Personal

Yes, the rumors are true. As anyone who follows me on twitter knows following my tweet, I will be leaving VMware.

The experience has been incredible, and being with VMware was the end of a journey started about 10 years ago when I first joined Covalent. Following some "interesting" events within that company, Covalent emerged as a premier FOSS-related business and as CTO I was able to continue working with Mark and Ryan to grow the company. We were so successful that SpringSource took notice of our products, or business plan and our customer base and decided they wanted in, and so they bought the company. At SpringSource I was, in addition to other tasks, the tech lead and developer for a project that became one of the most significant (if not the most significant) products for the company. And after around 2 years, SpringSource was so successful that VMware took notice and bought us.

Now after a year, it is time to move on.

I'm ready for new challenges and new opportunities. I'm looking for a place that can benefit from my talents, experience and expertise as much as Covalent/SpringSource/VMware has.

I'm ready to make a difference and an impact... Know of any places that might be interested? Let me know.

Thanks.

A number of very cool conferences are coming up, 2 of which I'll be attending and speaking at.

The 1st is SpringOne, which is kinda unique this year in which they have a SysAdmin/WebOps related track.

The 2nd is ApacheCon US which promises to be one of the most excellent ApacheCons in the last ten years. I'm doing a 2 day training (with Rich Bowen), which is our world-famous Apache HTTPD Nuts to Bolts guide. I'm also doing a session on the Apache API, with a focus on module development. And, of course, the State Of The Feather and Sponsorship talks.

What's also nice is that Eileen will be coming out for ACUS09 as well, and we're planning on staying in CA for an extra few days and enjoying wine country.

If this election indicates anything, it's that people will vote for whoever they want to, no matter what and no matter how much rationalization is required.

Ignore inconvenient facts; explain away issues; describe as "immaterial" or "besides the point" anything that would indicate that your choice isn't the best one.

In other words, make your choice and then see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil...

I've had facial hair (a beard and mustache, henceforth just called "a beard") for a long time. A real long time. Something like 30 years.

I first started growing it in my senior year of high school. Facial hair of any kind was forbidden at Archbishop Curley (my school), but I was able to convince my dermatologist to write a note excusing me from this rule, due to "skin irritation when shaving". There was some truth to that. But the real truth was, I wanted to grow a beard. The note worked.

It also worked when I got a new college job, which also did not allow facial hair. I never understood stupid rules like that so, in addition to simply wanting to have a beard, I also felt like a rebel, and bucking the system.

I wanted a beard because, well, I thought (and still do) that I looked better with one. It gave my face that quality called "character." Back then, any sort of facial hair was rare, mostly mustaches if anything, so it made me feel somewhat unique but also helped define my jawline, which I always felt was too weak.

Over the last 30 years, I've only shaved it off once. Maybe 15-18 years ago Eileen decided she really wanted to see what I looked like without one. So I shaved it off (such is love!). She liked it. I hated it. I grew it back (love has its limits after all!). Since then I've switched between full beards and goatees (presently I'm in full-beard mode). Sometimes I let it go a little longer, and sometimes I keep it very trimmed, almost like stubble. This reminds me of another good reason for beards: you can skip shaving for a day or so and it still looks OK. Even so, I've never been able to have it fill in as much as I'd like. For example, my cheeks don't fill in much, so I tend to keep my "full beard" focused on around the jawline and chin.

When I started going gray (I didn't go gray early, but I did go sooner than I expected... I guess I started in my mid 30s), it took awhile for my beard to catch up. I used to be a light brown (back in the day, it was called "dirty blonde"... I can't recall the last time I heard that phrase, but it used to be a common description), but now am mostly gray, both on top as well as my beard. I don't mind; it gives my face character.

For most men my age, a rite of passage when young was listening to "Class Clown". Even more so that sneaking a peek at a Playboy or Penthouse, a George Carlin LP signified your transition from being "a kid".

Thanks George! We'll miss you.

One of the many very cool things about being involved in Open Source is that you get to meet and become close to many other people who share a very similar world view with yourself regarding volunteerism. Heck, when you think about it, most of the really successful Open Source projects are based on people sharing their time, energy and talents to create code that is then used by numerous entities to impact the world. If that's not a core concept of volunteerism, I don't know what is. I've known, and been humbled by, people who have expanded their involvement in Open Source to other more "traditional" concepts of volunteering, transplanting themselves (and their families) to remote locations to improve literacy, reduce hunger, or increase the usage of technology to improve living conditions.

There is one non-profit which is especially near and dear to my heart: The Maryland State Boychoir. The MSB offers young men the opportunities to grow in their musical ability, but, even more importantly, the opportunity to understand and appreciate the arts (via the boychoir choral tradition) and grow in self-confidence. We have boys and young men from pretty much every social, religious, racial and economic background, and yet despite these "differences", they grow as a team, as a group, as a choir. They create life-long friendships. So more so than the musical training, these incredible young men learn that it's OK to be musical or "artistic" and that you are still masculine, that being "a man" is not just sports (although most of our boys are very successful there as well), and that cultural "differences" aren't divisive at all.

I volunteer quite a bit of my time to the MSB; I use vacation time to attend and proctor camps and tours, I volunteer at events and serve as proctor of the Concert Choir and on the board of the MSB, and help out financially. If you are located in the Maryland region, I encourage you to get to know the MSB and attend a concert. And with the economy the way it is, it is getting harder to find people willing and able to financially help out as well. If you can, then that would certainly be most appreciated!

