Thank You, Tim Moffatt

I woke up this morning and heard the news that Tim Moffatt, the President of Data Dynamics, died yesterday after a long battle with cancer. Tim was the one that hired me at Data Dynamics, for he saw something in me during my interview that I didn't see at the time. I have forever been grateful for his belief in me. He helped me believe in myself, and even had a few heart-to-heart talks with me about how to be who I want to be. He always showed me a lot of respect... with the exceptions of his crazy and (sometimes) offensive humor. That was just Tim though. :) I was very sad to hear of the news this morning. 

Rest in peace, my friend.

Keith posted a nice tribute to his passing on Farpoint's blog: Component Industry Loses a Leader

Data Dynamics Business Intelligence Suite

Today Data Dynamics announced an insane discount on their extremely powerful and feature rich component package: Data Dynamics Business Intelligence Suite for only $899!

This suite includes Data Dynamics Analysis and Data Dynamics Reports together. For a comparison on what this means, each one typically sells for $1,499 each. That means that they are offering both for less than you can typically purchase one. The two products truly deliver a full blown business intelligence solution. Trust me! They've done the research and interviewed the proper people to prove this. If you've heard me talk about these products in the past, but never gave it a second thought, please download each product and run it against your own data. You'll be a believer right away.

Both products have been built from the ground up at Data Dynamics. Features are constantly being added and samples are continually updated to help teach you what each product is capable of doing. Watch some of the screencasts (DDA / DDR) if you are not sure what they can do, and see what you're missing.

Update: Oct, 6 @ 9:30 pm
Data Dynamics Analysis just announced support for trend lines, part-to-whole calculations, extracting data from the selection, and many other new features. Download it now and see for yourself... I am!

See what people are saying:

• http://blog.scott.willeke.com/2008/10/huge-discount-on-data-dynamics-reports.html
• http://mrdotnet.wordpress.com/2008/10/06/fall-discount-on-data-dynamics-business-intelligence-products/
• http://twitter.com/LucasHardbarger/statuses/949044379
  

My New Job

As I recently stated, I changed careers... Well, last week was my first full week working for InfoPlanIT and I really like it so far. My new job title is not really defined, but I guess you could say that I'm a "business intelligence developer". My role is to develop business intelligence solutions for clients. Period. I am also the lead developer on the company's flagship product: Business Analyzer

The company is based out of Chicago, but InfoPlanIT has clients all over the world. So there is definitely an opportunity for travel. Jennifer and I took a few days earlier this month and went up to Chicago so that I could meet everybody and get acquainted with the main office. We had a lot of fun, though we didn't really get to go around and hang out together a lot. Jennifer had a lot of free time, therefore she shopped while I was out getting introduced everywhere. In her defense, she did shop at the "discount stores" in downtown Chicago. :) We took lots of pictures, and I'll be sure to upload them to my online photo album soon...

So going back to my role in the company: if you look at Business Analyzers' homepage, you will see that it has a large focus on a certain pivot table control. Yes, that's right, the Business Analyzer uses DynamiCube to deliver a dynamic dashboards and reports in a completely disconnected manner. Since I've come on board full time, I plan to integrate Data Dynamics Analysis and Data Dynamics Reports heavily into the product for the next version.

As an old employee of Data Dynamics, I know exactly how solid their products are and how committed they are to ensuring top quality and ingenuity into their products. Integrating Data Dynamics Analysis into Business Analyzer will add so much to the product.

So there it is, I have moved from a focus in .NET components to actually using them in real world .NET applications. How exciting!? I must say that it's really fun being on the other side of the API. Most of all, now I get to do all fun things like continuous integration, test driven development, refactoring, and all the other fun stuff that us .NET developers love to do.

Best of all, I get to do it from the luxury of my own basement.

Changing Jobs

Yup, you read it right. Today was my last day at Data Dynamics. Leaving DD was a tough decision. Especially after the company has done so much for me and my family. DD was, is, and always will be an amazing company. They took a chance on me and they helped shape who I am today. For the sake of good blogging, let me tell you what I mean by "they took a chance on me". Don't worry it's just a recap of the first year or two at the company... :)

The Mooch
Back in 2000, Jennifer and I got married in June and I was a student at CSCC looking for a job doing Assembler Language, COBOL, or AS400 programming. I was working 2 piddly jobs making a total of about $100 a week and completely mooching off of my new wife. At the time, I was a COBOL whiz kid and breezed through all of my programming classes. CSCC didn't offer very good courses at the time for Visual Basic, but I really wanted to know how to create windows applications using that fancy GUI stuff. I had done some small database projects for some friends here and there just so I could self teach myself VB5.

The Interview
Fall was quickly approaching that year and I had been through countless dead-end tech interviews. Everybody wanted someone with "experience". However, how was I supposed to get experience if I didn't have a JOB!? I had to start somewhere... So sometime around September 2000 (exactly 8 years ago this month), I got called in from some head hunter telling me to show up in Columbus for an interview at some company called Data Dynamics.

Lucky for them, I had just cut my long hippie hair and bought some new clothes. This picture was actually taken the morning of my interview. Jennifer took the picture before we hopped in the car and headed to DD headquarters (I can't believe I found this pic!). So anyway, I walked in the door and was pummeled with a ferocious roar of a miniature pincher named Zeus. This really added insult to injury at that point; I was nervous, looked like a dork, and now everybody in the office knew that the potential "prospect" had arrived. Aside from the ferocious beast, this looked like a hip place to work. They had a pool table with tie-dye pool balls... I mean, it doesn't get much cooler than that! Right?

Immediately, the boss at the front desk (aka: Tim) starts yelling at this dog and comes out and shakes my hand. By this point, I didn't know what to think; I had a cloudy fish tank to my right, a really cool pool table in front of me, a snarling miniature pincher at my feet, and I'm shaking the owners hand. He told me to have a seat, so I did. About 2 minutes later I see this scruffy looking dude (aka: Scott) come out of one of the offices near the back and he tells me to come on back. He looked like Jesus, so I listened.

