Goodbye HMV?

I can quite easily accept that I’m probably behind the curve on this one, especially considering the well publicised financial troubles they’ve been in recently (and are indeed still trying to pull themselves out of), but I now have what I consider to be first hand experience of HMV desperately trying to hang on to their business.

Over the last several years I’ve been sad to see several small independent music chains go to the wall, and when Virgin accepted a management buy-out to the Zavvi consortium I remember seeing an interview which plainly said "If Virgin is getting out of this business the alarm bells should be ringing for everyone else", but now I really do think that this time next year HMV will be no more.

Why?

At lunch yesterday I wandered into the Canary Wharf branch of HMV. Last week 1 of the eight aisles was dedicated to technology (headphones, iDevices and docking stations mainly). Today that number has risen to 3, selling various brands of tablets and more of the same old guff as before. What’s worse is that it looks like the Dixons tablet display.

So why will you buy your tablet from HMV?

Well, if you’re like me you won’t, you’ll go in, look at a few models, then go online and save yourself £50.

Cheap music and films at up to £15 is one thing, that’s an impulse buy. Dare I say even a crappy Android tablet for £99 is not?

I think this is a wrong move for HMV, but with the pressure of the Internet and supermarket eating away at the core business they are desperate.

This move is just making a bad situation worse though.

The fate of Virgin/Zavvi, Tower Records and Woolworth’s awaits. Follow the light.

What a shame.

So I’m one of the 30 million who’ve moved…

…or 30,ooo.

That’s probably closer to the truth.

If you don’t know what I’m on about, don’t worry.

Testing Times

Looks like this is going to be one of those rare blog entries that will live in both my tech and personal blog since I don’t know where to put it. I guess that’s good. Anyway:
Well, it’s week number four in my new job. i have a desk, a machine and I’m just about set up with my development environment. There’s a few things I’ve not been briefed on or covered yet, some of them quite basic (like how about giving me a Jira account, that may be useful soon, or on what branch do these guys do all their development, surely not main_latest all the time?!!)
So what have I achieved so far?
Well, not a lot yet, and it’s starting to bother me. I’ve so far been given a single 2 part task with the aim of speeding up the build tests:

• Go through a bunch of JUnit tests and remove anything not testing actual business logic (so for exampe if its a persist or retrieve operation, take it out).
• Investigate getting the JUnit tests to run in parallel.

That’s not so bad for a first task on an unfamiliar system.
So I spent just under a day looking at a select bunch of JUnit test code trying to decipher what was and wasn’t a business logic test. Sounds quite easy, but since a lot of methods are masking non-business logic, it’s very easy to leave them in. Similarly, what looks like a persist operation may be an actual calculation of one variety of another. Then you have the methods that call both responsibilities, or rely on persisted data to pass. It’s not as easy as it first looked, especially on an application with which you are not familiar.
The upshot of all this? I came to the conclusion that there probably wasn’t any business logic being tested in the set of tests I was looking at. I was, as you might imagine, uneasy with this deduction, it felt wrong and I couldn’t be 100% sure my findings were correct, however when I returned to my "mentor" for this task he didn’t seem to surprised and commented "I’ve skimmed over this myself and I didn’t see anything leap out either."
Oh thanks.
Actually one thing that did amuse me, I had flagged up one test as possibly being business logic, however as my mentor was looking into this I noticed a section of code that clearly suggested otherwise, so at least I beat him to that one.
With that task out of the way I started looking at making the JUnit tests run in parallel. A little research on the web revealed what was needed (including a version of Spring that’s still in RC status). Undeterred I created a small project with a bunch tests to try this stuff out, and sure enough it worked as I expected (albiet without a hint of Spring in sight, unlike the real project). So how did it go once I started applying this new found knowledge to actual project… well I’ve been on it a week now and I’ll be sure to let you know what I find when I finish (if you ask nicely).
I’ve been hit by numerous issues with my development environment, and on the odd occasion when things do work as expected, a run can take up to 26 minutes (usually closer to 19 for a full run – at least for what I’m covering). The worst thing is I’m only making changes to a handful of POM.xml files and so far the results show no avantage at all. At this rate my findinge will be: "Hey, I’ve spent over a week and can’t get any speed increase". That hardly makes me fell very good and I don’t actually feel I’ve achieved anything yet. Especially when for the most part my day consists of the following routine:

1. Start machine. Spend 1 to 2 hours getting the build to work properly.
2. Make a small, well trodden modification to all 4 instances of a command in 3 pom files. (5 mins max, probably closer to 2 mins)
3. Fire off build and wait to complete (up to 19 minutes if it completes)
4. Investigate any errors or note timings (2 to 10 mins).
5. Repeat from step 2 until time to go to lunch or home.