But even if the MSB isn't your cup of tea, I encourage to find something to volunteer for. It makes a big difference, not only in your life, but also in lives of the people you touch.

In a little over a week I'll be traveling to Amsterdam to attend ApacheCon EU 2008. I'll be doing 2 sessions but unlike other conferences, none of them will be technical in nature.

I was unable to attend last year's conference, so this will be my first time in Amsterdam. Unfortunately, due to other commitments, I won't be able to stay very long, flying in on Monday and then back out on Friday. That's a lot of traveling for just a few days, but it's well worth it.

As a comic-book fanboy, let me just say 2 things:

1: Marvel, you have screwed up Spider-Man for the last time. I'm canceling my subscription.

2: I am SO looking forward to The Dark Knight, Iron Man and The Incredible Hulk.

Sir Arthur C. Clarke has passed away

Even if all he had ever done was "2001: A Space Odyssey" then his reputation would have been well deserved. But in addition to being an exceptional writer, he was also a true engineer and visionary. He was also, by all accounts, a humble, nice man as well. A number of ASF friends and associates, while attending the Sri Lanka Open Source conference a few years ago, were actually lucky enough to meet Sir Arthur, something that I am still jealous of to this day.

He is one of my favorite authors, someone who early on sealed my fate as a SciFi addict. Although I'm not a collector of books, I do enjoy owning them (it's just the difficulty of finding storage space for all of them), and I most likely have more ACC books than any others. One of my prized possessions is a signed copy of Sir Arthur's "The Lost Worlds of 2001".

I shall miss his talent.

In my spare time (yeah, right!) I enjoy using my Macs to play around with various forms of digital media. I've spent time moving pretty much all of our home videos to iMovie, and using Lightroom to organize my digital pictures. I've created DVDs for people and slideshows and I have a great time doing it.

But lately I've also gotten quite involved with audio. Partly it's due to my and my sons involvement in the Maryland State Boychoir, and also due to my middle son Tim being in a few "bands". But also it's due to the Mac making it all so easy, and the fact that you can do great things with a very, very small budget. Behringer in particular has professional equipment at really affordable prices, especially their Podcast Studio Bundle.

It really is quite amazing that there are so many opportunities to be creative, and scratch that gotta-make-something itch, whether it's code or a CD or a DVD. And, as always, I love my Mac.

I weep for a populace that is so eager and hungry for change, that experience and substance are secondary to simple, constant pronouncements. Certainly with the country in the shape that it is, both domestically as well as internationally, we need someone who can be President, not just talk it.

BTW: I am a Libertarian, but here in Maryland you can't vote in primaries unless you are registered under one of the 2 main parties, so I am registered as a Republican. But neither party is where my allegiance is.

It's hard to believe that 2007 is just about over... My hope was to take a nice, relaxing, offline break during the holidays, but for one reason and another, it all didn't work out as expected (mostly in the "relaxing", as in stress-free, and "offline" aspects). But then again, I did kinda expect that as well. So the expectation of not achieving the expectation was expected, if you follow me...

There was one thing I wanted to do that I did find time to do, and that was to better organize all my digital photos (a relatively small number but growing quite quickly), as well as digitize all our family videos into iMovie. Next on the agenda is scanning in a huge slew of old slides that we have hanging around, but that will likely proceed on an as-needed basis. One of our goals for the new year is to really add lots more photos around the house, which is nice because it not only make the house even more of a home, but it gives me the excuse to indulge in 2 of my hobbies: woodworking (for frames and shelves) and digital media (the latter being relatively new). As the kids get older, having more and more "on display" pictures around the house seems almost required. This also gives me the chance to lay around with Lightroom a lot more.

But even with not being able to pull away from other things as completely as I would have liked, it's been a nice holiday. We had time to share with friends and family and had a really perfect Christmas day... and that's something to be very thankful about.

So earlier today we were setting up our nativity scene. It's a special one to us, because I actually purchased it from a small little shop in Bethlehem (the Bethlehem... you know, the one in the Middle East) back when I was US CTO for Zend. Anyway, we're setting it up when Andrew, our youngest (he's 9) says, "Hey. How come Baby Jesus has a full head of hair?"

I had no idea how to respond... But Andrew was right. He does.

Has it really been a whole 'nuther year already?

Sure has. Eileen and I have been married for 21 years now. We have a son in college, one in high school and one in elementary school. And it still feels like only yesterday when we exchanged our vows. How can time fly by so quickly when so much has happened during that span of years...?

It was just early this morning that I found out that Greg Stein was mugged and seriously injured last Friday. Greg's is personally a good friend, but also one of those rare people who have shaped the open source community in numerous ways. His contributions are many and varied, from being Director and previous Chairman of the ASF, to the driving force behind several open source (and related) technologies, like WebDAV, APR, Subversion, Python, etc... Greg is home now but, as he says, "I'm alive, but not feeling well at all".

The truly sad and shocking thing is that Greg was already on crutches before the attack, making this recovery even harder... I'm sure had Greg not been previously injured, the muggers would have been whomped so badly that they would have needed to crawl back to the gutter they came from.

Kevin Burton has started a fund to help Greg out, a fund fully authorized by Greg. It's time for the community to rally together; Let's all help Greg out, someone who truly, truly deserves it.

Donate Now to the Greg Stein Fund

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