[TechnoBear]

Good news: I found out why my tire keeps losing air pressure.

Bad News: There is a screw in it.

[smendoza88]

Some tire places will plug the tire for free if it's not close edge of the tire.

This post has been edited by smendoza88: 05 April 2019 - 02:40 PM

[Martyr2]

That is funny, I have the opposite problem. My head keeps growing because I have a screw lose!

Spoiler

Warning! Lame joke detected!

[TechnoBear]

smendoza88, on 05 April 2019 - 03:39 PM, said:

Some tire places will plug the tire for free if it's not close edge of the tire.

Whilst not free plugging the tire, an oil change, topping off other fluids, and a brake inspection was $50. The last 2 were free.

[astonecipher]

Over hard negotiations this past weekend, we have a contract on the house! I have the home inspection Wednesday and a closing date on May 16th.
Let the anxiety attack commence!



Also, over the weekend I grabbed an AWS Certified Solutions Architect exam book to start working on some certifications. Which is kind of ironic, since the employers I've talked to all use Azure, but this will be a first step, then I'll work on some MS certs and TOGAF certification to round it out.

[TechnoBear]

I know I've said this to you before astonecipher, but I really want to get some certs under my belt. I've just not got the available time.

[astonecipher]

I know we've discussed it. Time is hard to come by, but the way I am trying to resolve that is to cut out a bit each night to read and study. It helps because I am not taking in too much information to process while I still feel I am doing something toward the goal. I mean, we are in the midst of cleaning the apartment, packing, and planning everything out all while the rest of our lives still happens, plus dealing with issues at home that I won't get into. It is work, but in the end I hope it will be worth it.

[modi123_1]

Happy Rex Manning Day!

[BenignDesign]

Trying to figure out all the ASP.net/C#/Javascript/MVC/Docker/NuGet/Visual Studio/GitHub stuff. Every time I think I have a handle on it, someone tells me I'm required to use something else to do some other piece of the project. Why was a text editor and hand coding such a bad thing? I freaking hate using the "Solution Explorer." There's so much extra crap generated automatically. It frustrates me. I prefer to keep things clean and simple. That's not a freaking option with anything Microsoft. Blargh.

[xclite]

BenignDesign, on 08 April 2019 - 11:20 AM, said:

Trying to figure out all the ASP.net/C#/Javascript/MVC/Docker/NuGet/Visual Studio/GitHub stuff. Every time I think I have a handle on it, someone tells me I'm required to use something else to do some other piece of the project. Why was a text editor and hand coding such a bad thing? I freaking hate using the "Solution Explorer." There's so much extra crap generated automatically. It frustrates me. I prefer to keep things clean and simple. That's not a freaking option with anything Microsoft. Blargh. />

Ok, a lot going on here, and I agree that there are a lot of tools, but to give hope:

ASP.net is standard MVC fare, and should feel like PHP with more guardrails in a safer language.

C# is an excellent language, and is actually modern enough that its concepts are a worthy investment long-term. It's like the other blue collar elephant, Java, but with some nicer tricks up its sleeve that approach the fancier languages like F# and Scala. F# is also really nice to learn if you feel... adventurous, but really C# is a very very very good investment.

Javascript is Javascript; not going anywhere, you probably already know some... tooling here has gotten better, but isn't as good as what you'd find in e.g. the .NET world. Can't be escaped if you're a webby person.

Docker is definitely a complicating factor, and all I can say is I'm sorry. Docker is basically the software industry throwing up its hands in response to the problem of deployment and dependency management and saying "eff it, we'll just deploy an entire operating system." Thankfully Docker is relatively simple once you get a container built and hopefully you shouldn't have to spend too much time on this.

NuGet is definitely a good thing to learn. Any competent language going forward is going to have a good package manager, and NuGet is supposed to be quite decent. This is a transferable piece of knowledge.

I find both Visual Studio and Eclipse to be super unnavigable. I find Intellij to be quite helpful in my JVM-land: large projects with large teams are much easier to navigate for me. YMMV.

