all the other authors, I have my own perspective, and vision to share. Since I’m a Technical Evangelist, I thought it was natural for me to take the approach about personal branding for developers.

Let’s face it: developers are rock stars today. It’s also a question of being a linchpin, doing epic shit, and helping our careers to get to the next level. I won’t go too deep into the details for now as I’m still working on the outline, but I’m very excited about it. You can learn more about part of my vision on the topic (not specific to developer) by watching one the presentation at did on the topic. I also encourage you to let me know if you have any specific elements you would like to see in this kind of book or if you think it’s a good idea (or not).

I may end up working with an editor (ping me if it interests you) or releasing it online by myself, but at the end, I want to share about personal branding with my fellow developers, and help them to be  the artist they are.

--
I’m working on a personal branding book for developers is a post on Out of Comfort Zone from Fr'ed'eric Harper

http://outofcomfortzone.net/2013/12/20/im-working-personal-branding-book-developers/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=im-working-personal-branding-book-developers

I had a pretty intense 2013, but overall I think it was a good year. I say that with full knowledge that I had 2013 goals, but I have no idea where I wrote them down. Oh, well.

First off, I started or helped start a lot of new projects this year:

• dennis: lint .po files for strings that will set production on fire and translates .po files to aid development (awesome)
• ernest: sprint coordination system (awesome)
• douglas: my complete overhaul of Pyblosxom (in development)
• tedmund: console based slide presentation system
• james: cli for deployment with chief
• eugene: comms system for Artemis simulation
• victor: system for sussing out version information for dependencies (failed project)
• fredrik: Flask template (obsolete)
• harold: rough feedback/support system (prototype)
• captain shove: the mighty new deployment system we'll switch to in 2014
• hy: dialect of Lisp that runs in Python vm

Fredrik is obsolete. Victor was a failed project. Captain Shove and Hy are doing well and other than helping to start them off, I haven't touched either in some time. I work on Dennis, Douglas and Ernest regularly. I'm thinking about Harold, but probably won't do anything with it for a while.

I also spent a ton of time working on existing projects:

• django-badger
• django-browserid
• elasticutils and pyelasticsearch
• tower
• jingo-minify
• django-ratelimit
• playdoh, playdoh-lib and funfactory
• richard which powers pyvideo.org
• vidscraper

I'm probably missing a bunch there. It's hard to keep track of what one did on other peoples' projects.

I got a lot accomplished at work this year:

• I joined the sec-champs group and now help manage and coordinate security releases for Django and other software we use on our websites. (Security)
• I performed an audit on playdoh-lib and helped coordinate a bunch of updates including to Django 1.5. (Security)
• I helped work on Captain Shove which is a new deployment system to replace Chief. (IT)
• I worked on l10n issues, created dennis and rewrote the deployment scripts for Input and SUMO to eliminate production problems related to errors in translated strings. (L10N)
• I worked on community building as a mentor for SUMO and Input projects (more Input than SUMO) helping guide new contributors towards their first contributions. I should be doing a lot more on this front. One thing I did with Miro, Pyblosxom and other projects I've worked on is to keep track of people who have contributed to help keep them around. That sounds goofy, but it helps build lasting communities. (Community building)
• I helped fix some quality problems with the Kitsune and Fjord test suites and I'm working with Bob from QA on updating the Input tests. (QA)
• Implemented a more flexible filter/query system in Elasticutils and maintained it for the year. (Maintainer)
• Did a ton of work on SUMO and Input.

Challenges I worked on this year:

• I keep getting dinged in performace reviews for being acerbic (that's probably the nicest word for it). I recognize that it sucks to work with acerbic people and regardless of how busy or stressed out they are.

  I finally started working on it in earnest probably around August. I hope I'm more pleasant to work with. We'll see what people think.

• Everyone above me in the Mozilla org chart left.

  At the beginning of 2013, it was something like me -> James -> Mike -> Todd -> Gary.

  Now it's me -> Ricky -> Wil -> Rick -> Harvey -> Jay.

  I'm still working on SUMO and Input, but the Webdev group went away and the SUMO engineering team got shifted between groups. I'm feeling ok about it, but wonder if all that shifting makes it difficult for me to be noticed.

• I'm working on too many things and thus many things are starving for attention. That's a simple sentence for a very complex situation which involves all sorts of thought-provoking questions like, "why?" and "why is it important for all things to be worked on?"

  I stopped maintaining Pyblosxom. I stepped down from my work on MediaGoblin. I'm being more careful about what I commit to and try to commit to things that I feel that I'm the best fit for. I'm working on reducing context-switch time so I'll work on certain projects for longer periods of time, then put them down for longer periods of time. I'm trying to ask for help more often and spread the workload around and I'm trying to make helping me easier.

• I need to spend more time on pyvideo.

  This is an important project. It just keeps getting back-burnered and when I have time to work on it, crazy ass things come up which need to get fixed immediately.

  For example, blip.tv ditched a bunch of Python conference accounts. We scrambled to download those videos and now we're hosting them. That took a ton of time.

  Regardless, I started several code overhauls that I need to finish. That's blocking everything else and that sucks. I really need to get that done.

• I have a new roommate and having two roommates is crazy. I don't even know what to do to alleviate this short of just get through the day one day at a time.

• I need to take better care of myself.

  This is a hard one. It's easy to push off me-focused things when there's so many things that need doing. I haven't a good answer here, yet, but maybe being more aware of it is helpful.

• I got shingles. That sucked.

In 2014, I want to:

• Continue to get better at front-end development.
• Spend time working on pyvideo, richard, dennis and ernest and get them to better places.
• Figure out what to do with Elasticutils: Overhaul it to make it suck less? Pass it off to someone else to maintain? Figure out a list of 5 things to fix now and let it continue to be mediocre?
• Overhaul my blog. Douglas is coming along nicely. After I finish getting that working, I'll re-theme it. This is lower priority than the other things here, but it'd be nice to finally do this year.
• Work on empowering and enabling other people to do things rather than blocking them. This one is hard and tricky especially where my free time is unpredictable on account of roommates and obligations I have no control over.

It's been a busy year and there are things I should be doing better, but generally speaking, I think I did pretty ok.

[Comments]

http://bluesock.org/~willkg/blog/content/me_2013.html

I was going to “manifest” myself in Cairo via the powers of videoconferencing for Mozilla Power’13, but connectivity issues happened, so I recorded a screencast with my talk:

Slides

Here’s hoping the Mozilla Egypt community is having a great event :-)

Do send me any questions you might have about the topics I discussed, and I’ll do my best to answer them!

http://soledadpenades.com/2013/12/20/mozillas-new-technologies-for-mozilla-power13/