D'Arcy from Winnipeg

What Makes Online Business Systems a Best Workplace in Canada

2012-05-17T13:35:26-05:00:00

We’re having a shindig at my work today, Online Business Systems, to celebrate making the “Best Workplaces in Canada” list for the 6th consecutive year. This is a big deal for us, as we put a lot of work and effort into ensuring that our workplace is attractive to top talent, offers fantastic professional development opportunities, and provides challenging & meaningful work.

I’ve worked at a lot of technology consulting companies in Winnipeg, and I can honestly say that Online is hands down the best employer I’ve had the privilege of working for. Here are some things we do that make us one of the best workplaces in Canada:

Professional Development for Every Employee

For a company to grow, it’s employees need to grow. While many companies provide occasional professional development and often require employees to take vacation time, Online takes a different view.

Every employee gets a PD budget – approx $3,500 – to spend on courses, conferences, training, etc. This budget gets renewed every year, and while we do have an approval process in place its more to ensure nobody is taking training that is really off base. Also Online provides 5 days of PD time every year. That’s 5 paid days that can be used towards professional development: attending conferences, attending training, taking time off to study for exams, etc.

And I do mean every employee. Whether you’re a billable consultant, a sales professional, or part of the internal administration team, everyone in the company is given the opportunity to further their skills.

Career Mentor Program and Review Process

We believe that developing someone’s career at Online doesn’t just happen at review time but it should be ongoing throughout the year. We have Career Mentors throughout the company who keep in contact with Onliners in their care to ensure they’re engaged, growing, and happy with their employment at Online. Career Mentors are responsible for reviewing feedback for members of their group and perform annual reviews.

The benefit of this – instead of one or two people in HR responsible for everyone we take a “it takes a village” approach, which creates stronger personal/professional relationships and helps us identify/deal with any issues or concerns employees have sooner.

We Foster a Culture of Innovation

At Online we hire great people and give them the freedom to make positive impacts within the company. Ideas can come from anywhere in the company, and are actually encouraged. We’ve set up a program called “Innovation Den”, where Onliners can pitch their idea to our regional management. Ideas that are accepted are given time, budget, resources – whatever was being asked for – to see it come to fruition.

Innovation doesn’t just happen there though, it can happen anywhere and anytime. I noticed we were going to pay for presentation training which I could easily deliver and for a much lower price. I pitched the idea to management and they loved it. An Onliner wanted to put on a Code Retreat, and Online supported it through money for food and prizes.

We want people to be intrepreuners – working within a company but knowing they have the freedom to fully utilize their interests and talents.

We Have Fun

Every company mentions this, and while I won’t suggest we’re an amazing workplace just because we have BBQs, we do have BBQs – and social events, and team recognition parties for hard work, and celebrations for project success, and…you get the idea.

We work hard, we play hard, and we celebrate our accomplishments and success.

We’re Established and Mature

Online has been around for 26 years and employs approximately 260 people across our offices in Portland, Calgary, Edmonton, Winnipeg, Minneapolis, and Toronto. Our clients include major corporations in the telecommunications, oil/energy, health, finance, and agribusiness sectors.

26 years of business brings a very important trait: maturity. As I mentioned, I’ve worked at many different companies and out of those they top out at about 10 years of age. There is a difference between a company 10 years old and 26 years old – maturity of processes, stronger self identity and culture, and greater capabilities in offerings and skills.

We’re continually striving to be better though, and having fantastic people is the key factor in Online’s evolution over the next 26 years.

Interested?

We’re always looking for great people to join our team. While technology is a huge part of our offerings (Microsoft, Java, Oracle, Power Builder, etc.), we’re equally as deep in business management services: project management, business analysis, change management, quality assurance and testing, etc.

We’re actively looking for .NET and Java developers currently, but we’re always interested in talking to great talent no matter what the discipline.

