If you reached this site while attempting to find the wedding site belonging to Raj and Dana, it’s possible you didn’t include the “www” in the front of the URL. No worries, you can find our wedding site here.
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Automobile Magazine gives 2013 Car of the Year award to Tesla Model S
Automobile Magazine released an article awarding the Tesla Model S as it’s 2013 Car of the Year.
Elon Musk unveils Tesla Supercharger Network
Some of you may know that I work for Tesla Motors. Last night, at the Fremont factory, Elon Musk unveiled the very new and up until now, very secretive Tesla Supercharger network. The goal? “Relatively” non-stop driving of your Tesla Model-S between Lake Tahoe, Los Angeles, and Las Vegas, in the short term. Long term? Superchargers all over US, Canada, Europe, and Asia. Enjoy the video on youtube.
Change your default text editor in Mac OS X
Ok, I’m going to do my best not to make this a hate post, I already have one of those. Instead, let’s make this an educational post. Let’s take a look at the ridiculous easy and convenient way in which you change a default text editor in Mac OS X.
Go into Finder, and right click on any file that you would want to open in your favorite text editor.
Select the “Get Info” option from the right click menu.
In the Info Dialog, go down to the section labeled “Open with:” and in that dropdown, you can select your favorite editor! I like to use MacVim.
And there you go! Isn’t that totally convoluted and ridiculous simple and intuitive!
Ok, Spotlight is pretty cool
Just a quick note today on Macs. I found something that I do like. Yes, that’s right. I found something about my Mac that I like better than any Windows system I’ve had before. What, you say? But you thought I hated Macs? Well, it’s true that I have been constantly finding things about the Mac that I dislike. But let’s be realistic here. Many many thousands of people love Macs and it was only a matter of time that I came upon something that they happen to do better than Microsoft.
So what is this feature that has won over a smidgeon of my heart? Spotlight. Now, Windows 7 does have a similar functionality, but in my experience, it’s not as fast and it definitely doesn’t have the added “preview” capability, which is quite nice. Well done, Apple. Well done.
Learning to strongly dislike Macs
I don’t want to use the word hate. I’m not one of those people that never says “hate”. I probably say it all the time. But I don’t want to use that word here. It’s not appropriate. However, I really am in the process of strongly disliking a lot of things about Macs.
Before I launch into details, let’s get a couple things straight:
- I am a computer person. I grew up using computers and I like computers in general. The Mac is not an exception here. The hardware is great. The look and feel is great. It has a smooth, sexy look that is very likable.
- I am a new Mac user. I have been a PC person my whole life and recently, when switch companies, my new work laptop is a 15-inch Macbook Pro, with a 2.2 GHz Intel Core i7. It’s not a bad machine by any standard.
So what do I hate strongly dislike? Let’s make a list and then go through it, shall we?
- Keyboard
- Hotkey choices
- Apples “natural” choices
Let’s just start with those three. First off, the keyboard. Specifically, the bottom-left section of the Apple keyboard. Why is there a function key at the bottom left? If you are in ANY sort of tech field, you use the Control key WAY more than any sort of function key. Well, where to put the function key, you might ask? Why not do what all common USB keyboards do and put the function key up at the top, with the rest of the function keys. It makes no sense to me. It’s constantly in the way and every time I accidentally hit the function key, which is still at least once or twice a day (started out at 10-15 times a day), I wonder why it’s there, and why they didn’t just make it like any other keyboard.
Secondly, hotkey choices. Now, I’m not saying apple needs to do it the way PC’s do it. But there are a lot more common hotkeys between Linux and PC than there are between Mac and PC. Why is this? Well firstly, it comes back to that damn keyboard. The function and “apple” hotkeys on the apple keyboard play way too much part in the hotkeys. What happened to CTRL-v. Why does it have to be [Apple]-v. Makes no sense to me. Not only that, but in common programs, like Microsoft Excel, the hotkeys for things are different or not even there. For example, the “Replace” functionality (you may think of it as “Search and Replace”) is CTRL-h on all PC’s. The hotkey doesn’t exist by default on the Mac version of Microsoft Excel. What the hell is that? Now I understand that is a manufacturer choice and Microsoft could choose to put that on, but to me this all seems to stem from the different hotkey choices that Apple users are forced to endure for, what seems to me, to be no reason at all. and Alt-Tab? Nope, don’t think so. Apple-Tab it is.
Lastly, the “natural” choices in Mac OS. These are just silly. Different touchscreen orientation? Did scrolling change overnight and nobody bothered to tell everyone? So it’s more like using a touchscreen. Except that I’m NOT using a touchscreen. What is intuitive on an iPad or some other touchscreen application is NOT intuitive for a trackpad where the original functionality was there to mimic dragging the taskbar.