The interview was absolutely painful! Scott had a wrinkled up t-shirt, cut off shorts, long scruffy hair, a go-T, and he was sportin' Jesus-sandals. Tim looked like an owner (whatever that means), but I couldn't help but notice that he was drinking coffee from a VBITS '99 mug. I had heard about that conference (VBITS, now VSLive) from my Visual Basic Programmers Journal magazine (now Visual Studio Magazine) subscription. I thought it was so cool that this company exhibited their products at that show! This is what I wanted to do! This is the job that I want! I answered the questions as best as I could, but the one thing that sticks out for me (and always will) was when Scott asked me where I wanted to be in 5 years... I froze. Who knew this would be a question at an interview. I stuttered for a minute and thew up my index finger so that they knew I was onto something. Right then, I pulled out my Palm III out of my jacket pocket so that I could remember exactly where I wanted to be in 5 years... Lucky for me, I took notes before the interview and had this information readily available. I told them that I wanted to be a developer and that I wanted to be a drummer in a successful rock band. We talked a bit more, and then I shook their hands figuring it would be the last time I'd ever see them...

The Call
The whole ride home, I was pissed! I told Jennifer that there was no way they were going to hire me. I barely knew Visual Basic and this was a cutting edge company that was writing ActiveX components specifically for Visual Basic. We laughed about my interviewing skills for a while and talked about how cool it would have been if I could have worked there... But, I was going to keep interviewing until something else came up, since I tanked this interview.

The rest of the day just played out, and we had friends over that night for some cards and beer. I had just come back from the store or something and when I walked in the back door, all our friends at the table were looking at me with big smiles and Jennifer was grinning ear to ear... "What's going on?", I asked... "You got the job!"... "WHAT!?"... "YOU GOT THE JOB!!" Talk about a life changing sentence. I couldn't believe it. I had pretty much written them off since I was nowhere near qualified for the job. I remember how exciting it was to know that we were gonna be making some real scratch now. Jennifer and I had lived on pennies for way too long, and the starting salary at this job was waaay more than I could even fathom at that point. We all got drunk.

The Rookie
My very first role at Data Dynamics was DynamiCube 2.0 support. I would be in charge of assisting other programmers about how to use this product in their applications. Not only did I know very little about Visual Basic, but I knew NOTHING about pivot tables and analyzing numbers in a cross tab. I felt like I was in way over my head right out of the gun. Scott was my mentor for the first few months on the job and rather than helping me by answering my immediate question, he helped me teach myself how to learn. Rather than bugging him with insanely stupid questions day in and day out, I would basically spin my wheels for hours on this component trying to figure out how it worked and why anybody would even want to buy it. At times I felt like I was on my own trying to support these users while at the same time trying to learn this epic product. Looking back now, I wouldn't have wanted it any other way. Thanks Scott! :)

In no time, I was traveling all over the place. My first trip was to head out west to San Jose (aka: Silicon Valley!). It's safe to say that I felt like I had "made it" in my career by this point. I had never been past Indiana before that trip, so going out to California to learn some new technology was huge for me. After Silicon Valley, I was pretty much on the move all the time after that (or so it seemed). I was going to places (some regularly) like Orlando, San Fransisco, Boston, Los Angeles, Denver, Pittsburg, Las Vegas, Seattle, Tulsa, Russia!, Grand Rapids, Ann Arbor (puke), Tulsa, and of course various cities around Ohio. Since the day I started, I've supported and some what mastered :) DynamiCube, ActiveBar, SharpGrid, ActiveCube, ActiveSizer, ActiveReports, SharpUI, SharpGraph, and Data Dynamics Analysis. The company has let me develop my speaking skills, my PM skills, all kinds of stuff!

Conclusion
Well crap... I had a whole huge post written up that was going over everything that I had learned and experienced while I was at Data Dynamics. I wanted to give credit where credit was due, but once I got towards the end of the post, I realized that it started to look more like a resume. Rather than post a list of "look what I can do now", I just deleted it all and decided to stick to the point of the post. The purpose for this post is really to just say that I'm very happy to have had the chance to work for such a cool company. They took a chance on me, and really helped me "be all I could be" for many years.

The Data Dynamics motto is deliver reporting and analysis tools to developers, and that is exactly what they are still doing today. It's amazing how the vision hasn't changed in my 8 years there. They are constantly striving to deliver stellar products at a fair price. There is some intense competition right now in the component market, but I know that Data Dynamics has some tricks up it's sleeve... some of the upcoming products are sure to take the component and BI market by surprise.

I'll forever be a customer and proud alumni if Data Dynamics. I'm going to miss everybody! Tim, Ferhat, Issam, Scott, and everybody else... Thank You!

What's Next for Me?
Without going into too much detail right now, my new gig is this: I will be working from home, writing code out of my basement full time for a small software company out of Chicago. This is a dream come true for both me and my family. I've always wanted to be able to stay home and write code to "bring home the bacon" and that's exactly what I'll be doing now. It's for that reason that I decided to change jobs...

I'm following my dream. :)

CodeStock 2008 is a Success

As I mentioned back in June, we attended the Codestock down in Knoxville, TN. I'm so happy we did! We got to meet some really cool people and I think that the the way they handle the Data Dynamics sponsorship was very unique.

We heard about Codestock at a speaker dinner in Grand Rapids, Michigan before West Michigan Day of .NET. We were sitting around eating our dinner and drinking some booz and ended up sitting next to Wally McClure. Wally had nothing but great things to say about Data Dynamics products. We talked a bit and he asked about sponsoring a cool event in Tennessee. We told him to send us some information, and immediately he got on the phone with Mike Neel (head coordinator) to tell him about out possible interest. Well, the rest is history.

The most appealing thing about Codestock (to me) was that they were going to dedicate speaker rooms to the sponsors. By this I mean that each sponsor would have a speaker room named after the company. For example, there was a Data Dynamics room, a Red Gate room, a Microsoft room, etc... I thought this was really cool. Best of all, the Data Dynamics room was the first room and had the nicest chairs. Our room was a lecture room that had nice 'movie' chairs. The other rooms had college (half-table) desks. The sponsors were able to setup anything they wanted in this room, so we took our pull ups and set them up at the door. This ensured that everybody who attended a session in our room would see our name everywhere. Major kudos to Codestock from Data Dynamics!!


