“Hi there Nicholas, it’s REDACTED here from REDACTED. I’m calling about your recent switch of electricity provider to Powershop, and I was just wondering if you had a few minutes to run through your reasons for changing providers.”

Well hello! We swapped to Powershop for a few reasons - it’s cheaper, it’s easier for us, and I also have a small stake in a couple of the brands running on the Powershop marketplace - FlowerPower and GreenPower.

“Okay… well, are you aware that REDACTED includes GST on their per unit prices on their bills? And let me check your current per unit price <short pause> your current per unit price is about 19c/unit. We also charge a small daily use charge of 94c”

I was looking at my bill last night, and I’m not sure whether that price included GST or not. But I don’t think it did, there was a GST addition right at the bottom. Also, the average house uses 8000 units of power per year, right? So that works out to <short pause> just over 22 units per day. Which means my per unit price, assuming GST isn’t included, is a little over 22c per unit.

“Okaaaaay….”

I’m looking at Powershop now, and FlowerPower are offering me 18.18c/unit. That’s a lot cheaper.

“That is quite cheap. Are you sure that includes GST?”

Well, looking at my invoices on Powershop now, it looks like it is. Pretty cheap, huh?

“Yep, that is. I will have to check that one out for myself! Ha, I shouldn’t say that! Anyway, are you aware that the electricity Powershop sells Electricity from the National Grid, that’s been all mixed up, whereas REDACTED sells only power from renewable sources”

That is interesting… Well, on Powershop there is a company called GreenPower who will buy Carbon Credits (Actually - we’ll plant trees) to offset carbon generated by providing me power. Cool huh?

“Ummm yeah that does sound cool…”

Besides, I live in a flatting situation, so Powershop is a godsend. We can pre-pay for our power, so that we can work out what each person owes and we’re never left in the lurch if someone leaves unexpectedly.

“Wow! I’ve just had a flatmate leave myself, and now we’re stuck paying their power bill… I’ll have to check that out! Anyway, ummm, haha. If you have any more question, just uh, call us and we’ll let you know”

I sure will. And make sure you check out Powershop!

Yes, this actually happened.

Yes, it will be better for them.

People have different reactions to different words. “Smash Box” cosmetics must’ve seemed like a great idea to a marketing manager somewhere (”We’ve got to convey being out of the box and different and new. Why don’t we smash the box! It’s brilliant”). But to someone more, well, frankly, puerile, it takes on an entirely different meaning. (Warning: Urban Dictionary, may or may not be safe for work, depending on how draconian your workplace is about cursewords)

“Sexy” is another interesting case. Personally I use it to describe anything that is particularly nice or attractive, and along with “Epic”, it forms James‘ entire repertoire of adjectives. However, there are a few family members who look at me sideways when I describe a piece of computer equipment in this manner, maintaining that it should only be pulled into service when describing the attractiveness of a potential mate.

One of our customers recently sent me an instant message:

btw… I reset the other day my password for my account and it emailed me the following pw “asshole2342″… quite funny

(Alain, it should be noted, is particularly awesome)

The source of the trouble was the sexy_temp_passwords Rails plugin I had installed. Its word list included, among other things, “penis” and “virgin”.

Now, you can giggle, but some people might not. We thought it safer to replace the word list with a list from a less controversial source.

Watch your wordlists carefully folks. And check Urban Dictionary before you name your company.

Like designers, if you give a programmer a problem with parameters, they’ll apply every bit of genius they have to solve it in the best possible way. If you tell them how to do it, you’ll suffer the wrath of an angry God.

I can bear testament to the veracity of this. There was a previous workplace (will shall, of course, remain un-named) where I was often told by a non-programmer “that should be really easy. Surely it’s just a SQL query”.

Nothing makes me madder. Especially when the “offender” has no clue what they are talking about, and are simply using the only piece of jargon they happen to have picked up. My typical response was similarly useful - to turn my laptop around, fold my arms and say “Fine. If you know so much, you write it”.

Hmm. Perhaps the word “God” in that quote should be replaced with “petulant child”.

Zed Shaw reminds me of House.

He acts like an asshole most of the time, but he’s smart and right too often for anyone to do anything about it. And he gave an awesome talk at CUSEC - about becoming a corporate programmer and not losing your soul. It is so freaking cool that they have speakers of this calibre talking to students. Should’ve gone to school in Canada.

“Corporate” programmers have been getting a lot of stick in my orbit lately (much to the amusement of the closest thing to a corporate programmer I know). I don’t think I’ll be in the position to go and work for a “big” company anytime soon - I’m enjoying being my own boss way too much. But, if I was looking, I know where I’d be going. Look at this office!

I’ve never written code for any company with more than about 7 employees. I’m definitely missing out on some valuable learning and experience working with smart people in big teams. But everybody complains about it so much!

Someone (who shall remain nameless to protect the innocent) who works at the State Services Commission (government) just came on my IM and said: “It’s POETS day!”.

Piss Off Early, Tomorrow’s Saturday.

I couldn’t even go to work if I felt like that. Why bother doing something you hate?

But hey, I’m a freshly-minted University graduate with no family to feed or mortgage to pay. Make the most of it while it lasts, I guess.

(Photo from the Fog Creek Software Office Tour)

Every so often, I’ll write a funky little control in Javascript. Usually it’s because a customer has asked for it, or because I think it would be cool for them to have. Every so often it’s just to see if I can.
I thought I should release a few of the latter category, as a collection of useful snippets for anyone to use and build upon. And so, I present to you, Show Off!

Show Off! on Github

I’m not generally a fan of big Javascript UI control libraries. I prefer to pick and choose, and not add extra dependencies into my project (aside from Prototype, of course). So Show Off! will be an independent collection, from which you can pick and choose whatever takes your fancy.

Currently, there’s just a fairly basic iTunes-style search box. I’m looking for suggestions for more though. What would you find useful? What have you seen elsewhere but didn’t have the time to implement?