The meme has been going around with the “This is what X person or group thinks I do” and then “This is what I really do…”  It got me thinking, so what do I really do and what do people think I do?

At that thought I stumbled. What do I do? I’m kind of rogue, a little bit of a wild card. Always have been, always will be, but in a good way. At least I’d like to think. Beware now, if you’re not into understanding the “feeling” side of things, you may not want to read this. With that warning, here I go…

There are a few things that I’m good at and these things traverse a wide spectrum of technical, writing, and art. I speak and think in abstractions, grasping the psychological need and business focus of companies and people, then implement in the technical realm. I have been told, that I do that pretty well. I try, amid frustrations that I’m sure most developers face, to strive toward making things better, faster, cooler, and up the bad ass on whatever I work on.

Lately though, I’ve stepped upped my game to push toward and focus on cloud technologies. I’ve been studying, implementing, and generally working in that realm of the technology industry for about 2 years now, but it has all been just a personal focus. Kind of a “for fun” type of drive. Now I’m working in the cloud realm 100% of the time. In addition I’m working with people who think, breath, and eat technology and apps and how it all can fit together to make life better.

Beyond that technical realm I’ve been doing something else that I have an aptitude for. Socializing and networking. I’ve taken it upon myself, since I like working with, meeting, and coordinating between people. I work to find the connections that should be made, to bridge gaps in technologies with partnerships, and to push forward key pieces of technology that I personally find interesting. All that, I’ve decided to do myself and have struck out to continue doing that. Things like Node PDX, my blog entries over on New Relic, the AWS User Group (in Seattle), Hadoop & Big Data w/ (@lusciouspear, Devops, PDX ALT.NET, PADNUG, and many other groups I’m working to connect, extend, and help spread the knowledge in these groups and bring and inclusiveness to these events for people in less “tech enabled” parts of the world. I have some pretty big goals in the next few months. But my aim is good so far and things are looking good.

So where does that put me? An implementing, artistic, weird-o, nerd, metal head, musician, who networks, partners, and codes? I suppose all of those things tend to work. Maybe my explanation made things clearer or maybe things are just as cloudy as before (pun? oh dear). Either way, I’ll be in touch with many of you out there hacking on the code, creating the next disruptive technology, and rocking the world while kicking ass!

Eventually, I’m hoping to kick that little dent in the world.  😉

Back in December Uhuru Software and Tier 3 released two different forks of Cloud Foundry that enabled .NET Support. I wasn’t sure which I wanted to use, since I had some serious Cloud Foundry work I was about to dive into, so I’ve picked them apart to determine how each works. This is what I’ve found so far.

Uhuru

• Source Code
• Public Site: http://www.uhurusoftware.com/
• Community / Support Site
• Community LinkedIn Site (Mostly “biz” oriented)
• What Uhuru Software is…
• Micro Cloud VM/Installers (requires registration)

Iron Foundry

• Source Code
• Public Site:  http://www.ironfoundry.org/
• Community / Support Site
• Iron Foundry Blog
• VM Download (For Micro Cloud Foundry)

That covers the basic links to the downloads, community, and other points of presence, now it is time to dig into some of the differences I’ve found. First though, I got a good environment setup to test each of the forks, from within the same Cloud Foundry Environment! So this is how I’ve set this up… Setting up the Virtual Machines w/ VMware Fusion I suspect, you could tangibly do this with some other virtualization software, but VMware is probably the easiest to use and setup on OS-X & Windows. I haven’t tried this on Linux so there’s another space I’d have to give it a go. Using ESX I also suspect this would also be extremely easy to setup. It’s up to you, but I’m doing all of this with VMware Fusion. The environment I’m using for this comparison consists of the following virtual images:

Micro Cloud Foundry Instances

These instances were easy, I just downloaded them from the Cloud Foundry Site on the Micro Cloud Foundry Download Page. The simple configuration is outlined in “Micro Cloud Foundry Installation & Setup“.

Iron Foundry Instances

For this, I downloaded the available VM on the Iron Foundry Site here.

Uhuru Instances

I setup the Uhuru Instances using the instructions available from Uhuru Software here.

Setting up Some Controllers

So the first thing I did was dive into setting up a controller, or actually two, because I wanted to have an Iron Foundry Environment and a Uhuru Software Environment. After that I’d then try to mix and match them and figure out differences or conflicts. The instructions listed under the “Uhuru Instances” has information regarding setup of a controller for the Uhuru Software Environment, which is what I followed. It is also a good idea to get setup with Putty or ready with SSH for usage of Cloud Foundry, Uhuru Software, and Iron Foundry.

