The Eric Wroolie Blog

Overpass Experiences

Moving On . . . Again

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For the past couple of years, I’ve been working a contract for an investment bank.  I finish up in 5 weeks.  It was a nice work with good pay.  The people are great.  I was very comfortable doing it.

I was working for a company that I had worked for before.  This time around, I used some of my experience with offshore development and helped set up the offshore development team.  I helped introduce SVN and we stumbled through collaboration in the enterprise.  It started out being very difficult and challenging, but then got easier and easier as the offshore team became more confident and didn’t really need me around much at all.  It’s bittersweet– I’m proud of how well they are progressing while seeing myself fade more and more into the shadows.  All as it should be.

But it’s time to move on.  More challenges await. 

One of the tough decisions of being a contractor is knowing when to leave for something more challenging.  Every time a contract comes up for renewal, the client has to decide if they want to keep you and you have to decide whether you should stay on.  If money were the only consideration, the choice would be easy–just stick with a job until they stop paying you.  But stay in a place too long and your skills start to wane.  You become a company guy instead of an industry guy. 

The market changes and you have to adjust to it.  If you stay in one place too long, you end up stranded.  This philosophy has worked for me so far.  In technology, as in so much else, diversity it king.

Decked out in the Gear

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In London you see a lot of guys with fold-up bikes.  They’re pretty cool.  Kind of like laptops for bikes I guess.  You can take them anywhere.

But nearly every guy I see with the folding bike is decked out in full cycling gear.  I don’t just mean the helmet (everyone should wear one).  I mean biking shirt, spandex trousers, shoes, etc.  They are obviously on their way to work and they are being healthy.  I have no problem with that.  But if you are going to ride a half a bike, shouldn’t you wear just the basics in clothing?

Before I bought my motorbike, I was looking to buy a scooter instead.  They look small and fun and easy to zip around in.  I’ve rented them in Hawaii and it was really nice to cruise around with the wind in my hair.  But helmets weren’t required there.  It was half a motorcycle, so it didn’t require a full motorcycle safety commitment.  In England there is a helmet law. When I saw that I would have to wear the full garb with a scooter that I would on a bike, I decided to get the full bike.  (I’m really glad I did, by the way.)  I guess I kind of think of fold-up bikes as the pedal equivalent of scooters.  I’ve never ridden one, so I’m in no way an authority.

I guess I’m guilty with this over-dressing when it comes to running.  Back in my early twenties, when I had little money, I can remember looking at special running shirts which removed sweat from your body and dedicated running shorts which fit the contours of your legs and marvelling at how expensive they were.  There was nothing wrong with my ratty-ass cotton t-shirts and shorts.  This high-tech gear didn’t help that much—the important thing was to get out on the road.  I used to snicker at people who wore that stuff and obviously didn’t run very often.  Now, I have a few running shirts and a couple pairs of those shorts.  I head out in the morning looking like an Olympic athlete in training – except for the belly of of course.  I don’t know how much the gear helps me.  It’s more for motivation than anything else.  Sometimes, that one thing that gets me out on the road is the chance to test out my new shorts or see how comfortable my new running shirt is.

Maybe that’s why the portable bikers wear it.  Because it was fun to shop for and it keeps them on their bikes.

Plesk Upgrade messed up Mysql and PHP

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My site was down for a little over a day because I upgraded Plesk to version 9 on my VPS.  It caused the PHP and Mysql adaptor to stop working.  The site gave me this error:

Your PHP installation appears to be missing the MySQL extension which is required by WordPress.

It took me more about an hour Googling this to find out what the issue was.  Plesk modified my php.ini fil while upgrading. 

The guy that helped me the most was Donncha O Caoimh which his blog post on Holy Shmoly: “Cannot load mysql extension. Please check your PHP configuration“.  I’m really glad he posted that.  I’ve never met him, but he really helped me out.

Problem solved in less than an hour.  5 years ago, before the blogging explosion, this problem would have taken me days to resolve (at least!).  Thanks to Donncha.