So anyway, James and I did our session on "Simplicity in Visualizing Numbers" and this time it went much better than we had both thought it would. Before we left the office Friday, we had a dry run in the lunch room in front of everybody. It paid off big time! During this dry run, we smoked through the talk in about 20 minutes... This was way short of 1 hour. We also found out that we (ok, mostly me) said "um" and "uh" a lot.

We left the office around 2pm and headed down to Tennessee. It was a pretty uneventful drive down and we arrived at the hotel around 8:30 - 9:00pm. Once we got settled in, we hooked up the laptops, turned on the TV, and ordered some pizza. James and I reformatted our talk a bit after some great feedback from Philip and the DD crew. I wound up falling asleep around 2am and James was still working on the slides.

The alarm went off a few minutes later (or so it seemed) and we headed to Pellissippi State Technical Community College to get setup. We setup our banners in the Data Dynamics room and wound up missing Jeff Prosise's keynote. Our session went off without a hitch! James stood behind the podium, while I stood off to the side, in front of the podium. We basically took turns talking; I would talk through a few slides, then James would talk through a few slides. At the end, people spoke up and asked some really good questions about some problems they're facing building charts and graphs at their company. One of the developers in the audience stated that she was doing everything wrong according to us and asked for some advise. It was at that point that I knew the session was a success. A few other developers asked for some advise and we answered them to the best of our ability. I'm sure that our insight helped them go back and apply some of our ideas.

After our talk, we did lunch, then attended some other sessions. James and I both attended a session titled "Mono and Open Source .NET". I learned quite a bit, but admit that it was hard to keep my eyes open after eating lunch. After that session, James and I attended a session titled "Getting Dirty with httpModules and httpHandlers" in the Data Dynamics room. This was a very cool session and Chris Love knows his stuff! The last session that we attended was (again) in the Data Dynamics room and was titled "Linq Migration Strategies" by Joe Wooley. This was a very informative session and it really made me want to get neck deep in to VB 9's XML Literals. Wow!

To finish off the day of sessions, there was a big sponsor giveaway in the auditorium. It was fun to say the least. After the sponsor giveaway, we headed outside to the concert area and got to listen to some live music by a band called Hanover Fist. They were pretty good, but we only got to hang around for 3 songs before we decided to hit the road. Codestock was a hip-hip event, and the logo pretty much says it all (hippy / rocker look). Congrats to Wally, Alan, and Mike for a successful event!

The drive home was pretty uneventful as well, but we all had some fun conversations. :) I got home at 2am, checked some emails and tweets, then went strait to bed.

CodeStock in Knoxville

Data Dynamics is a proud sponsor of this year's CodeStock down on August 9th in Knoxville, TN. James and I are going to be exhibiting and speaking at this years' event. We're going to be doing our speech on the proper way to graph and display numbers. Our talk is called Simplicity in Visualizing Numbers and we've incorporated a lot of the Presentation Zen ideas.

If you're in the area and have nothing to do, you should go. It's only a 5 hour drive from Columbus. :)


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Data Dynamics Analysis (First Maintenance Release)

The Data Dynamics Analysis team has been working diligently on some new features and bug fixes for the product. We just posted our first maintenance release yesterday. This build includes a few new features and some pretty important bug fixes. My favorite new feature for this release probably has to be the AutoConnect property.

This new property allows a developer to deliver a (front to back) visual analysis solution without writing a SINGLE LINE OF CODE! Here is how it works...

1. Start a new Windows Forms solution.
2. Drop a PivotView control onto your Windows Form.
1. Set the Dock property to Fill
   
3. Drop the RdDataSource control onto your Windows Form.
1. Set the ConnectionString property (same one you used to build the custom schema file *).
2. Set the ConnectionType property (OleDb, ODBC, or Sql)
3. Set the CustomSchemaFile property (*)
   
4. Set the QueryString property (ie. query or stored procedure)
5. Notice the new AutoConnect property defaults to True
4. Set the PivotView's DataSource property to rdDataSource1.
5. Press Play!
   

This new AutoConnect property prevents the developer from ever having to go to the code window and manually writing rdDataSource1.Connect() in the Forms' Load event. Sure, it's a little feature, but it's a really big selling point for some of our more non-technical users.

We are continuing to make enhancements on the product and are committed to delivering new builds much more frequently to ensure that our users are taken care of quickly and effectively. More and more cool features are coming very soon too; there are 3 (huge) features that we hope to deliver to the public in the next month or so. If you haven't signed up for product updates, I highly encourage it!

-------------------------------

* - When you install Data Dynamics Analysis, it ships with many prebuilt schema files that describe some of the relational data sources that ship with the product. If you would like to explore these data sources, simply reference the schema files from the following directory:
...My Documents\Data Dynamics\Analysis\DataSources

Otherwise, you can analyze your own data by modeling a default schema to represent your data source. In order to quickly build a default schema file that represents your data, refer to our online walkthrough.

Orlando TechEd 2008 & Marathon Training

Since this is my blog, I can make posts that tie two totally different aspects together like I've done here. :) The best of both worlds IMO. If only I could tie in drumming and banana's. Actually, I can...


Last week I was in Orlando for TechEd 2008. This is the show that Data Dynamics has been talking about and excited about for a very long time. We were able to show off some new products as well as demonstrate some cool features with our existing products. We had a very good turn out to say the least.

My team had a sprint meeting on Sunday night @ 11pm, and my flight for Orlando was Monday @ 6am. This means that I have to be at the airport at 5am, which means I have to leave my house at 4am, which means that I had to wake up at (no later than) 3:30am. So basically, by the time I was done with my meeting and finished packing, it was about 2:45am, so I got about 15 minutes of (very bad) sleep before I decided to just get up and eat some cereal. I made it to the airport around 5am and made my flight with time to spare; I was Orlando bound...

Monday was off to a no-sleep start, and the sun was coming up, so I had a full day ahead of me. James was in the same boat, although he had 0 minutes of sleep, whereas I had whopping 15. We were both pretty skitzo to say the least. When we landed, we got checked into the Peabody and then met with Issam to setup the booth. Once the booth was setup, I went back to my hotel room and crashed. I slept from 5pm to 10am the next morning... much needed!