I can’t help feeling this should have been finished some time ago. I know deep-down proving something doesn’t work is as important as proving it does, but this seems to be dragging now. it feels like my fault, but frankly i don’t know how to make it better, it’s just the nature of this particular beast.
I guess deep down I feel the need to prove myself as the new boy, and with this task I feel like I’m coming up short, rightly or wrongly. Oh well, I guess that could be me worrying too much. Sometimes, that’s just the way it is.

Job Skipping?

Just over a week ago I posted an entry on Facebook revealing how I’m starting a new job shortly. I had a couple of responses along the lines of "not again", so I thought I’d take this opportunity to run through some of my previous employment history to set the record straight from my point of view.

Please note, I can’t give out the full details of some of the circumstances for departure as I’ve signed legal agreements not to do so (needless to say this is because the company wants to keep the details quiet, such as compensation agreements, rather than this being my wish, I’ve got nothing to hide, far from it), and because it would be unprofessional of me to do so.

Lets start at the beginning.

After school I started working for a great guy called Steve Sowerby, whom I have unfortunately lost touch with. He taught me a lot and has shaped my view of this business in more ways than he could ever have imagined, to the extent that I use his approach and attitude as a yard stick against which all my subsequent managers have been measured.

I worked for Steve on and off for the duration of my degree, and for about six months after. I should have possibly continued with him, but at the time he could only afford to pay me part time and I felt the need to move out of home and make my way in the big wide world, so I left for London and my first job with Britannia in Jan 95.

Britannia was where I first started using Borland Delphi, we re-wrote the existing DOS applications for Windows 3.1 and later Windows 95. I was there for about 21 months and generally having a great time working with good people, but after working a few weeks from 8 to just before midnight with lower than market pay, I realised I needed to move, so made my way to ICOS on Carnaby street.

I loved the job at ICOS (mostly), and worked with a great bunch of people on some very interesting projects; I was there for 3 1/2 years. This job only came to an end when we were purchased by a competitor who had no interest in continuing with bespoke development (which is what I worked on). I didn’t much fancy installing CRM systems for a living, so I moved to a contract position at Teletext. Most of the other developers had already gone by this point, leaving only those who already had the CRM role, and some of the managers.

Teletext was a contract. I was there for about 8 months before this came to an end. One reason (the main one from my point of view) for this was the fact that they wanted me to go permanent, but I was unwilling to sign a contract with a three month notice period. To cut a long story short we all got bored of negotiating, Teletext got angry with me, and we went our separate ways. I spent 2 months out of work (but not signing on) before landing a job at UBS Investment bank.

UBS took me on as a Delphi & Database developer with the promise of cross training to Java in Jan 2001. I finally left in April 2006 via redundancy. I can’t say too much about this, but it was something I wanted to happen (and I like to believe my direct managers of the time, a very decent couple of men would give me another role in an instant) as I needed some time off. I had a year out before joining JP Morgan in April 2007.

JP Morgan successfully put me off working in investment banks for a while. I’ll say no more. During the recession JPM purchased Bear Sterns and "integrated" the best of their technology with the "best" of ours. For my particular project theirs was much better than ours, so our project was "slimmed down". I was laid off in April 2009, not the first to go, and certainly not the last (for example, my manager went a couple of weeks later).

So now we come to the present. I started work at Evaluate only a couple of weeks after officially becoming unemployed from JP Morgan in April 2009. So why am I leaving now? It’s a familiar story to what happened at UBS and JP Morgan.

As mentioned above, "UBS took me on as a Delphi & Database developer with the promise of cross training to Java". What transpired was the project manager actually took me on to replace the database developer on the team, with whom he was having many conflicts at that time. To cut a long story short, the project manager got promoted, we had a new PM arrive and I moved into the Java area, but all this took over a year.

With JP Morgan I was taken on as a Java developer with Sybase experience. The actual position consisted of 90% stored procedure programming. Again, it took about another year before I was eventually doing Java development.

This time around I was taken on to help move the current applications into C#. A year later I find myself working entirely in Delphi, the small C# applications that did exist have been (unofficially) abandoned (the code becomes more out of date with the current Delphi applications each day) and I don’t see this situation changing any time soon.