Github is worth learning just because everybody seems to use it. It's a pain though, and every company uses a different branch and merge strategy. I highly recommend git overall, even though it requires a nontrivial amount of effort to understand its model of operation.

[BenignDesign]

xclite, on 08 April 2019 - 11:06 AM, said:

ASP.net is standard MVC fare, and should feel like PHP with more guardrails in a safer language.

ASP.net isn't a huge problem. Getting the MVC portion is a headache. What's the point? Why is it done this way? What's wrong with having a file and all the stuff you need without having to worry about what goes into Models, Views, and Controllers? And every tutorial I watch throws in a Hubs folder, too. Please the Javascript folder and the CSS folder and a Content folder and a Start folder and a Data folder and a Font folder. Nevermind the properties and references and Connected Services and packages and jesus! It just seems like a lot of garbage to do what I can already do with a lot less headache.

xclite, on 08 April 2019 - 11:06 AM, said:

C# is an excellent language, and is actually modern enough that its concepts are a worthy investment long-term. It's like the other blue collar elephant, Java, but with some nicer tricks up its sleeve that approach the fancier languages like F# and Scala. F# is also really nice to learn if you feel... adventurous, but really C# is a very very very good investment.

I enjoy C#, sometimes. Othertimes, I want to stab somebody in the throat. When it works, it's awesome, when it doesn't, I get irrationally angry. I'm hoping that tendency will subside as I get more used to working with it.

xclite, on 08 April 2019 - 11:06 AM, said:

Javascript is Javascript; not going anywhere, you probably already know some... tooling here has gotten better, but isn't as good as what you'd find in e.g. the .NET world. Can't be escaped if you're a webby person.

I thought I knew a fair bit of Javascript, but my boss is sending me links to libraries I didn't know existed. So it's tutorial after tutorial after tutorial to learn what these libraries can do... followed by sheer frustration when I can't get it to work within the confines of my ASP or C# code.

xclite, on 08 April 2019 - 11:06 AM, said:

Docker is definitely a complicating factor, and all I can say is I'm sorry. Docker is basically the software industry throwing up its hands in response to the problem of deployment and dependency management and saying "eff it, we'll just deploy an entire operating system." Thankfully Docker is relatively simple once you get a container built and hopefully you shouldn't have to spend too much time on this.

Boss is a hardcore Docker fan. No one knows why. Everything has to go through Docker. I can't say I fully understand it's purpose. Coming from 20 years of PHP and super simple deployment, there are pieces of this nightmare I'm really having trouble wrapping my head around.

xclite, on 08 April 2019 - 11:06 AM, said:

NuGet is definitely a good thing to learn. Any competent language going forward is going to have a good package manager, and NuGet is supposed to be quite decent. This is a transferable piece of knowledge.

I only know of NuGet inside of Visual Studio. In some ways, it simplifies the addition of JS to a project. In other ways, it's a pain in the ass because once an update is run, previous code will no longer run on it, you have to pull everything back down when you reopen a project... and it's just a headache.

xclite, on 08 April 2019 - 11:06 AM, said:

I find both Visual Studio and Eclipse to be super unnavigable. I find Intellij to be quite helpful in my JVM-land: large projects with large teams are much easier to navigate for me. YMMV.

I find Visual Studio to be the software equivalent of running through mud. But boss insists we all have to use it. No explanation, just "this is what you're using. Period."

xclite, on 08 April 2019 - 11:06 AM, said:

GitHub is worth learning just because everybody seems to use it. It's a pain though, and every company uses a different branch and merge strategy. I highly recommend git overall, even though it requires a nontrivial amount of effort to understand its model of operation.

I was actually excited about the GitHub/code repository end of things, but I have to run Git through VS and it just adds an unnecessary layer of complexity to each and every project.