Tuesday came and went. Woke up, did booth crap, did some networking, ran 3 miles in the sun, more booth crap, dinner with colleagues, then fell asleep at 4am after chatting with my Novosibirsk comrades all night about our amazing product.

Wednesday was very cool. I woke up at 10ish and spent all morning and early afternoon manning the booth in the exhibit hall. When exhibit hours were done, I got my 4 miler in and sweat like crazy in the Florida sun and humidity. After my run, I got ready to go feast at Texas de Brazil (the best restaurant in Florida) with our friends from ComponentSource. After I stuffed my belly with 28 1/2 kinds of meat and too many cinnamon glazed banana's, I attended the MSDN party at the Lux Night Club where there was nothing but good times and booze. I got to network with a lot of people including my FarPoint people, Scott Hanselman, Carl and Richard, Telerik crew, Wintellect crew, ComponentSource crew, Dundas crew, CodeProject crew, nSoftware crew, and many many others. I actually got to be the sit in drummer on RockBand with my Dundas buddies. We sucked, but had lots of fun. :) I got home around 12:30am and crashed with a pretty bad headache (too much loud music and yelling).

Thursday morning came very fast. I woke up around 10:30 and got to the exhibit hall a bit late, but it was still pretty slow by then. Once it got busy, the booth stayed bumping all day and I got to show off Data Dynamics Analysis to a lot of unsuspecting people. I feel we made a lot of sales leads today, as my demo's were packed. At one point, I found myself talking to ~10 people. My voice was a bit scratchy from the yelling I did the night before. People would still hear me, and I made it a point to make eye contact with as many as I could so that they new that I was genuinely passionate about this product. All in all, it was a great day at the booth!

James took this from the room. I'm on my 2nd loop, ~5.25 miles finished.

After the exhibit James and I went back to the room and I took a 6 mile run. This run was extremely hard. It was about 96 degrees Fahrenheit with 100% humidity. The training schedule said to do hill work, but... I was in Florida and there are no hills. I decided to just run at a good pace and keep my heart rate elevated instead. Unfortunately the sun and heat got to me and I found myself getting cold chills after only 2 miles of mildly-intense jogging. I decided to slow it down and walk at a few points. I poured some water over my head to avoid passing out and it helped a bit. I picked my pace back up once my cold chills went away, and put in the full 2 loops around the Convention Center and the Peabody hotel. Oh yeah, my iPod took a crap on me about 1/4 mile into my run, so I carried it the entire run for no good reason. That was pretty frustrating...

By the time I got back, it was almost time to go to Universal Studio for the TechEd attendee party. Microsoft bought out 3/4 of Universal Studio and all attendees got to eat, drink, and ride any ride for free for 3 hours. I had about 3 beers, a hot dog, an ice cream bar, a cheeseburger, and got to ride a few rides before heading back to the hotel. We hung out with FarPoint crew and had a blast! Got home around 1am and crashed.

Friday was our last day at the exhibit, and it went pretty well. We did more showing off of our products and then broke down the booth. After the exhibit, I put in my 4 miler and then we all went to a really fancy restaurant called Christini's. It is also the best restaurant in Florida, but on a different (higher class) level. I got the Fillet Mignon and gorged on it. I, of course, topped it off with some espresso and Florida's best Key Lime Pie. We got home around 9:30pm and watched a weird movie called Shrooms (ehh), then a really funny movie called Strange Wilderness (must see). James passed out while I spent the rest of the night packing until almost 3:30am.

Saturday we woke up around 10 am and headed downstairs for breakfast at the B-Line diner (in the Peabody) before we went our separate ways. James was going to hang out with Issam and do some shopping at the outlet malls, while I spent the day poolside soaking up the sun. I did just that! I had nowhere to be, nobody to answer to, no "tasks" on my task list except for "Pool". I got toasty red in no time. I was at the pool from 12:30 - 4pm and I loved it. I spent a full week of running in circles for my training plan and going crazy doing "geeky" things here and there, so I didn't really get the chance to enjoy the pool at all. Issam and James picked me up around 5pm and we headed to the airport. I got home around midnight and it felt real good to be with my girls again.

Sunday, I spent all day with my girls and then took my 7 miler around 8pm and got to enjoy the a nice summer night in Ohio and see the sunset while I leisurely chugged along my country roads. Very peaceful!

Conclusion: TechEd was awesome and my training was not hindered by the crazy TechEd schedule at all. It was great to stay so busy with work related stuff, yet not let my insane schedule get in the way of my marathon training plan. The best part of my training efforts so far has been that Jennifer is taken note of my subtle weight loss and transforming shape... as funny as that sounds. It definitely keeps me motivated. :)

Data Dynamics Analysis

Data Dynamics is proud to announce the immediate release of... What am I saying? I've spent way too much time doing marketing lingo. You'd think I knew how to talk...

What I meant to say was:

Hot off the press! Data Dynamics Analysis is released! Go download the most complete .NET component for analyzing data you'll ever see, ever... ever!

I know I have a few sporadic .NET readers out there (Jason, Josh, Jim, Steve, Phil, and my DD peeps (James, Pilgrim, Scott, Issam, & Rajnish)). Please help me tell the world about this thing. If you don't, then step aside so I can. :)

I want to share a quick movie to explain what this product is in a nutshell. There is no sound, but I'm going to show it to you anyway. Just hum to yourself while it plays. It's only about 2 minutes long and I feel that it really shows what Data Dynamics Analysis can do. Keep in mind that I don't even show the AJAX control during my video, but it's there for all you ASP.NET people and SharePoint people. You can find out all about that on the product page. For a cop-out on disaster recovery here, I made this for an online ad and only realized afterwards that my voice sucks; so the audio was removed. Sorry! Luckily I had a credible voice dub over video, reading my content who was able to add much more enthusiasm. Thanks Carl!

Ok, so you've heard about this product on .NET Rocks, you've seen ads for it on DNRTV, you've probably seen my demo's at various events over the last 2 years, and I'm sure you've dreamed about this product in your sleep; I know I have. I'm here to tell you that you can now buy the product directly from Data Dynamics website and begin building Business Intelligence apps for ASP.NET and Windows Forms applications.