Any other PC-turned-Mac users out there have any comments on the matter?
How do you reject a good candidate?
This topic is a bit outdated as I am not at the company in question anymore, but I felt like posting it all the same, even if it means I just look back after some time and think about it again.
Back in early April we were hiring for a single position. Interviewed approximately 10 candidates and found one that I thought was a great candidate: great job experience, good attitude, good references. Had all the paperwork ready and then a single phone conversation derailed it all. In the interests of protecting the candidate and the company I can’t really go into the details but needless to say, while I disagreed with the reasons of my manager and my manager’s manager, I could not hire someone that I trusted but they did not, so I had to make the call. Were we unfair? Did we make the wrong choice? I’m left with an awful feeling.
How do you leave a good job?
How do you leave a good job? A tough question to answer, for more than one reason. Before we tackle the question as a whole, we need to really drill down to the definition of a “good” job. WHAT makes a job good? After that, we want to answer WHY we want to leave this good job. Then we can think about HOW.
When I think of a great job, I think of the following:
- Compensation, including benefits (obviously)
- Workload
- Travel requirements
- Room for growth (promotion prospects)
- Educational value (how much you can learn from this job)
- Career path (how the job gets you to that final dream job position)
How would you prioritize that list? The last three are the most important in the long run. Those three aspects will determine how your career unfolds and the opportunities made available to you for the rest of your life. Unfortunately, my impression is that at least 50% of people focus on the first three aspects instead. You may disagree with my list but for the sake of the rest of this post, let’s accept the six main aspects given previously, and look at them one by one.
Compensation is important, but only to a certain extent. You want to be well compensated and comfortable but once you reach that point, it becomes a non-issue. Desired workload is dependent on the individual. Some are happy with more, some less. Travel is also an individual preference for the same reasons. Any one of these three aspects can vary in a job and I would still stick with the job. If two or more of these aspects are negative, you should consider leaving.
What is really important are the next three aspects. If you are largely unhappy with any one of those three aspects, you have reason to consider leaving. Those three aspects will shape your career for the rest of your life and should be prioritized over everything else. In summary, if you are unhappy with two out of the first three aspects, and one or more of the last three aspects, you could consider leaving your job, even if the other aspects are very good.
Finally, how do you leave this job gracefully and without burning any bridges? Let’s envision a job where only the workload and the career path aspects are bad. You are still getting great compensation, little to no travel, learning a lot and you are advancing nicely with the respect of your peers. However, you have a vision of where you want to be in ten years and you just don’t see this job getting you to that position. By all definition this is still a good job, it’s just not the job for you. It could be a great job for someone else. So what to do? First, gain the proper perspective. Spend some time and reflect. Come up with a rock solid way to verbalize your position on the aspect of the job that is making you unhappy. Now you have a clear unambiguous way to explain to your superiors why you are leaving. Second, give as much time as you can before you leave to passdown your critical ownerships. Make the transition as painless as possible. It’s going to take your peers months to compensate for you leaving and the easier you make it for them, the better it will be for you. You want to maintain as much network as you can. Who knows, you may need to go back there someday (it happens).
I hope this helps many of you out there put your life in perspective the way I have in the last month. Remember that it’s your life and you will only get where you want to be if you grab the reigns and drive yourself.
Successful Blog Writing
What leads to successful blog writing? Do you have to be a fantastic writer in order to have a successful blog? I hope not, otherwise this site is doomed to fail before it even gets off the ground. Nevertheless, I feel like the longer I live, the more I have to say. Or maybe I just run out of people to tell?
I love cartoons and chances are the majority of my posts will contain at least one. I even found a website that specializes in cartoons that you can use in your blog. This one seems to properly identify my thoughts on the subject at hand. Here goes nothing.
Cartoon by Dave Walker. Find more cartoons you can freely re-use on your blog at We Blog Cartoons.
Career Path Considerations
I recently have been strongly considering my career path. I work for a company that is tough, demanding, makes you travel, requires long hours at times, and for 4 years didn’t give me any sort of substantial raise. However, recently they have shown their appreciation by giving me a 30% raise and a promotion, the highest raise ever given to an employee in the history of the company in one iteration. I am in no way ungrateful and I wouldn’t even consider being unhappy had not another event transpired to put things into perspective.
In my first post on “An Engineer a Day. . .”, let me accent the conversation, as I may often do in this soon-to-be-blog, with a Dilbert. 
When you envision your career path, how do you know you are in the right job/industry/company? How do you define advancement? How do you gauge your progress as an individual in the workplace? And after you answer those questions for yourself, do you think your company views you in the same way?
If you felt like there was a disparity between the company vision of your career path and your own, would you jump ship? What about jumping ship right after a 30% raise? This is the topic my mind has been dwelling on for the past week. What do you think?