Mike Deasy

We have all seen them, all remember them - the IT office funnies. There was the Story of Creation as told to URK - a lovely reenactment of Genesis put together by hard-core mainframers. There was a document (prepared by individuals working in the defense industry) that had a hilarious list of acronyms, mostly defining the many ways that the worker bee was dumped upon. It was before Dilbert, before the blond jokes, even before we could IM each other with the latest classic comedy. It was simplicity itself. The "Does The Stupid Thing Work" flowchart (see Figure 1) showed you in no uncertain terms how to cover your backside in case you were actually doing some work, showing some initiative, or attempting to be helpful. It was hysterical; I never worked in an office where so... (more)

Charting The Flight Of The Killer App

Groundbreaking nuclear-geneticist Hermann Joseph Muller said, "Life is a whole ceaseless change. There is no sign of physical limit yet." Bearing that in mind, it occurred to me that I should begin to test the limits of PowerBuilder 8, and see if I could disprove Muller. It seemed to me the easiest way to go about this heady undertaking was to convert our EMS natural gas trading and accou... (more)

What Happened to Tiger?

Tiger Woods is, arguably, one of the finest golfers ever to pick up a club. During his peak a few years ago, it really did not seem as if anyone would ever beat him. He dominated the game, dominated every player he came up against. He was an invincible force. I asked a buddy once why he and his fellow duffers thought Tiger was so amazing. He said it was because there just weren't any hol... (more)

Holiday Greetings from Seattle - Jingle all the way . . .

Ahh, the holidays - time for warmth, family, a spirit of charity (or greed, depending on your wont), and days off. Many of us spend our holidays vacationing, shopping, worshipping, and trying to rekindle childhood memories or feelings. However, many of us computing professionals spend our holiday season in some other ways, don't we? Days in a Row One of the real problems with the holidays... (more)

Showdown: Are You Ready to Rumble?

There is a raging debate in the developer community: Microsoft's new platform .NET versus the Sun standard J2EE. J2EE has been around for a few years, while Microsoft's attempt is decidedly the new kid on the block. While the comparisons may be defined by some as purely technical, some have deemed it a battle of corporate cultures. Sun has certainly chosen to consider that the battle. Du... (more)