Here is a quick story of the product from it's concept, to it's release: We have been working on this product for almost 3 solid years now. It started out as a PM research project, then it turned into a cool concept application that our developers whipped together in no time (these guys are smart). After that, we realized that we really had something here, and nobody could really compete with this component. We put our hearts and souls into making it the best thing on the market, and I truly believe that it is the best thing on the market today. Today being it's official birth date. No other competitor in the component market can touch this thing. If you feel there is a product out there right now that comes close to this product, I beg you to please comment and send me a link.

If you don't believe me, or you have your doubts, then I challenge you to download it, and try it out. Not only am I challenging you to try it out, but I challenge you to place the component on your form and connect it to your own data. You will be able to see your data in a whole new light! I plan to create some pretty stellar samples and post them on my blog over the next few months. Of course, my samples will revolve around running data and other random data that I deal with on a day to day basis. So stay tuned to that, and feel free to comment with any ideas on some analysis scenarios you would be interested in.

With a tear in my eye and a chin held high, I'm here to tell you that Data Dynamics Analysis Version 1.0 is officially for sale. If you want to know what it does, check out the features page. I've written down the features so many times, that I refuse to repeat them on my blog. This is where you grin, nod in understanding, and click my links. :)

Also, please respond and tell me what you think!

West Michigan Day of .NET

This weekend, James and I are headed up to Grand Rapids, Michigan for a full Day of .Net. Data Dynamics is sponsoring the event and we signed up to give a presentation on how to present data in a meaningful and elegant way. The topic of our presentation is titled: Simplicity in Visualizing Numbers.

James and I have given this presentation a couple of times at events in the past. This past weekend we took some time and refined it a bit to apply some presentation zen to our talk; I'm anxious to see the outcome. We've done a lot of research over the years on this particular topic and I feel confident that we will teach a lot of smart people something new this weekend.

Central Ohio Day of .NET

If you've not heard already, then crawl out from under your rock:

Data Dynamics is a proud sponsor of this year's Central Ohio Day of .NET. Talk about a great group of developers and a great group of organizers! This is projected to be an awesome event.

So, if you have nothing to do on April 19th, then come join us and learn something. Even if you do have something to do, cancel it, and come anyway. This is a FREE event! That's right FREE!! So, take the day off, put on your jams, your tank top, and those worn out flip flops and come learn something. I know I'll be there!

Here is a list of what you can learn: http://cinnug.org/cododn/sessions.aspx

Hope to see you there!!

Data Dynamics on .NET Rocks - Overview

Well, I've listened to it twice now and I gotta say that Scott and Issam (I refuse to link to you until you start blogging again! It's my way of kicking you in the butt...) did a great job representing the company. I'm very excited and pleased with the results of the interview. We've had lots of very encouraging emails from many users through email and forwarded to us from the .NET Rocks guys.

While listening to it, I actually learned how Data Dynamics got it's name too. I never knew that it was thought up on the show floor like that. I guess I never bothered to ask either, so... :)

Anyway, it was a great interview and I was very excited to hear all the hype behind Data Dynamics Analysis; this is the product I've been working with for the past 2+ years. It's almost out of beta! We're finalizing some of the marketing stuff and prettying up our site until then. I plan to do some "tips and tricks" on my blog in the coming months. We've also talked about having a public blog at Data Dynamics as well, so I'll be posting a lot of tips and tricks out there too when it's up and running.

If you haven't listened to the podcast yet... Stop blogging and listen to it! If you've not heard of .NET Rocks or Data Dynamics, then why not listen to the podcast and learn something... Especially for all my running friends that read this blog; what's a 55 minute podcast gonna hurt when you're on a 2-3 hour run? :)

Data Dynamics on .NET Rocks

Scott and Issam had an interview with Carl and Richard yesterday on .NET Rocks (aka: DNR). Amazingly it was posted today!?!

Download show 323 now! I'm listening to it now myself. Expect a follow up post soon. For now I just had to blog about it because its so cool to hear Scott and Issam talking on one of my favorite podcasts. Stay tuned... :)

Mac Daddy Luc

I'm officially Mac'n. I've had this MacBook Pro for some time now, but I've procrastinated for too long on getting all my stuff moved over to it. To be honest, I've just dreaded the whole process. I've been on this Tablet (Toshiba Portege m200) for almost 4 years now and have everything I need on it (and then some).

This week, I dedicated some major hours to getting it setup. At work I would have it setup on my desk and install all the apps I needed on it, while I did my "normal" work on the Tablet. When I was home, I just installed update after update for the Vista in between surfing the web inside OS X. I must say that I'm gonna miss my tablet (which I'm using now) and I know it will miss me too. Even though I don't use the pen too much anymore, I just know where all the keys are and can do anything on the keyboard without ever looking at it. I drive Jennifer crazy because I can fly on this thing. For example, right now, my fingers are going about 120 mph right now and it's nothing for me...

Aside from my mad tablet skills and relearning a whole new keyboard configuration, I gotta say that I'm pretty excited about the whole new get-up. James and Pilgrim helped me get setup with Boot Camp and Parallels. I'm basically running Vista on a separate partition through the Mac OS. With a couple of keystrokes I can switch from Mac to Vista without rebooting. Major props to Pilgrim and James for that, thanks guys! They helped me big time through that whole process. I told James at one point that I felt like that guy that had an empty cup and I was standing at the sink totally clueless as to how to fill my cup up (it was the only analogy I could think of, but hit the nail on the head). I was yelling his name every 2 minutes for silly questions; I felt like a total noob.

My Vista is setup with Office 2007, VS2008, Sql Server 2005 with Analysis Services, Starteam, TotalCommander, and Firefox. I still have to put Visual Basic 6.0 and all the components that I can't live without on it; you know... DynamiCube, ActiveBar, SharpGrid, and ActiveReports.

Bottom line, I'm Mac'n baby!

Novosibirsk - Day 20 (The End)

This post will be a recap of my time here in Novosibirsk. It will be long and will conclude my impression of all the wonderful people I've met while here. Sure, cheesy, but well deserved. This is the trip of a lifetime, so I'm going to use my blog as my outlet to share my feelings with those that may read this. And believe it or not, I'm not using this blog only to share my experiences with you, but also to look back on them one day and read about each day that I spent here in Akademgorodok.

