You've reached the internet home of Chris Sells, who has a long history as a contributing member of the Windows developer community. He enjoys long walks on the beach and various computer technologies.
Tuesday, Apr 22, 2003, 9:39 AM
My Dad's All Set to Work At Microsoft
The one where my Dad answers the Microsoft manhole interview question and we judge just how far from the tree this acorn has fallen.
Tuesday, Apr 22, 2003, 9:03 AM
Write Access to RegexD Source
Here. I've had a bunch of requests for write access to the RegexD source. I provide read-only access to the RegexD source via a .zip file in the RegexD GotDotNet workspace. If you want write access, add your code to the snapshot of code in the workspace and send it to me for review. If it passes muster, I'll add you as a read/write member of the workspace. This helps me to ensure that only good code makes it into RegexD. Thanks!
Tuesday, Apr 22, 2003, 8:58 AM in .NET
Borland details .NET development tools
Here. Yet another signal of the inevitability of .NET.
Tuesday, Apr 22, 2003, 12:00 AM in Interview
My Dad's All Set to Work At Microsoft
Tue, Apr 22, 2003
My Dad, a long-time draftsman in a civil engineering firm in Fargo, ND, had this to say about manhole covers:
"It's like this. Sanitary manhole covers are usually round (and solid, i.e. VERY heavy) but Storm sewer manhole and Inlet covers are usually square or rectangular grates which let water in. The deciding factor is where they are placed relative to the curb line. All covers are actually installed on a concrete generic 'Mexican Hat' structure which can be centered or offset to one side. The structure fits on the round concrete casting (5' - 8" diameter) and can be made to accept any solid or grated casting. If this part of the world, where river flooding is fairly common, Sanitary manholes and lift stations are either raised above potential flood limits if possible or sealed and bolted shut, making them much more difficult to open. It's also a very good idea to vent Sanitary manholes and lift station with a portable fan to avoid being overcome by methane and other gasses trapped in them."
Anyone wonder where I got it? : )
Monday, Apr 21, 2003, 5:28 PM
CornSharp
Here. From Eric Sink: CornSharp (written entirely in C#) is a free tool for editing and publishing a weblog. CornSharp generates static HTML files which can be used on any web server.
Monday, Apr 21, 2003, 1:41 PM
"Look with favor upon a bold beginning"
Here. The one where I start to work for Microsoft as an employee.
Monday, Apr 21, 2003, 12:00 AM in The Spout
"Look with favor upon a bold beginning"
A couple of weeks ago, I was having lunch with my wife at a little Chinese restaurant. My fortune was the title of this spout piece. I immediately associated it with my recent job interview at Microsoft and it made me smile. I had already pretty much decided to take the job, but it was nice that the Universe agreed with me. : )
Right now I'm sitting in NEO (New Employee Orientation) for Microsoft employees. Not only is it a cool name, but the nice folks at Microsoft provide a wireless network for new folks that can't spent hours w/o one (although I'm the only one that's geeky enough to have his laptop out at the moment : ). I start today as a Content Strategist on the MSDN content team at Microsoft, Corp. I'll be in charge of the Longhorn DevCenter. A DevCenter is a section of the MSDN web site that focuses on a specific technology area, like the XML/Web Services DevCenter.
Longhorn is Microsoft's next major operation system (and different than Windows Server 2003, which is the OS that Microsoft is launching this month). I can't (yet) say anything more about Longhorn except that it's cool enough that I took a job at MS so that I could get my hands on it. If you are dying for more info on Longhorn, but aren't quite ready to change your employment arrangements to get it, check out the PDC in October. And, if you stop by and say "hi," I'll show you the implant scars... : )
Monday, Apr 21, 2003, 12:00 AM in Interview
The Human Side of Microsoft
For more than a year, I've had a request to video tape an interview at Microsoft up on this page. The goal was to show the human side of Microsoft by showing that one of their most famous practices isn't something to be scared of. I never expected that I'd actually get to tape an interview. In fact, I expected to be ignored by Microsoft altogether.