So how do we match up against your current employer? Do we sound like the type of organization you’d like to work at? If you’re interested in learning more about Online, what its like working there, and current opportunities, please get in touch with me:

Email: dlussier at obsglobal.com
Twitter: darcy_lussier
Or contact me through my blog (click the “Contact” link in the menu)

Technorati Tags: Online Business Systems,Winnipeg,Technology,Best Workplaces in Canada

Mother’s Day - To The Forgotten Moms…

2012-05-13T09:53:34-05:00:00

Today is a day to celebrate mother’s everywhere. There will be breakfasts cooked, cards opened, gifts given, brunches and dinners shared. There will be church services where mothers are given flowers from their children and sermons will talk of the blessings mothers are. People who aren’t even related will wish others who are mothers a “Happy Mother’s Day”. And all of this will go on without any consideration or thought to the forgotten mothers in our midst.

For many, mother’s day (and father’s day) isn’t a celebration. It’s a reminder. A reminder of what could have been. I reminder of hope lost, of dreams shattered, of “what if’s”.

***

It’s their first ultrasound. They wait with anticipation to see the little heartbeat on the monitor. Something is wrong though…the doctor furrows his brow. He points to where the fetus is attached, and then delivers words like a sledgehammer to the heart: There’s no heartbeat.

***

She cradles her baby in her arms, singing her a lullaby. There’s a knock on the door. It’s time. She hands her daughter to the social worker along with a bag filled with her toys and clothes. She kisses her daughters forehead and says goodbye, watching the social worker get into her car and drive off into the night. The adoption process had gone well and there was no warning signs. But she knew this was a possibility. 16 days ago her daughter was born, 14 days ago she was brought home, and 2 days ago the birth mother changed her mind and wanted her baby back.

***

The local high school is getting ready for graduation. Fundraisers are being organized, dresses are being ordered, and plans for parties are being made. She hears over coffee with friends how their kids are getting ready to leave high school and embark on the next phase of life at college. She hears them reminisce on various events of the last 4 years and how their kids have grown into fine young adults. They finish coffee, say goodbye, and she drives to the florist. Thirty minutes later she drives to the cemetery, placing the flowers on her son’s grave. 7 years later, it still feels like that first night when she got that horrible phone call.

***

So to those moms out there that don’t have a section at Hallmark devoted to them, to those moms who keep their pain hidden and tolerate Mother’s Day, to those moms that never got to meet their children or did for only a short amount of time, and especially to those moms that don’t feel that today applies to them:

This is your day to recognize the sacrifices you made, emotionally/physically/spiritually, in giving your heart to another human being. This is your day to acknowledge the care, nurturing, and love that you showered on your child, regardless of how long you had with them. That doesn’t make the pain and memories hurt any less, but please know that in the frenzy of Mother’s Day you are not forgotten.

You are a mother. This is your day. Happy Mother’s Day.

A Simple Framework for Creating a Culture of Innovation

2012-04-29T23:37:31-05:00:00

I tweeted at the Sask 3.0 Summit that I’d put up a blog post on how we encourage innovation at my work, Online Business Systems. There was a presentation at the summit which showed a framework for innovation, but seemed quite large for what many organizations really need…especially those that are just starting to encourage their people to come forward with ideas and innovations.

There’s a few things that innovation requires to really thrive within an organization.

Commitment and Openness

There needs to be commitment from the organization itself that they will support their employees innovative ideas. Openness is a key component of this. Some organizations hold that certain people in certain positions in certain departments are the only ones that can come up with ideas. An innovative organization embraces the belief that ideas can come from any employee and everyone should be open to hear and consider what’s being put forward. Nobody will suggest things if they don’t think they have a shot of seeing it become a reality.

Showing commitment to innovation and an openness to hearing ideas are key aspects of creating a culture of innovation

Resources

Whether its time, money, people, or equipment, resources are necessary to ensure that an innovative idea has a chance of becoming a reality. If you’re going to be serious about encouraging innovation you need to be serious about providing necessary resources.

Yup, that’s really it…

Commitment, Openness, and Resources are the three key things you need…well, maybe one other thing: an opportunity for people to express their innovative ideas! At Online we’ve borrowed a format from a popular Canadian TV show, Dragon’s Den. But instead, we call it the Innovation Den and we’re nowhere near as nasty as Kevin O’Leary.

How the Innovation Den Works

Every few months we hold an Innovation Den. Leading up to the day, employees are encouraged to submit their innovation ideas for consideration. Then on the day of the Den, times are arranged for individuals to pitch their idea to our region’s managing Directors. The pitch needs to include:

- What the idea is

- What the benefits are

- What resources are required

Questions are asked, discussions are had, and in the end those ideas selected get what they asked for and the commitment from the company to support them in their endeavour.

