Rick's Random Ramblings

We released NetworkLocation 3.1 tonight.  I always forget how much work it actually is to release software once it’s done.

Version 3.1 is our first official Snow Leopard compatible version of NetworkLocation, and also our first version to require Snow Leopard.  Version 3.0.7 ran in Snow Leopard, but AutoLocate was mostly (err… complete?) broken, and various actions ceased to work due to Apple changing how some of their private APIs work.

Skyhook also stopped working in Snow Leopard for reasons I still don’t understand.  That was fine with us because 10.6 comes with CoreLocation which is based on Skyhook but has a MUCH nicer API to work with.  A little switcheroo there did the trick.  Only it wasn’t such a little switcheroo, and required a significant amount of work.

This is also the first release of NetworkLocation where I was mostly hands off.  My role on this one consisted mostly as a tester, because I’ve been busy lately on Bodega.  The only development I really did was fixing the iChat and Airport Power actions.  Chris Farber did the rest, and Phil freshened up the site for it.

It’s nice to have NetworkLocation back in my menu doing all of my boring tasks in the morning.

Let’s start this off with something easy.  Every night, I dream.  A lot.  I dream significantly more than most people I know.  That or I just tend to remember them more.  Or maybe it’s that I just wake up during them more.  I wake up often during the night, if only for a split second; enough to kick me out of the dream.

My mind seems incapable of just chilling out and enjoying the ride.  When I’m dreaming I’m constantly wondering “is this a dream?”  And as soon as the answer can be yes, I wake up.  I have quite the imagination, and I’ve seen the beginnings of a hell of a lot of neat dreams, but it’s very rare that they get very far before the “whoa, hey, dude, you’re dreaming!” kicks in.

Of course, that doesn’t mean I can’t have interesting dreams, they just tend to involve things that are physically possible, and could potentially happen to me.

Like the one where I got to swim with dolphins.  Hey that’s cool, right?  Who doesn’t think it’d be neat to get to swim with dolphins?  I’m swimming next to one near a dock on the ocean, enjoying the opportunity.  Then…. it grabs me by the right arm.  I remember thinking “Huh… this is odd.”  It starts pulling me somehow.  OK so my mind never got the memo that dolphins can’t physically swim backwards.  Now that I’ve thought that one through I’m reasonably assured that I won’t be having this dream again.  And so I’m thinking “don’t remember a dolphin ever doing this to someone at Sea World.”  That’s about when it starts pulling me under water. “uhhh.. umm… is it…”  And deeper we went.  ”Yup.. I think the bastard is trying to drown me.”  This dream lasted until I had to gasp for air, and managed.  ”wwwaaaaiiittt a minute. you can’t breath under water!” … and right back to reality.

I’ve considered reading a book that helps people have more lucid dreams.  I like to think that it could help me kick this habit.  It’s not a bother as far as sleep goes.  I sleep fine.  I just think I’m getting ripped off on the whole dream experience.

So I haven’t had a blog since my 2nd year of university… back in the day when you still had to roll your own if you didn’t want to use the likes of livejournal.  I literally posted stuff via INSERT sql statements back then (quotes were a bitch).  ANYHOW… I’ve been thinking lately that I want somewhere to post my little rants.  Twitter’s 140 character limit just doesn’t make it very good for that (probably for the best).  And Facebook… don’t get me started on that cesspool.

The inevitable question that comes next is… what am I going to blog about?  I don’t know, really.  Who’s going to read this?  Fuck if I know.  You, I guess. :P

But seriously… if nothing else, my hope is that this gives people a bit of insight into who I really am.  I pretty much hate talking about myself, so a lot of people don’t actually know much about me.  Why it is that I hate talking about myself will come later.

Things I could see myself writing about:

• Me.
• Stories about funny/awkward things that have happened to me (I’ve lived a lifetime worth of awkward moments already).
• Software development, though I don’t see myself making it very technical.
• Music.
• Why I think I’m awesome might be a recurring theme.
• Random geekery.

Oh… and no promises about this staying on tumblr.  I’m trying it out for kicks.