Weekly review: Week ending November 21, 2008

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I rocked. =)

I turned my Drupal-based project over to a new team member. It was in great shape: the new branch passed all my old regression tests, the deployment script still worked, and the module that I’d partially implemented was well-documented with my notes. I was so glad that I’d invested the time in writing tests, tools, and documentation. I was also glad I insisted on using doxygen for low-level documentation instead of (gack!) Microsoft Word, as doxygen gave us call graphs and caller graphs for free. I checked on the team members today to see if there was anything else they needed in order to work effectively, and it looks like everyone’s happy.

I started a new Drupal-based project on Tuesday, and I brought the habits and tools I picked up during the previous project. The features I’ve been working on now have nice little tests. I’ve automated more of the install and testing process. I also spent some time scrubbing my old deployment scripts, and I sent them to the person who just started as the release engineer for the project. Things are going well. =)

I still haven’t met another Linux-based Drupal developer within IBM, though. =| No matter – maybe I’ll eventually inspire people to give it a try!

I helped Aaron Kim and Bernie Michalik out with a workshop for a major insurance company. I seem to be their go-to idea-generator, which is awesome fun. I love coming up with a range of ideas based on what I’ve seen, what I’d like to see, what technology makes possible, and so on. I think Aaron exaggerated when he said I come up with hundreds of ideas, but it _is_ a lot of fun for me. I get to play with all sorts of combinations of interesting things. I attended part of the workshop, too, and I shared a couple of stories.

I also found myself gathering resources this week. I handled a number of requests for information on new employees, Gen Y, social networking research, and other topics, and people were very happy with the information and people I pointed them to. I get a lot of questions because people know I’m interested in these things, and I love handling those questions because each question gives me an opportunity to organize more information in a coherent way. I get to build on top of other things I’ve done before! =)

So that was this week: I turned over my old project (in a way that made me happy), hit the ground running (in a way that also made me happy), helped generate lots of ideas (and that made me happy too), and answered lots of questions (happy happy happy). Oh, and I sewed a pajama top out of red fleece. (Happy _and_ warm!) =)

Next week: More Drupal work, a Government 2.0 panel, a dinner party with some family friends, and maybe the pajama bottoms…

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