This process has worked very well, with some fantastic ideas being brought forward. In the coming weeks we’ll have the output of one of those announced (can’t talk on it right now), but let me give you an example of an idea I put forth.

We were planning on bringing someone in to do presentation training. This training wasn’t free and wasn’t cheap, but was from a respected corporate training company and there was value in offering it to our employees. When I read what would be covered and who the target audience was, I knew that I could put together an even better course for less money than they were charging us just to send attendees to. Not only that, but because it would be developed as part of Online we’d have a repeatable, internal course that could be delivered to all our regions and as often as we wanted to. There was also significant cost savings!

I pitched this idea, outlining the benefits and resources required, and the idea got put through! These are the things that fostering a culture of innovation can yield – employees with great ideas that can impact your organization in ways you might not have even dreamed of emerge with confidence that they’ll be listened to seriously.

This is one very simple model that works well, doesn’t require large amounts of time, and can produce beneficial results quickly. If you have another successful model that you’ve seen, feel free to comment on it below!

Sask 3.0 Summit–Day 2 and Final Thoughts

2012-04-28T14:41:38-05:00:00

Day 2 of the summit was more of the same from Day 1 – which is to say fantastic speakers, insightful presentations, and great discussions. I really enjoyed the afternoon breakout sessions where attendees got together in groups to discuss topics like how to attract and keep talent in Saskatchewan, what the current and coming impacts to industry and economy are, and what needs to happen to nurture the next generation of technology companies. I think the entire Sask 3.0 Summit has been a rallying cry for Saskatchewan to recognize how far they’ve come, where they’re at, and what they need to focus on for the future.

Saskatchewan has always been seen as the butt of jokes in Canada. The “Gap” where the landscape is nothing but flat prairies, and their biggest export was seen as Saskatchewan Roughrider jerseys, wheat, and Pilsner beer. Manitoba has long held an air of superiority to its western neighbour, using the stereotype of simple farm/hillbilly folk in ways such as promoting sports events (The Banjo Bowl) or sell phone services (MTS used them as a punchline in TV commercials). We act like school yard bullies, thinking that we’re much more superior because…because…why? We have the Jets? We have population? We have industry? We have…?

For some time Saskatchewan has been surging ahead beyond Manitoba. Their economy is stronger, backed by various industries and natural resources. They are forward thinking with technology – downtown Regina offers free internet access and they recently adopted Open Data as part of an Open Government initiative. Saskatchewan entered into the New West Partnership with Alberta and BC in 2010 which, according to the announcement (view here), will enable better trade, innovation, and procurement. Their universities have accredited courses on iPhone development and over the last two years there’s been three tech-related conferences that have emerged to rally the province around technology (Prairie Dev Con, Mosoconf, and now Sask 3.0 Summit).

There’s only one thing holding Saskatchewan back from really surging forward – themselves. Being friendly, humble prairie folks seems to bring with it a lack of confidence. One of the topics in the breakout sessions was on how to attract and retain people in Saskatchewan. I think the first thing that needs to change is the attitudes of people who are already there. Saskatchewan should be proud of who they are and what they’ve built and accomplished. They shouldn’t put up with the asinine comments from the rest of Canada, and shouldn’t feel shy about flaunting the amazing things the province offers.

I’m very excited to see Saskatchewan evolve over the next few years and continue to be an example for other parts of Canada. I hope that the information I collected and the ideas that came to me while attending the Sask 3.0 Summit can help at home in Manitoba – and hopefully others are taking notice of the changes happening to our neighbours and why its important for us to surge ahead as well. Because as it stands now, Manitoba is looking like the “gap” between the east and west in Canada.

Sask 3.0 Summit–Moving to Open Government

2012-04-25T07:45:38-05:00:00

More and more we’re hearing about Open Government and its become a buzz word over the last few years. Those two words conjure up varied imagery based on who you talk to, and my own bias was this idea that Open Government simply meant a bunch of data was made available to citizens. What I’ve learnt after day one of the Sask 3.0 Summit is that exposed data is just one trait of Open Government, but its truly a shift in thinking on how to govern. You can’t do morning scrums on a Waterfall project and call yourself Agile no more than exposing data in machine-readable format makes you Open Gov.