Before I close up this Russian trip, I must say that my next post will be about code, or running, or my family, or something other than Novosibirsk. So if you only kept up on my blog for my adventure in Novosibirsk, you're free to leave after this. :) Otherwise, I'll keep writing and you can keep reading. Of course I will not commit to writing every day... that's ridiculous and way too OCD. I'll probably write a post when I get home in a few days, maybe a week. It will more than likely take me a whole 5 minutes and will be completely meaningless. These daily journals are fun and interesting, but very time consuming. For example, this one kept me up all night last night. :)

Before I get started, please don't let the order of the names have any relevance to who I liked the most. That's too "high school" for me, I mean... we all totally know that I like Scott the least, and he's not last... so? :)

Oleg
You were the first one to help me get settled into Novosibirsk off of the plane, along with Konstantin. I enjoy your crazy jokes, but not so much your taste in fish jerky. I had a lot of fun at my party watching you slam down your sissy pink cards from way up over your head. We'll make sure you are able to cut your hair before 2009! :)

Konstantin & Irina

You were at the airport with Oleg and it was your voice that brought me back to sanity "Lyookas". :) It was nice to actually meet you face to face after already knowing you so well over Skype; I feel as though we're close friends now. Irina is a great compliment to you. You two will always be "cute" in my mind. :) I can't tell you how much I love this Russian bib number!! Honestly! And I'll never forget your Russian soldier story! :)

Anna A. & Sasha

I'm very happy that I met you guys. Having you at my first Russian party really made for an extremely fun night. Anna, my first few days with you were great! My Russian and your English made for one hell of a ride to town. :) The first bad word that I learned in Russian was from you that first day, though I'm still not sure if it's "popo" or "grieshka". Maybe I'll look it up. :) Lieutenant Sasha (aka: Moy Ruskie Bradt), I'm glad I got to know you. When we see each other again, we'll start that fight in the streets! Keep driving like a mad man!! :)

Semyon

To moy other Ruskie bradt. The one thing that we have in common is the happiness that the Chocolat gives us in the morning. :) You really need to switch up your breakfast choice though, man. The omelets are very good, though you continue to eat the same thing..? Sorry for making you late to your daily scrum meeting, but it was your choice. You still owe me a dinner at your flat! And always remember, everybody is crazy but me. :)

Ivan & Family

I'm embarrassed that I cannot remember your wifes name, but I remember that she was extremely nice and she complimented me on my "Russian-ness". You two made one hell of a cute kid too. :) You were a lot of fun at my party and your choice of raw fish was better than Oleg's choice. :) I enjoyed your company at the Chocolat and it was great taking the back way to work, off the main strip for a change. You can get that "Perfect Pushup" online actually if you get bored of the same old "old school" pushups. I hope to see you again soon. :)

Maxim

Thank you for everything! It was a great decision on your part driving us to downtown Novosibirsk that day. I really enjoyed your company, but not so much your driving. :) No, you're a great driver, it's everybody else on the road!! Seriously though, you made a great tour guide; if things don't work out for you in computers, consider that as an alternative. I still plan to send a post card to you so that you can see that people really do this. Thanks for hanging out with me over here and taking me out to eat all of those times! No matter what anybody tells you from this day forward, your banya leaf smacking skills are stellar. My back is still sizzling with welts. :) THANK YOU SIR, MAY I HAVE ANOTHER!!

Alex S.

You have got some crazy skiing skills my man! Thanks for letting me use your poles after I broke mine; I wonder if they ever found the broken ones. ;) Also, how does it feel to be the producer / director on the most famous video in blog world. Everybody loved that video back home. :) And since nobody did this for you, here goes: Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday dear Aleeeeeeeeeex. Happy birthday to you. :) The link is a bit different, but you get the idea. Next year, you have to force everybody sing!!! Not just me. :)

Julia P.

Thanks for taking me out and showing me how the locals have fun at the "live band" scene. I enjoyed listening to you pick on all the guys in the Apache room. You are right, they are sissy's! Don't tell them I said that of course. Wait a minute...? Seriously though, maybe you should switch to using words like "clouds" and "sky" when they give you a new bug, it's better for everyone that way. Keep growing those booger scrapers and take care of that tooth. Oh yeah, stay away from those Russian toothpicks too!! They're bad for you. ;)

Oksana & Scott

Thanks for showing me around. It was fun eating at the pizza place that first night. It's amazing to see Scott knowing so much Russian. Even though I'm tearing him up with my learning curve (or lack there of). I'll miss your English lessons Oksana, it was fun to follow along in the audio lessons, you have some very good students and it's obvious that you are a great teacher. Maybe you could teach Scott some Wii Tennis while your at it? OHH! Just kidding, keep practicing man... I look forward to see you both together in the fall. Thanks for making me feel welcome over here.

Lena B.

It was great to get to know you. Welcome to the family (ie. DataWorks / Data Dynamics) and I look forward to working with you in the future. You are a very fun person to be around and I had a blast with you each time we went to the city. :) Your English is awesome and your Russian is... very fast! It was quite fun to sit back and hear you and Oksana talk in Russian at such speeds. :) The ballet was amazing, but the hot chocolate, needed a little more hot and a little less... yeah. Anyway, if you ever come back to the states, be sure to stop by Ohio and visit! Thanks for the ping pong game and all the fun times in downtown Novosibirsk!

Sergey A.

NOO ZAA SERGEY!! Dude, nobody knows what this means... even your Russian compadres? I will use it for the rest of my life though. :) I had a blast with you at the sports bar. You sure know how to have a good time. :) That B52 was great especially after chasing it with a Captain Morgans! I'm anxious to take the Russian Standard Vodka back home and share it with the DD crew... Yeah you heard me DD Crew, I got some real Russian Standard Vodka headed your way, compliments of Mr. Abakumov. Sergey, hurry back to the states if I don't hurry back to Russia and thanks for the fun night with all that (hicc..) alcohol. :)

Igori

You are a "@#!$#@* FUN" dude! I had a great time with you at the bar and the pool hall. I'll always have this 10 ruble buck with all the signatures on it. Thanks for believing in me on the billiard table, for I'm sure it had something to do with my success. It was either that or the 27 beers you guys fed me. :) Either way, I enjoyed your rather drunken English and all your "bala-bol-ness". :) ANDREY TOLD ME TO WRITE IT!!!! Thanks for showing me a good time!... "Friend" :)

Andrey T.