First things first, I want to make sure EVERYBODY gets a shirt that is good n’ proper for them! So ladies and gentlemen, if you did not get a Node PDX T-shirt please e-mail me (‘adronhall’ at gmail) and I will make sure in the coming weeks you get a Node PDX shirt!. Be sure to tell everyone how awesome the conference was, and come this time next year, we’ll have an even bigger conference of node.js awesomeness (plus even some new surprises that I promise you’ll like).

Until Next Time…

Be sure to stay in touch, if anyone has links, references, projects, or other things feel free to e-mail me as I’ll be doing a lot of Node.js Blogging.

Also, we’ve already started plotting the next conference and will be working to set it up a little different. Namely we’ll get a space that can accomodate 100 people a little better, and maybe structure variations in tracks, multiple tracks, a little more open space, and other things. Matter of fact, if you have any ideas at all, send those my way too or even feel free e-mail me or just jump into organizing (I’ll have more information about that in the very near future).

Over the next few days I’ll be collecting all of the links for the presentations, videos, and other items form the conference. I’ll have a blog entry coming here, with those, and will also – please help me out if anybody sees any other write ups – post any write up links here.

Again, thanks to everyone for coming and helping to make this a great time!

Time for the secret to be out of the bag. I’m currently working on contract with the awesome company of AppFog in the Fort of Awesome. Let me tell you, it is indeed awesome too! You might ask why I am working with them? How do I align with them? What is it they do?

Well you’re in luck, I’ll tell you all about it.

A few months ago, I started really digging into PaaS more. Not that I needed a reason, because I’m one of those “PaaS is the future” guys. I see this as a huge shift, kind of like when the developer world moved on from Assembly and punch cards to C & C++. It’s a big deal, and it is shifting the way companies build apps, the way they stay competitive, and stand out and above the herd with better process, better capabilities, and more efficient operations. PaaS, is the path to tomorrow.

What is AppFog building? Currently if you’re fortunate enough to have beta access, you may be able to play with the amazing PaaS offering that they’re putting together, and I’ve stepped forward to help put even more awesome into it with their kick ass team! So what will AppFog be aiming for? Well, it is an impressive list, check it out!

Help us out, take the poll and get your favorite technology added to the list! There’s a whole list of other things that will be coming too, this is just the basic big hitters list.  🙂

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In other news, Node PDX has just finished the list of speakers, we’re finalizing the rest of the sponsors and related things, and just waiting (ok, we’re really busting our butts over here running around to make sure this is a cool event for all you node coders!)

Some of the cool things you’ll be able to look forward to is…

…and awesome Saturday “open drinks” party w/ New Relic! So be sure to be there for that…

We’ve aimed to get everyone a Node PDX t-shirt…

…and more. So go get RSVPed already, time is running out.

Alright…  deep breath. The last few weeks, no wait, the last few months have been hella busy. I finally got my act together and have set some real goals. One of them is stepping up to bat in the Cloud Computing/Utility Computing Industry, instead of just being a mere critique, writer, and sideline gazer I’ll be in the full battle on Monday. The reason Monday, is because today is my last official day at Russell Investments.

Beautiful Russell Investments Building in Seattle

Working at Russell has been awesome. The team I got to work with regularly used advanced practices (which I like to think of as practices that everybody uses, but I’m aware of reality) – such as TDD, BDD, and Pairing. We did a mild form of Scrum, mostly to help leadership manage to the even higher up management. It works really well. We have happy customers, solid products, a deployment success rate that never had us at work late, and to top it off I got to work on net profitable projects. I love seeing success across the board!

The the guys I worked with the most pairing, TDDing & BDDing, and generally making the math work – Jeff Schumacher @codereflection & Scott Koon @lazycoder – cheers, beers on me in the near future (like at 2:00pm!). To the host of others…