The concept of Open Data can’t be discounted as an important part of Open Government, but the data that is exposed is only the end result of internal government changes to embrace transparency. Governments are political entities which work in a public arena where perception is a precious commodity. There’s risk in exposing data. Yes, its the citizens data and yes people really should have a right to it, but the pain in exposing that data isn’t in the technology enabling its sharing – its the philosophical change of the people running our governments that is the biggest barrier to entry.

Open Government is about efficiency as much as accountability. It’s about service to citizens as much as it is transparency to government data. It’s about deeper collaboration and connection with citizens as much as it is enabling self-service and streamlined service offerings.

Gary Dickson, Information and Privacy Commissioner for the Government of Saskatchewan, listed some key factors for moving to Open Government:

Political Leadership – You need people in the government to buy into the concept of Open Government. As I mentioned above, they need to understand the paradigm shift of how to govern that Open Government brings with it.

A Plan – Initiatives like Open Data alone require detailed analysis on privacy and security concerns (as Gary said “You can’t just open the vault.”). But internally you also need a plan for how to communicate and implement the various process changes that Open Government requires.

Dedicated Team to Execute the Plan – Moving to Open Government is not a part time endeavour and its not something that anyone can volunteer for. You need the right people and provide them the required time and resources to effectively manage the change. I’ve worked on many IT projects where new systems were rolled out, and the ones that focussed on the change management aspect – not of the data or systems but of the end users – were the ones more successful. Why? Because a system alone doesn’t address the business processes and functions that must adapt to use it properly. And so it is with Open Gov.

Modern Access to Information Legislation Regime – Canada’s access to information and privacy laws are 30 years old, and do not properly reflect the changes in technology or society since then. Every Open Government needs be lobbying for changes at the federal level which will in turn enable a richer local Open Government experience.

So what’s the benefit of moving to Open Government? Well for one thing, improving services results in happier citizens.
Roda McInnis with the Institute for Citizen-Centred Service, talked about survey results on how Canadians rated their government. She showed a graph on one slide that showed a line wavering around 60 out of 100 for more than a decade.

Let me state that again – For more than a decade, Canadians have been 60% pleased in service levels of their federal government.

When her group broke down the key drivers to citizen satisfaction, they identified these:

Ease of Access

Timeliness

Government Staff

Positive Outcomes

Recent experience with Public Service

And in Canada what was the most important driver across all services? Timeliness! Timeliness had the biggest impact, and speaks to how Canadians expect our governments to react similarly to businesses in the private sector when it comes to services.

Open Data plays well into this. Aneesh Chopra, former CTO for President Obama, spoke about how they took a NetFlix approach to facilitate finding information on government sites. Instead of requiring citizens to go to the government’s website to find data, access to the data was exposed and multiple vendors wrote applications – the idea being that the more applications are out there using your data the better. The specific data for this required some level of authentication, and oAuth was utilized for it – so Open Data is not just about the freely available, its also about enabling access to improve service.

On the free side of Open Data governments get the benefits of their citizens knowledge and expertise to help solve problems they may not have known existed. David Eaves shared how one journalist discovered that top charitable organizations according to government records were actually tax evasion schemes and alerted the Canada Revenue Agency. Now while this is fantastic, remember I mentioned the change in philosophy that needs to happen. On the surface the CRA should have been able to detect this and it took a citizen to point it out – that’s not good traditional government where perception is king. It is fantastic Open Government, where collaboration and cooperation between governments and citizens rules.

Open Government can be scary to those holding on to the traditional government model. It breaks down the walls of silos and mini-kingdoms that we hear about constantly being erected within our governments. It addresses the cultures of fear and protectionism that ultimately hinder innovation and impact service quality to citizens. But from what I’ve seen at the conference, those jurisdictions that adopt Open Government reap the benefits – better services, better collaboration, better transparency.

Sask 3.0 Summit–Day 1 Recap

2012-04-25T00:14:52-05:00:00

I’m only done Day 1 of Sask 3.0 Summit and I’m already exhausted – but at the same time exhilarated; the sessions today and the information shared was of huge value. While the conversation will continue here in Saskatchewan long after the conference is done, there are definitely new conversations that need to be had back in Manitoba.