I will never have a problem saying your name again. I think I said your name a total of 124 times and each time I know I had it right. :) It was great to get to know you. You have great English skills and I love the fact that you are so serious and knowledgeable about the products that you support. You're a great guy to have on our team! The ride from the bar to the billiard hall was a lot of fun because we got to pick on... you know who (the last guy I just wrote about). Hope that we can see each other again. You're a fun guy to hang out with... Adrrrey... Tsetsoho... :) That's an even 125.

Sergey R.

Again, nothing but good times with you too. It was great to put a face with a name. I was amazed at how much Heineken you ordered before we even got started on our first bottle; I knew right away that I was in for a long night. It was great to play you in a game of billiards and I also thought that it was very generous that you let me win also. :) Seeing you at the trade center that day was pretty cool too... That's the first time I'd seen anybody out in public "by chance" here in Novosibirsk. I felt like I was a local for a split second. The next time I drink Heineken, I'll consider ordering 3 more just for backup. It works rather well; no waiting. :)

Eugene & Sophia

You two are "tough" together. I enjoyed hanging out with you both in the bar that night. It was nice that everyone spoke English on my behalf. Eugene, even though you didn't say much at first, I knew you were just waiting for the right time to crack. Finally at the billiard hall, you did and I got to talk to you a bit before the night ended. You're a very fun guy to hang out with. Sophia, it was very nice to talk to you as well, you have very good English skills and I was pleasantly surprised when I first met you and you jammed out some English like it's your native language. Sorry for blinding you guys in this picture, but it made for a great photo of you two. :)

Sergey P.

It is because of you and only because of you that I had internet at the office. My super encrypted password will never be hacked and I'm sure you'll never be able to remember it when I go. :) In my next band I'm going to rewrite "Pinball Wizard" to "Pingpong Wizard" and dedicate it to you. I've never been so afraid of a tiny ball in my life. I wish I had known you better when you visited the states; all the guys said you were a lot of fun and I see that now. :)

Anna M.

Thank you for a great time at the Nee-Kooda bar that night. I still have your autographed drawing of a "chiburashka" in my planner, so it goes everywhere I go. I plan to pin it on my tac-board at work when I decide to go back. It was so fun for me to walk around the office and guess where I was going to see you and Anna A. hanging out together. "The Anna's". Take care of your family and tell your husband that I said thank you for letting you hang out with me, it made for a memorable night! Lastly, don't get so mad at yourself for not knowing English. :) I don't know Russian, but it's amazing, what hand gestures and sound effects can do. :D

Sergey T.

"Que pasa eh casa" or whatever the hell Scott says to you. You got some crazy Wii Tennis skills my man; I'm glad I was only ever to play against you one time. Your serve is all kinds of nasty. :) It was nice seeing you each day, cause you were always smiling. Maybe you were putting Vodka in that coffee cup, I don't know, but it was nice to see. Your Mexican plate comment was hilarious. I think it was even more funny when the joke was turned around on me... Neighbor. ;)

Daniel

It was nice to meet you. I don't know how you work in that break room with Scott. It's like a coffee shop; people in, people out, doorbell!! Anyway, more power to ya. I can't wait to see you play Wii Tennis. From all the times that I've been in there playing and you just sit there and watch all the secret moves. Of course, there are some other "regulars" that you probably see more than me. When it's your chance, you're gonna be the DataWorks man to beat!

Alex M.

I didn't really get to know you until the last few days, but realized very quickly that your a lot of fun to hang out with. Scott says you can run like the wind... but that's probably because Scott is slow as molasses. Either way, it would have been nice to have known you better earlier. Be sure to share the O Sweet Static bonus tracks with everybody, or don't. You could maybe sell them online for some big bucks, then pay me royalties... just send the check in the mail, that'll be fine. Thanks for turning me onto that iPod utility; I'll be downloading that for sure! Wow, that banya was HOT! You had a pretty cool move jumping into the barrel though; BONZAI!! Keep in touch and be sure to practice those paradiddles. :)

Leonid

It was nice to meet you after months and months of emails. You're a very nice guy and I wish we would have had a chance to hang out while I was over here, outside of the office of course. The only times we did meet, we were talking business. See you in cyberspace my friend!

Roman S.
I know he doesn't work here anymore, but I thought about him while I was over here. He was at our company Christmas party two years ago and kicked my butt in arm wrestling. Just wait 'til I see him again. Roman, if you are reading this... "Here's a toast to you!!" :)

To the rest of the DataWorks crew:
I'm sure I crossed paths with you at the office during my visit here, but unfortunately I never got to really meet you or spend time with you. Maybe next time. :)

To my 4 girls:
I'M COMING HOME!! :D

Novosibirsk - Day 8

The word of the day is Городок (aka: Gorodok). It's been my favorite hang out so far here in Novosibisk. Semyon and I ate there last night, we met there again this morning and I just got back from there 20 minutes ago.

I woke rather early this morning and got a few things done around the flat before heading out the door. I got to the Городок at 9:20 and decided to go in and order my coffee while I wait for Semyon. About 10 minutes later, I recieved a call from some groggy Russian dude (aka: Semyon (pictured on the left)) and he said he was running a bit late. I said "no problem doood", and I went ahead and placed our orders. Of course, I ordered my usual omelet and went ahead and ordered him his usual breakfast too (fried eggs). This way, by the time he got here, his food would be ready to eat and his coffee would be waiting on him. It worked out quite nicely actually. He showed up, we ate, then we began our trek to the office.

Before leaving the flat, I made sure I had everything for the day, including my camera. I wanted to take some pictures on our walk so that I could upload them to my picasa web when I got back home. However, I failed to check my battery and as it turned out, I would be lugging around a bulky dead camera all day today. I think when I uploaded my video for yesterdays' post, I never turned off my camera, so it just sat out all night until the battery drained out of it. Live and learn.