I was thrown into this with very little guidance. My first project using all this crap was not, as one might assume when learning new languages, a simple website to get a feel for how it all works. Instead, my first project is a cross-browser compatible video player with full seeking functionality that reports the authenticated user's total elapsed time since hitting "Play", current location in each video (because they can skip around, re-watch pieces, skip over parts, etc) back to the database in real-time... so, like, every second, it's writing to the database...
Record 44: Bob, Video #24, Time elapsed 1 minute 22 seconds, Video location 1 minute 22 seconds.
Record 45: Bob, Video #24, Time elapsed 1 minute 23 seconds, Video location 1 minute 20 seconds.
Record 46: Bob, Video #24, Time elapsed 1 minute 24 seconds, Video location 0 minutes 32 seconds.

Ultimately, it will also have a real-time chat feature, a quizzing/testing feature, and a discussion forum feature. I have been explicitly forbidden (by the client) to use any third party products. Everything HAS to be built and hosted in-house. The client and client's team are a very whimsical bunch and prone to fits of fancy. We have weekly update meetings regarding the status of this project which usually involves me responding, "Um... I've been working through tutorials" and the client giving us a new list of 23 more features they'd like to see added to the system (grading rubrics, video commenting system, user roles with specialized views based on the role, customizable groups within each role, etc, etc, etc). Plus a function to upload new users, and assign usernames and passwords, and notify each new user that their new account has been created, by a single click spreadsheet upload.

The original deadline for this modern marvel was May 30. Even if I was writing it all in PHP, there's not a chance in hell this thing is going to be done by the end of May, much less writing it in languages of which I barely have a beginner's grasp.

I'm more than a little fussy right now. I need a pack of cigarettes, a bottle of rum, and a long goddamned nap.

[rgfirefly24]

Day 1 of unplanned Vacation. I got a lot of couch time in today as I just wasn't in a mood to do anything. I'm planning to take some Angular courses and brush up on my front end. Tomorrow is going to be filled with driving into my soon to be new office during rush hour to make sure I understand the full extent of the commute, as well as doing some stuff around the house that I've been meaning to get to. Still not fully 100% from being let go, but it's getting better.

[jon.kiparsky]

BenignDesign, on 08 April 2019 - 11:52 AM, said:

Boss is a hardcore Docker fan. No one knows why. Everything has to go through Docker. I can't say I fully understand it's purpose. Coming from 20 years of PHP and super simple deployment, there are pieces of this nightmare I'm really having trouble wrapping my head around.

Docker, as xclite says, is a heavyweight problem to a nontrivial solution. And vice-versa, I suppose.

It sounds like you're getting railroaded into what might be a cargo-cult usage of docker, but the upside is, this is career development on his dime. If you need to use this, carve out the time to learn what you need to, and then add that to your resume.

This may or may not be one of them, but there are circumstances where docker is more good than harm, so it's not a bad thing to get your head around it.

Quote

ASP.net isn't a huge problem. Getting the MVC portion is a headache. What's the point? Why is it done this way? What's wrong with having a file and all the stuff you need without having to worry about what goes into Models, Views, and Controllers? And every tutorial I watch throws in a Hubs folder, too. Please the Javascript folder and the CSS folder and a Content folder and a Start folder and a Data folder and a Font folder. Nevermind the properties and references and Connected Services and packages and jesus! It just seems like a lot of garbage to do what I can already do with a lot less headache.

As a design pattern, MVC is a good way to structure an application which allows people to see and manipulate data. I'm not familiar with the proprietary-sounding buzzwordy usage that I come across in a microsoft context, but if it's a formalization of the design pattern, it might be helpful to see what it's buying you.
PHP is traditionally easy to deploy and hard to maintain, one of the selling points of MVC is that, in exchange for adding complexity to a simple app setup, it allows you to scale out feature-wise while bounding the growth of complexity. In the long run, this is a good trade-off.

[modi123_1]

@B9 - I hopped the ASP.NET MVC and went right to Razor pages. More intuitive and a descent pullback from the jump into MVC™.

[BenignDesign]

I did some brief playing around with Razor pages and they're far more straight forward and easier to get a job done. When I mentioned it to the boss, however, I was told I have to use MVC.

The general consensus from the rest of the department is he insists we all use whatever he uses. Instead of trying to branch out and use what is best for each situation, he's spent his career doing things one specific way and refuses to try anything else. Therefore, we all have to do it the way he would do it or suffer his wrath.