So what did I learn. Well, Open Government is here and is the future. It’s not a gimmick, it’s not a fad – its a new way to do government, and the paradigm shift is neither trivial nor easily implemented. The considerations are numerous, and I can fill multiple blog posts (which I will) on the subjects, but if there’s a synopsis I’d give its this:

Moving to Open Gov is about efficiency as much as it is accountability. Open Gov isn’t about allowing people to snoop on your government, its about nurturing collaborative relationships between government and citizens to benefit both. The power of Open Data and the potential it has to impact policy decisions or create solutions to problems people didn’t even know existed is palpable. The opportunities around improved online government services are huge. Like any initiative though, planning and ensuring the right support system from shareholders, stakeholders, and champions is a must.

(Read my blog post on Moving to Open Gov here.)

You also need to consider security and privacy. Canada has old, outdated privacy laws that were drafted 30 years yet are still in place today. At the same time, ensuring citizen’s personal information is secured throughout interactions with online services is crucial, and we heard how BC has leapfrogged other provinces in their move to a more streamlined service offering while maintaining high privacy standards.

Another consideration is around citizen expectations. We heard at the conference about the data collected from Canadians on how they rate the federal government’s service levels and its an underwhelming 60/100 for approx the last 10 years, and currently trending downward.

And finally, there’s the next generation of workers. I believe very strongly that for our governments to really move forward, to leapfrog over current and emerging technologies and techniques, and to ensure we have the right people working on the right things in the right way, that we need a new labour movement. One that differs from the adversarial and entitled culture rampant in many governments.

I’ll get to blogging on all of the above points this week, and Day 2 of the Summit will I’m sure provide even more insight and ideas.

People Need To Be Reminded How Valuable You Are

2012-04-16T13:10:38-05:00:00

Here’s an interesting experiment to try. Write down all the projects, initiatives, operations, and successes that you were part of at work over the last year. Once you have your list, go to a few people in your organization:

- Your boss

- A team member

- Your immediate manager

- A colleague that’s not on your team

The point is, go to various people that hold various roles within your organization. Now, ask them this question:

What did I do this past year?

Maybe they’ll come up with a few things, maybe one or two, or maybe none at all. Now assess the results and consider this:

If the people you talked to had limited or no knowledge about what you did in the past year, you failed at communicating your value.

We can have a tendency of not tooting our own horns. We don’t want to be “that guy” – you know, the obnoxious, arrogant, conceited, attention seeker that flaunts themselves to anyone they see. So we shy away from telling people about our triumphs. We play humble, knowing that supposedly its the meek that will inherit the world.

But to do so does yourself a disservice – not just to you but to your organization as well. Businesses want people who are willing to invest in the organization beyond their job description. They want people who will contribute in meaningful, valuable ways and they want those people to be recognized. The nuance for us is to communicate our value in a way that isn’t offensive to others. We need to get over our own misconception that telling people how valuable we are is somehow egotistical.

One of the comments I got recently from my annual review was that people weren’t sure what I was working on, or when I was working. There was no visibility into my work week, and as a result people made certain assumptions based on the information they had. This really bothered me, as I was involved with many project, business development, community, HR, and internal initiatives throughout the year.

The missing connection was *telling* people about what I was working on. In a way, you need to sell yourself internally to your managers and co-workers in the same way that advertisers do on TV. If you’re not in front of them on a regular basis, you’re not top of mind.

At the suggestion from my direct boss/career mentor, I’ve now started doing weekly reports to management, sales, and my project leaders to ensure that everyone is up to date on what exactly I had been working on the week prior. This isn’t a detailed list of hours and tasks – that’s what our time sheet system is for. This is just paragraphs summarizing work completed the week before. By doing this, it accomplishes a few things:

Keeps key people in the organization up to speed on my activities and keeps me top of mind.

Keeps me accountable to better track the work that I’m doing every week. I now add an all-day appointment in Outlook called Notes where I keep a running tally of what I accomplished, and I ensure that anything I work on is blocked off in my Outlook calendar.

Alerts people to any issues/concerns. Sometimes we can have the “how to boil a frog” view of things. Frogs, from what I’ve been told, can’t detect increases in temperature very well. So if you put a frog in a pot of cold water, then turn the heat on to boil the water, the frog won’t catch on and will die. Work can be like that for us – where we just keep getting more and more tacked on and not realize that we’re overloading ourselves. Reporting on activity can flag our managers/bosses that maybe we need to delegate activities or re-prioritize them.