We had a great walk to work this morning and we talked about a lot of stuff. I explained to him that when I speak to him, I actually slow down my words and articulate the pronunciation so that I don't have to repeat myself and overwhelm him with my shortened speed talk. He indicated that he would rather I speak normally to him (as if I were talking to Scott or something) and that he would still be able to understand me. This is fine with me of course, so I switched back to "Americanized" talking and sure enough, he did a pretty good job. I might try ta screw ithim tomorra tho, an see just how good e really is. ;)

When I got to work, I was able to break out my cool "old man" slippers and war them around the office. The last couple of days, I've been wearing only my new Russian shoes to the office, but they make my feet pretty uncomfortable because they are so warm. Yesterday I actually took them off and was able to turn a few heads in just my socks. In the states, I do this a lot too; and of course in the summer time, it's bare feet most days. I've actually interviewed people in bare feet a few times and I think this usually leaves a lasting impression on how chill our company really is (as if the pool table and basketball hoop didn't say enough). Nevertheless, my slippers were a very good addition to my backpack this morning, as I stayed comfortable and my socks stayed white today.

For lunch, I played a couple of games of Wii Boxing. I found that Wii Boxing is the best game of Wii Sports so far. Granted I still haven't done Golf, Bowling, or... (I think there is one other), but the boxing is very cool. I found myself talking smack to the projector a few times as I threw punches and dodged left and right. This Wii is a great console, especially for a computer company, to have in the break room. I found that after about 3 games (3 rounds each), I was actually moving around quite a bit throwing hooks, jabs, upper cuts, and swaying side to side. As of today, I think boxing is my favorite Wii sport; the others are fun, but this one gets my vote. Plus it's boxing, and... well... 1 word: Rocky. Just ask my Jennifer about my Rocky "fan-hood". :)

After work, I decided to walk back home. It's a 2.5 mile trek and I had a nice brisk walk in the cold. My mustache freezes about 2 minutes after getting outside, and the longer I'm outside, the more ice builds up on it. When I got home from work, my entire upper lip was a big blob of ice. I'll have to take a picture sometime before I come in the flat to show you how silly I look. At first I felt weird walking around the city with a icestache, but realized that most everybody with mustache in Novosibirsk probably has the same problem. It's pretty weird feeling, and it actually thaws out pretty quickly once I get inside.

As soon as I walked in the door, I noticed that it was 6:30pm, which meant it was 7:30am in Newark. This is about the time that Lizzie and Jazzy are eating breakfast. I told Jennifer that I probably wouldn't chat with her today because I was going to do something with Scott and Oksana this evening. However, as I turned out, I was home during our "normal" chat time, so I decided to log in to Skype and see if they were online. At first they weren't, but then after catching up on a few blogs in my blog reader, I got the call and there they were. :) We only talked for about 5 minutes or so, but it was great. I guess Ohio weather got nutty last night (high winds, freezing temperatures, etc...) and people were loosing power and all that good stuff.

After the Skype call, I thought it would be a good idea to start filling out some of my post cards before Scott and Oksana called. I got these post cards at the trade center the other day and I was rather surprised to see that all of them are actually post cards of summer time. I would think that in a place where snow is abundant 75% of the year, you would expect to see (at least 1) post card with snow, but this is not the case. Regardless, they are beautiful post cards. I've heard from numerous people that it is beautiful here when the snow goes away, and I totally believe it! The satellite images in Google Maps and Google Earth, show that the trees consume approximately 90% of the overall terrain and I can only imagine what it looks like from the ground. Plus I bet it is very refreshing to breath in such clean air. Perhaps one day I'll be able to come back during their 3 months of summer. Until then I just have to take peoples word for it and see pictures... and post cards.

Scott called after I got about 2 post cards done and asked if I wanted to eat at the Городок... hell yeah! I love this place! Guess what I ordered? Go ahead... If you said Caesar Salad, then you are right! Oksana ordered me a very popular hot wine drink, but I didn't find it to be as refreshing as it looked. I drank about half of it and thanked her for the suggestion, but I wasn't able to finish it and enjoyed some green tea instead. We had a very good time and I really enjoyed their company. I think it is safe to say that they too are a very "cute couple". I think that they, along with Konstantin and Iris, and Jennifer and I all need to get together and just sit around and be "cute" somewhere. I'm noticing that I'm using this word a lot and I don't think that it's socially acceptable for a guy (like myself) to be using it so much... The next time I decide to say [said word], I'll say "tough" instead. That sounds more... yeah, tough. :)

When we finished dinner, I walked back home and here I am getting ready to do a bit of pc work before going to bed. I have to meet Semyon at... you guessed it, the Городок in about 10 hours. Before I leave Novosibirsk, they are going to know me as the Регулярные Иностранец (look it up).

Russian Lingo
For todays' lesson, let's break down some of the words that you've seen on my posts.

1.) The first word will be (of course): Городок

• The first letter is Г which is actually equivalent to our "G".
• The second, fourth, and sixth letters are all "o"'s and they sound just like Englishki "o"'s.
• The third letter is "р" which is equivalent to our "R".
• The fifth letter is "д" which is equivalent to our "D".
• Lastly, the seventh letter is "к" which is the same: "K".

So there you have it: Gorodok

2.) The second word is: Новосибирск

• The first letter is "Н" which is the same as our "N"
• The second and fourth letters are more "o"'s (which we discussed above).
• The third letter is "в" which is equivalent to our "V"
• The fifth letter is "с" which is the same as our "S"
• The sixth and eighth letters are "и", which are similar to our "e" or "i" (in this case "i").
• The seventh letter is "б" which looks (a bit) and sounds just like our "B"
• The rest of the letters you've seen already. :) "р" = "R" / "с" = "S" / "к" = "K"

And there you have it: Novosibirsk

3.) Lastly: Лукас

• The first letter is "Л", which is the same our our "L"
• The second letter is "у", which makes a "oo" sound (like 'noodle').
• The third letter is "к" which (still) sounds like our "K"
• The fourth letter is "а", which sounds just like our "A"
• And the fifth letter is "с" which (still) sounds like our "S"

Viola: Lucas

Ok, now for a pop quiz:

What does this say?

• Гуд Водка Глас

See??? Before you started reading this post, you would have never known how to pronounce that!

Tune in tomorrow, for I'm going to try to take a run sometime and maybe do some solo-shopping at the trade center. I may touch a bit on the "hot water" situation over here. Ouch!...