• Kelly – Thanks for that whitty sardonic 5-year old humor that I love and adore! You kick ass!
• Don – Thanks for keeping the QA ship headed in the right direction and helping me coordinate, get things out the door, and providing comraderie every day.
• James – Test, QA, thanks for destroying any hope that a bug may make it to production. Keep throwing out those lines of Russian to scare the passersby, superb indeed!
• Chris Sjoholm – Thanks for troubleshooting JavaScript, enjoying the TekPub jQuery Videos, and hacking the jQuery/JavaScript until it works. …and I had to use your name because nobody can say  it!  mwhahahahaahahaa!
• Castle – Thanks for confusing me by having the name Castle, since we use Castle Windsor, and oh yeah, thanks for being a very knowledge domain person ( <- Note I’m not in HR, I didn’t call you a “resource” ). Your random jabs, jests, and relaxed vibe always brought ++ to the work day.
• Lane – Dude, seriously, boss++, awesome, ski dude, punk rocker, gets wooed and honored in Seattle Coffee Works, great guy, rock star, Scrum King, Lean Advocate, Get Shit Done Well guy… I think I summed ya up. Thanks a billion! You going to bat to destroy the insanity that is TFS I will never forget!
• Jeff – Thanks for the coding, helping me think, and the death metal, black metal, Deicide show (along with attempts to make other shows, which I fail miserably at), etc…  You rock dude, keep it up, never stop, stay a little crazy, it’ll make those bus rides all that much more fun.  😉
• John & Terry – You guys were like the silent brain trust, with Terry piping in with the announcement that Corp IT does some inanely illogical things, for the whole floor. I seriously have enjoyed your public service announcements!  John, thanks for all the awesome food suggestions over the last year +.
• Sree – Rock that Mac dude, enjoy your family, and stay that happy guy you are. Keep hitting the code and love the coder life.
• Sai – Hey wait, where’d you go?  Oh yeah, enjoy the Bellevue. It was fun, I learned that there are only like 5 countries that have people driving on the wrong side of the road because of you!!  😛  But seriously, great working with you, see ya around for sure!
• Skoon, Scott, I mean Scott Koon – Ok, had to use your whole name because of all the iterations we’ve used over the many months. Needless to say, Herding Code rocks…
• Cefe – You, the invisible power that be, to right wrongs and keep the ship sailing, we didn’t get to work together that much, but I always felt a very positive morale with you at the helm. Cheers, will miss working under your command.
• Hassan – Again, like Cefe, thanks for commanding the ship from the strategic command center on high. You also, kept our morale up, kept the alignments clear, and led us to the battle.
• Michael O’Shea – Thanks for the zillion great conversations, the breaks, music chit chat, OS-X & Android utilizations & hacking, Star Trek knowledge beyond Gene Roddenberry himself. Hats off!
• Scott S. – Thanks for the NSFW jokes, connections, networking knowledge, etc. You’ve been a great comrade, will miss ya…  and yes, I’m still working on the logistics around Alaska, keep me abreast in Facebook if ya would. Cheers! Thanks for those other things too.  😉
• Aeden – Sucks we didn’t get to pair together, we’ll do that soon, at a conference or something! Keep it wild, stay adventurous, and enjoy the Indian Food.
• Lisa – Thanks for the NSFW moments, the Shadow IT, and the snarky comments. The whole team enjoys your input into the kittie cats these days, so don’t stop. Cheers! …and thanks for the chance to further infect the company with the awesomeness that is Shadow IT!

Ok, I’m sure I missed somebody, I’ll owe them double beers! It’s been great, absolutely wonderful time….

…but where am I going?

There are some secrets that will remain. Such as what specific companies I’m going to work with, who, where, what, and why, that will stay a mystery at this point. There are a few things that are happening that I can and will elaborate on right now. (if you were waiting for something technology related, this is the part, sorry for all the sobbing and tearful moments above). For the others topics, I’ll provide a juicy update in the near future (I’m thinking in about 1-2 months).

Cloud Foundry

Over the coming months I will be doing extensive work with, and maybe even on, Cloud Foundry. Will it be with Ruby, C#, or JavaScript? Well, actually it will be a little of all three. Yes indeed.

Cloud Architecture

This is an area where I’ll be doing a ton of work, related almost entirely to PaaS (Platform as a Service). I will have blog entries coming about this topic through various medium, which will include my ongoing series on New Relic’s Blog (Part 1 & Part 2 of Removing the OS Barrier with PaaS which is up now). In addition, there will definitely be a lot of open source software in my future!

TriMet Light Rail

Community

One of the things that is hugely important to me is community. Local community, tech community, neighborhood community, and city community. With that there are a few other changes that will be pretty big for me over the next few months. I’m making a huge shift where and how I’m going to be living. I’ll be spending a whole lot of time in San Francisco, Portland, Seattle, and likely Vancouver BC, Amsterdam, and Copenhagen. There is a strong connecting fiber for all of these cities around livability and building strong communities, something a lot of other cities lack. But one slight change, since my home base is in Seattle currently, is that I’ll still be very active in Seattle but will be making my home base Portland again, with living arrangements for my frequent visits available in Seattle and San Francisco. To summarize, I’ll be swapping some bus commutes for light rail & streetcar commutes!  🙂  Thx to all who are helping me out with this complexity!

Panoramic Portland - Click for a massive full size image

Tech Community

Along with this slight shift in geographic location & traveling a lot more I’ve been pushing forward (you might have realized from the string of speaker introductions) on getting events organized. I’m thinking that this will become a recurring habit of mine since I sincerely enjoy the work I do and meeting, coding, and helping people to build a larger community of technology mega-awesomeness!

Which brings me to my last mention, go RSVP for Node PDX, it’s going to be a good time!

So all in all, cheers, and on to new great things and working to making a little dent in this universe. 😀