Companies hire us because they want us to be valuable. If we’re valuable, then the company profits from that and hopefully we get acknowledged. Don’t feel bad about communicating that value. Note that I didn’t use words like “great” or “important” or similar verbiage. They suggest the type of attitude most try and avoid – egotistical, arrogant, self-centered. Value is what we’re focussing on here and it can be delivered in the most humble of ways.

I Clobbered a Leopard with a Window Last Night

2012-03-30T12:49:51-05:00:00

I’ve had my 15” Mac Book Pro for a little over a year now, and its hands-down the best laptop I’ve ever owned…hardware wise.

And I tried, I really really tried, to like OSX. I even bought Parallels so I could run Windows 7 and all my development tools while still trying to live in an OSX world. But in the end, I missed Windows too much. There were just too many shortcomings with OSX that kept me from being productive.

For one thing, Office for Mac is *not* Office for Windows. The applications are written by different teams, and Excel on the Mac is just different enough to be painful. The VM experience was adequate, but my MBP would heat up like crazy when running it and the experience trying to get Windows apps to interact with an OSX file system was awkward. And I found I was in the VM more than I thought I’d be. iMovie is not as easy to use for doing simple movie editing as Windows Movie Maker. There’s no free blog editing software for OSX that’s on par with Windows Live Writer. And really, all I was using OSX for was Twitter (which I can use a Windows client for) and web browsing (also something Windows can provide obviously).

So I had to ask myself – why am I forcing myself to use an operating system I don’t like, on a laptop that can support Windows 7?

And so I paved my MBP and am happily running Windows 7 on it…and its fantastic! All the good stuff with the hardware is still there with the goodness of Win 7. Happy happy.

I did run into some snags doing this though, and that’s really what this blog post is about – things to be aware of if you want to install Win 7 directly on your MBP metal.

First, Ensure You Have Your Original Mac Install Disk

This was a warning my buddy Dylan, who’s been running Win 7 on his MBP for a while now, gave me early on. The reason you need that original disk is that the hardware drivers you need are all located there. Apparently you can’t easily download them, so make sure you have them ahead of time.

Second, Forget BootCamp

The only reason you need BootCamp is if you still want the option to boot into OSX. If you don’t, then you don’t need BootCamp. In fact, you don’t even need BootCamp to install Win 7. What you *will* need though is a DVD with Win 7 burnt on it. Apple doesn’t support bootable USB drives. Well, actually they do for Mac Book Airs which don’t come with optical drives…but to get it working you’ll need to edit a system file of BootCamp so your make of MBP is included in an XML document, and even then you *still* are using BootCamp meaning you’ll be making an OSX partition. So don’t worry about BootCamp, just burn a Windows 7 disc, put it into the DVD drive, and restart your MBP.

Third, Know The Secret Commands

So after putting in the Windows 7 DVD and restarting your MBP, you’ll want to hold down the ‘C’ key during boot up. This tells the MBP that it should boot from the DVD drive instead of the hard drive. Interestingly, it appears you don’t have to do this if its the Mac OSX install disc (more on that in a second), but regardless – hold down C and Windows will start the install process.

Next up is the partition process. You’ll notice that there’s a partition called ETI or something like that. This has to do with the drive format that Apple uses and how they partition their system drives. What I did – I blew it away! At first I didn’t, but I was told I couldn’t install Windows on the remaining space due to the different drive format. Blowing away the ETI partition (and all other partitions) allowed me to continue the Windows install.

*REMEMBER – No warranty is provided or implied, just telling you what I did and how I got it to work.

Ok, so now Windows is installed and I’m rebooting. Everything looks good, but I need drivers! So I put in the OSX install DVD and run the BootCamp assistant which installs all the Windows drivers I need. Fantastic! Oh, I need to restart – no problem.

OH NO, PROBLEM!

I left the OSX install DVD in the drive and now the MBP wants to boot from the drive and install OSX! I’m not holding down the C key, what the heck?! Ok, well there must be a way to eject this disk…hmm…no physical button on the side…the eject button doesn’t seem to work on the keyboard…no little pin hole to insert something to force the disc out…well what the…?!