As a result, this time I’ve decided to cut my losses and try again with a new job that promises to provide both Java and C# work. I made it completely clear in the interview why I’m leaving, so if this job does the same I’ll be off again. I don’t want to, I want a job that offers what it promised, if that involves lots of hard work then that’s fine, that’s what you’re paid for (within reason).

Life is too short to be lied to (although I believe sometimes the lies are genuinely believed at the time). As I’m realising, that goes equally well for all areas of life, not just work, but at 36 rapidly approaching 37 I’m at a stage in my life where I can say "Look, I wanted to do my best for you, I tried and YOU let me down".

I don’t expect to be offered opportunities on a plate, they have to be earned, but neither do I expect to be mislead. What I want is a job I can look forward to doing, that offers progression and rewards for hard work. I’m not after an easy life (there are two jobs I could mention where I would have probably got away with doing a couple of hours work each week, but that’s not for me, thanks), just good work, a job of which I can be proud. A job I actually want to do.

Is that too much to ask? I know some will say that any job in the current environment is a good thing, and I agree to an extent, but if you don’t try to advance who looses out other than yourself. The ideal job is out there somewhere.

The question is, will I ever find it?

Nokia Music. How to make awful into terrible…

So you may have read my earlier post how dismayed I am by the DRM lockdown still being applied to music you purchase from Nokia Music (no link there, I don’t want to drive one person to the site).

Now to rub salt into the wound, I received this email from Nokia Music this morning:

Hi *@*.*,

You’ve got some pre-paid credit in your Nokia Music account that’s about to expire. If you don’t use it before 09/04/2010 you’re going to lose it.

Unused pre-paid credit usually expires one year after you bought it. However, you can get an extension of an extra year by contacting Nokia Care.

But why wait? You can use your pre-paid credit to download music up until midnight on the day before 09/04/2010.

Thanks,

The Nokia Music Team

What?

I’ll tell you what, you may take my unused credit, however much that may be (since you don’t bother putting that in your kind email) and shove it up you a**e.

Who do you think you are, Skype?

(BTW: I’d have put cash into Skype if they didn’t do something similar).

Outrageous.

Well done Nokia, not only will I never touch your music service again, I’m actually being turned against your whole brand, which is sad as I actually quite like Symbian.

Nice DVD Trick

Here’s something I’ve just seen on the internets:

To skip past the trailers, FBI warnings and other crap at the start of a DVD just press the Stop button twice, then play.

This should take you straight to the main feature on the disc.

I’m not at home so can’t try this at the moment, but I’d be interested to know it if works.

Of course, the other method is to rip the main files on the DVD to your media center, but that’s a bit harder….

Looking Back

I was just looking back through this blog for an article I posted some time ago, and discovered that I actually started writing here in May 2005. That’s almost 5 years ago, and despite having not been anywhere near as prolific an author as John, it’s interesting to see how much has changed for better and worse in my life over the last five years.

It’s also interesting to see the peaks in posting that occurred during this time depending on what I was up to.

I notice references to a several people who have sadly left us, and several new arrivals, including my own Adam.

I’m happy to see many old friends mentioned again and again, and saddened to realise that a few are now out of touch.

It’s easy to look back and think how times used to be much simpler, but reading between the lines on several things I wrote, and reliving the memories they stir, life really wasn’t much different to now, it just looks that way because the trials were different to those I currently face (at least for the most part, although in some cases it’s just that the players have changed).

I’ve blogged about stuff I wouldn’t bother with now, but I guess that just goes to show your concerns shift gradually over time, which is why you probably don’t notice.

So what to the future?

Well during this time Facebook has arrived on the scene in a big way, so I also guess some of the items I would have written about have ended up on there, not to mention Twitter, but I don’t think I’ll stop writing the (very) occasional article. In actual fact most of my attention in the last few months has been directed to my other geek blog at http://imorital.blogspot.com where I seem to generally write much longer (and probably way more tedious) articles.

Also, whilst it’s been 5 years on here, I was running my own web site for some time before this. Unfortunately all those postings may now be lost in time as the machine they were stored on has died, taking the data with it (including the back-up drive). Whilst I’m sad about this on a personal level, I don’t feel the world has particularly lost anything worthwhile.

So here’s to the next 5 years. Here’s hoping they become more interesting, but in only good ways. Here’s hoping old acquaintances are re-discovered, and the fun times revived, without affecting the good things of now.

And let’s hope I won’t still be apologising for "not blogging for a while" in 5 years time if I’m still around.

Unless I’m up to something far more interesting!