One for the math geeks

I seem to be in a Tool-esque mood at the moment, and I specifically found myself on the Lateralus album by Tool. Whilst listening to the track of the same name I found myself tapping a pattern that I seemed to recognise, but I just couldn't place my finger on it. After moving to the computer to listen to it, and replaying it several times I decided to do a bit of research - call it a dense moment.

After a "quick" bit of searching around you might come across this blog entry from Patrick Flannigan that points out the Fibonacci sequence (which ties in rather nicely with the lyrics). There's also a rather nicely composed YouTube submission that iterates through the sequence as the song progresses. Wikipedia also appears to have an entry on it, so it must be true!

Maybe it's a coincidence, but it seems you really can claim Tool to be "intelligent" rock. Plus I guess the math that my teachers tried to bestow on me actually had a bit of an effect. How cool is that?

Blizzard IV: The results

I thought I should round this set of blog entries off, as it'll clear up some discussion I've had on various forums about this job prospect.

About 2 weeks ago I got the results from my interviews with Blizzard. I received several phone calls from them whilst I was out and about for my current employer. Eventually I got an email from my contact asking what number was best to get me on and I responded, apologising and detailing my details.

They phoned in due course and they offered me the job. I was unbelievably gobsmacked. I seriously didn't think that I had any chance of even going to see them, let alone being offered the job. I said my thank yous and asked for a few days to think it over.

Unfortunately I then spent the next few evenings out at the cinema, or at the pub, and then the rest of the day asleep (it was the weekend before you panic). It was the first time I'd seen my mates in a few weeks, so whilst it was cool to see them and chat about stuff, it was weighing on my mind a fair bit. My best friend was also out of contact during this time, so couldn't chat to her about stuff. Fortuantely I have a small number of really great friends that I can talk to about this sort of stuff. To those guys and gals I apologise as all I did was talk at you, but I really, really appreciated that as it just let me get my thoughts out.

Eventually I reached my decision and informed Blizzard that I could not accept the position. I couldn't quite believe that I was telling them this for a start. I was giving up the opportunity to play with some really, really cool technology (sorry, I can't really tell you what little I learnt about their setup - please stop asking :P), and I was giving up the opportunity of working with some undeniably cool people that I had met. However, I just wasn't sure about the prospect - the fact I'd be moving to France, a country with different customs and a different language I didn't speak was really daunting, and I personally found the pay to be a little less than expected based on similar roles I've been offered in the UK in the past. Now, before anyone gets the wrong idea it wasn't bad, and money is certainly not the most important thing to me - happiness is - and there were other benefits. However, for the risk of moving to a country that I might not enjoy in my personal time for sometime, I just could not risk it. So based on this decision I declined.

A day or so later they get back in touch with me regarding my decision, and I have another phone conversation with the fantastic HR guy that I'd been dealing with. He took me through their offer, in detail, which I'll admit was a fantastic offer that I've never seen another company offer (it does offset the money thing quite a bit, but that's not something I can go in to), and then asked if I was still sure. I asked if I could have another few days and I would get back to them this Monday. Over the weekend I thought about it all. The geek factor and the prestige of having Blizzard on your CV is undoubtedly unbelievably cool. Sadly my feelings didn't change, so I declined again. I have the belief that if you're really not sure then you shouldn't go for a job in your chosen career, it's just not fair to the employer or yourself.

So there it ends, at least for now. Who knows, maybe things will be massively different in a few years time, and maybe I'll get a similiar opportunity. The whole experience has taught me a few things about myself though. I'm clearly either good in interviews, or technically capable. I hope it's both, but I'd settle for technically capable over good interview skills any day. I'm also perfectly capable of dealing with obstacles in my way in life (see this post for details on the actual in person interview and the "nightmare"), which is something that I'd never be able to have done a few years ago. So, on those grounds, thank you Blizzard.

I'd almost say, that I'm happy in life at the moment. Well, maybe a begrudging indifference at least.

Now, all I need to do is gently nudge a certain maths teacher (Mark Rawlinson) who really introduced me to computers, and Blizzard games, in the first place. He'd really freak out if he knew I'd turned this down! I'd also like to say thank you - for various reasons.

Sage Line 50 HR 2007 (Rant alert)

During the course of work I often come across various Sage products, and usually this ends up with amplified ranting in various IRC channels. For those who are present in those channels I apologise as you've already heard this.

To those who don't know Sage, they're a self titled "leading supplier of business management software and services to 5.4 million customers worldwide". I wouldn't exactly agree.