It turns out, if you want to eject a disc at boot up, you need (and I kid you not) to plug a mouse into the laptop and hold down the right-click button while its booting. This ejected the disc for me.

Seriously.

Finally, Things You Should Be Aware Of

Once you have Windows up and running there’s a few things you need to be aware of, mainly new keyboard shortcuts.

For instance, on the Mac keyboard there is no Home, End, PageUp or PageDown. There’s also no obvious way to do something like select large amounts of text (like you would by holding Shift-Home at the end of a line of text for instance).

So here’s some shortcuts you need to know:

Home – fn + left arrow

End – fn + right arrow

Select a line of text as you would with the Home key – Shift + fn + left arrow

Select a line of text as you would with the End key – Shift + fn + right arrow

Page Up – fn + up arrow

Page Down – fn + down arrow

Also, you’ll notice that the awesome Mac track pad doesn’t respond to taps as clicks. No fear, this is just a setting that needs to be altered in the BootCamp control panel (that controls the Mac Hardware-specific settings within Windows, you can access it easily from the system tray icon)

One other thing, battery life seems a bit lower than with OSX, but then again I’m also doing more than Twitter or web browsing on this thing now.

Conclusion

My laptop runs awesome now that I have Windows 7 on there. It’s obviously up to individual taste, but for me I just didn’t see benefits to living in an OSX world when everything I needed lived in Windows. And also, I finally am back to an operating system that doesn’t require me to eject a USB drive before physically removing it! It’s 2012 folks, how has this not been fixed?!

Air Canada Will No Longer Be My Airline

2012-03-19T06:36:08-05:00:00

If the constant labour disputes at Air Canada (the most recent being a week ago where pilots were locked out and mechanics and bag handlers were poised to strike) weren’t enough to make me reconsider moving all my flights to West Jet, this latest twist definitely will.

CBC reported that Aveos, a privately held company that has the contract to provide maintenance for Air Canada, had suddenly and without notice shut its doors (read the story here)

There’s something missing from the stories currently online though. Months ago, Air Canada gave their Winnipeg based maintenance staff an ultimatum – stay with Air Canada but be forced to relocate to a different city, or switch from Air Canada to Aveos and stay in Winnipeg.

So all of those staff that Air Canada pushed into Aveos just so they could stay in Winnipeg are now out of a job with huge uncertainty around their future.

Labour disputes that rise up continually and hamper personal travel and business, questionable timing of business decisions and the resulting impact on individuals…there’s too much drama in that company for me to rely on it for my travel needs. WestJet it is moving forward until Air Canada gets their act together – which probably means its WestJet for the foreseeable future.

The Most Epic MVP Attendee Party EVAR in Three Acts!

2012-03-05T08:33:43-06:00:00

Last week was the Microsoft MVP Global Summit, where Microsoft brings together their independent experts and community leaders for a week of sessions, product group interactions, and some fun along the way.

These nights are always epic, stretching into the wee hours of the morning. I brought my camera and flipcam with me this year to capture the events, and so I give you

The Most Epic MVP Attendee Party EVAR in Three Acts!

It has everything – Playing football on an NFL field, singing karaoke with SQL Server MVPs, and crustacean death! So kick back, relax, and live vicariously through the recorded antics of a group of MVPs!

Act 1 – Any Given Thursday!

Act 2 – SQL Karaoke

Act 3 – The Ho Ho Lobster Massacre

Twitter + Arduino + Traffic Light = Awesome!

2012-02-25T13:11:34-06:00:00

Check out this video I did with Tyler Dueck and Jason Smith at the Winnipeg Code Camp on how they used an Arduino device attached to a traffic light to allow it to be controlled by Twitter!

The Failing of Technical Education–Too Much Tech

2012-02-19T09:41:28-06:00:00

Our Universities and Colleges haven’t gotten it yet, and its producing a disservice to the technical industry and trickling down to every other industry that relies on technical people (read: All of them).

I’m talking about the lack of soft-skills, leadership, interpersonal, and professional training that organizations are demanding from their IT professionals. Gone are the days of the stereotypical programmer that sits in a dark room lit only by a computer monitor, with food and requirements slid under the door. Gone are the days when your network technician, DBA, or server administrator never talked to anyone outside of their office and only through email, trouble ticket, or help-desk call.

The technology industry has moved on. It’s realized, as have the organizations that rely on it, that technology professionals are just that: Professionals, whose knowledge and opinion are just as important as finance, HR, sales, operations, and other key departments. The stereotypes are shattered, and technologists are seen as people first, who work with others to attain goals.

And yet for some reason, universities and colleges continue to ignore that graduating with a degree or diploma in the technology field requires knowledge and understanding of how to work within a team, an organization, with other people; how to effectively communicate, how to see beyond their immediate surroundings and care about things at a broader level; being open to different points of view and not succumb to the religiosity that is so prevalent within the technology industry (we are still very much an industry driven by vendors and individuals loyalty to those vendors).

I mourn for our industry at times. So many brilliant, talented people who could solve generations worth of problems through technology – yet so much energy spent on defending frivolous stances on which platform is better, or which approach is right, or why vendor x is evil and stupid.

As I write this, I realize that education can only go so far. That teaching students what the industry needs is different than seeing a cultural change in a global community. Still…even if it just plants the seeds, maybe the new growth will overtake the weeds we seem to be struggling in now.

Announcing Prairie Dev Con Regina, Oct 1–2 2012!

2012-02-17T15:43:38-06:00:00

We’re coming home! In October of 2012 Prairie Dev Con returns to where it all began: Regina, Saskatchewan!

And while we’re over seven months away, we’re already starting to plan for the event – and we need your help to make it the best Prairie Dev Con ever!

We’ve set up a *very* short survey asking what topics and workshops you’d like to see at the conference. We’ll also be drawing from survey submissions on May 1st for a free registration to the conference!

Just visit our online survey here to fill it out, that simple!

We’ll have more information on the Regina event in the coming months.

Thanks,

D’Arcy

2012 Exciting Year in Microsoft Space

2012-02-13T14:40:34-06:00:00

We’re only in February, but the rest of the 10 months left in 2012 look to be very interesting in the Microsoft space with products that Developers and IT Pros will find intriguing.

Redmond Channel Partner posted a great article outlining what products we can expect to make an appearance this year and when. Some highlights:

Windows 8/Windows Server 8

Well we all know this is coming, and that it will be a huge focus of Microsoft’s marketing (once their people are actually allowed to talk about it). Could be released as early as Q3 2012 to early 2013

SQL Server 2012
The latest version of Microsoft’s database will be released sometime in early 2012, and we’ve already seen sessions at conferences and user groups showing off early builds and features. There will be a virtual launch on March 7th, although there’s no confirmation that the date is also the official launch of the product availability wise.

Visual Studio 11
Not sure when we’ll see this, but there’s a correlation between Windows 8 being released and the dev tools required to make apps for it. VS 11 will come with .NET 4.5 and all the goodness required to make Metro-style applications that run off the WINRT. I have no personal info, but my guess would be fall at the latest for at least a beta.

Office 15
The next version of Office may hit in Q4 of 2012 and betas are already being made available through certain channels.

IE 10
Late this year we can expect the next version of IE to come out, version 10. We’re seeing more increments of IE coming out faster, which can only be a good thing considering the previous gaps between versions.

Make sure to check out the BCP article linked earlier to get all the details and info on the other products being released this year by Microsoft!

NES Fanboi’s Dream–Ryu in Super Mario Bros?!

2012-02-10T06:53:55-06:00:00

I came across this awesome video…

…and I thought “That was really well done!”. Then I get to the end, which points to ExplodingRabbit.com. So I head over there and…omg…its’ not just a video project – these guys actually *wrote* this!

They’ve creating a Flash game of Super Mario Bros, but give you the options of playing characters from other NES games, including Samus from Metroid, Simon Belmont from Castlevania, MegaMan, Link, and (this is freaking awesome) the tank from Master Blaster!

And its not just that the sprites are slapped in! The characters act as they do in their respective games! So Ryu uses his sword, has his arsenal of secondary weapons, clings to walls…in fact, Mario/Luigi are the only ones that can still kill enemies by jumping on them.

This awesomeness is blowing my mind! Go check it out!

http://www.explodingrabbit.com/games/super-mario-bros-crossover