Many of their programs ignore basic practises for Windows, ranging from demanding write access to system32, to installing 'unused' SQL engines. I say unused, in one or two products they only appear to be used as a network transport. Which is seemingly bonkers if you ask me, especially when the various installers, and "certified experts", create shares also.

In this respect Sage Line 50 HR 2007 is an improvement; to a certain degree.

One of our clients produced the media for Sage Line 50 HR 2007, so I apologise if there's a known problem with the current releases of CDs. However, I shall endeavour as this really pissed me off, and there doesn't appear to be any updates on the official website at all. Sage Support made no indication that any such fixes currently exist.

  • If you select a "server" installation you are unable to customise any paths at all. This is one of the few circumstances where I might actually want to customise an installation path. Don't make me work harder.
  • If you select a non-"server" installation then you can only customise some paths. Specifically you can only customise an installation path for the binaries.
  • The documentation directory only contains an installer for Adobe Reader 5 (no actual documentation). I shouldn't need to explain myself here. It's wrong for so many reasons.
  • It demands it must share C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Sage\HR, although you can specific the share name (this really pissed me off). Why on earth am I not allow to configure this path? This appears to be where data gets put (I don't know if this is strictly true at present, since is uses SQL (see below), but even so. That's just shit for data management. Any attempt to reshare another directory with the same share name and removing this one just upsets the Sage HR "server".
  • It installs an "embedded" version of MySQL. Ok, so they've gone for a sort-of-open source product here, and that sort of pleases me. However, I am well and truely fed up with embedded SQL engines all over the network. Many of our customers have at least one system on the network with a full SQL engine. I know Sage is perfectly capable of talking to a non bundled SQL server. Look at Sage Line 200/MMS/etc. As a techy this would make me happy. Don't litter the network. Please.
  • It fails to install on an Active Directory box with FSMO roles (aka Domain Controller), because it tries to create a local group, failing silently for obvious reasons. The installation then carries on blindly, despite the install log hidden away in the installation target directory stating that it rolled back.

In the end, after trying to manually add the Sage HR server service, and failing (for some reason that I didn't have time to determine), I made a "quick" call to Sage. Sage's advice? To install it on a non-DC box. They're fully aware of the problem and the support staff have to deal with it fairly often. Apparently there's a request in to change the behaviour. Surprisingly Sage Support were actually helpful in this instance, although I did throw "Barbara" off track slightly when I mentioned the install log. She also seemed to be a bit hazy on exactly what a Domain Controller is, but I guess that's not her thing to have to understand, it's mine and she at least made herself clear enough for me to understand what she meant.

In this instance it's rather lucky that the customer does have an additional server they can use for this, but it's not ideal. I'd rather keep on this stuff on the file server (which in this instance is a SBS box).

Perhaps had I more time to play with this I could've sorted it, but I was getting rather annoyed at this stage and just had to move on to other things.

In terms of getting that share somewhere that might not be "forgotten" (we document everything via our helpdesk software, but sometimes the importance of making things easy is useful in a tight spot - if the backup gets recreated, for whatever reason, can I bank on someone including that obscure directory?) a DFS replication to another location may be an option (this has worked for various other products they use that demand a directory in C:\Windows - not ideal on a clustered terminal server environment).

Would I recommend using Sage Line 50 HR? Personally, I wouldn't touch it with a barge pole, from a professional geek point of view. However, as a tool to help out with HR I honestly couldn't compare it with the various other products out there as I've not really touched any HR software since I parted ways from the MoD. However, I may be trying out OrangeHRM for the company at some point soon, so maybe I will have something to compare it with soon.

Castlecoombe race track is under threat. Again.

Once again Castlecoombe race track in Wiltshire, which is the second oldest track in the UK, is under threat again. During the summer it was slapped with a noise order preventing the track from hosting the F3/British GT event and it's now under threat from complete closure.

As always there's a petition against this, which can be also found online here. If you're in the area, or have ever been to Castlecoombe and had a good time, then you might want to spend a minute or two of your time signing it.

Personally I've always had a good time, everytime I've been Castlecoombe - both in the rain and in the sun. It's a brilliant place and it would be a shame to see it close.

Nameserver issues

Apologies go out to all that I host services for at present. 123-reg, whos Name Servers I use are currently experiencing trouble. I reported the problem as soon as I noticed it last night, but there was no response from 123-reg until 9am this morning. They're currently "still fixing it", according to their status page.

Once again, my apologies. Had I realised it was going to take this long I would've transfered the DNS records elsewhere.