Of course, as the most juicy litigation target in the world, and especially sensitive to legal issues, Microsoft couldn't grant my request. That didn't surprise me. What did surprise me is how hard that they tried. In fact, all kinds of folks at Microsoft -- from engineers who wanted to interview me to managers who wanted to help make it happen to HR folks who went to legal to ask -- all kinds of folks at Microsoft really did *try* to make it happen.
So, while I'll never be able to put a recording of an interview up on this site, I can tell you that my mission to find the human side of Microsoft was a success. All of the people I've encountered there -- whether trying to let me tape an interview or taking my feedback on whatever technology I'm working that day -- all of the folks that I've encountered at Microsoft really *care* about doing the right thing. They want interviewees to succeed. They want to build the right products. They want to meet their customers' needs. And as much guff as I give them (they are a juicy target), by and large they succeed. I wouldn't spend my time with their technologies if they didn't.
With that in mind, I withdraw my request. I'm seen the human side of Microsoft. Thanks for showing it to me.
Sunday, Apr 20, 2003, 1:44 PM
Windows 2003 Hands on Labs
Here. From Carlos Aquino: I found Windows 2003 Hands on Labs on http://www.only4gurus.com . There is three exercises about the new features coming with the Windows 2003 Server. They have a section with some documentations about it too.
Sunday, Apr 20, 2003, 12:00 AM in Interview
Interview Synopsis
From Fred (not his real name):
So the interview was rough, as to be expected. Here is a synopsis:10:15-10:45 - Met with my recruiter. Discussed what day would be like and talked about the two teams I would be interviewing with: the CLR team and the Enterprise Services team.
11:00-12:00 - Enterprise Services Interview: Discussed High Performance systems and Enterprise Service standards. Programming problem: Design and Implement a self-managing Thread Pool class.
12:00-1:30 - CLR team Lunch interview: Discussed Security in the CLR and PKI. Programming problem: two fixed length buffers padded with nulls. Swap and reverse them, not swapping and reversing nulls.
2:00-3:00 - Enterprise Services interview: Discussed VS.NET. Design a function to select the six strongest stations for a car stereo.
3:30-4:30 - CLR team interview: Implement strpbak. Common Parent for two nodes BTree problem.
Sunday, Apr 20, 2003, 12:00 AM in Interview
If Richard Feynman applied for a job at Microsoft
Interviewer: Now comes the part of the interview where we ask a question to test your creative thinking ability. Don't think too hard about it, just apply everyday common sense, and describe your reasoning process.
Here's the question: Why are manhole covers round?
Feynman: They're not. Some manhole covers are square. It's true that there are SOME round ones, but I've seen square ones, and rectangular ones.
Interviewer: But just considering the round ones, why are they round?
Feynman: If we are just considering the round ones, then they are round by definition. That statement is a tautology.
Interviewer: I
mean, why are there round ones at all? Is there some particular value to having round ones?
Feynman: Yes. Round covers are used when the hole they are covering up is also round. It's simplest to cover a round hole with a round cover.
Interviewer: Can you think of a property of round covers that gives them an advantage over square ones?
Feynman: We have to look at what is under the cover to answer that question. The hole below the cover is round because a cylinder is the strongest shape against the compression of the earth around it. Also, the term "manhole" implies a passage big enough for a man, and a human being climbing down a ladder is roughly circular in cross-section. So a cylindrical pipe is the natural shape for manholes. The covers are simply the shape needed to cover up a cylinder.
Interviewer: Do you believe there is a safety issue? I
mean, couldn't square covers fall into the hole and hurt someone?
Feynman: Not likely. Square covers are sometimes used on prefabricated vaults where the access passage is also square. The cover is larger than the passage, and sits on a ledge that supports it along the entire perimeter. The covers are usually made of solid
metal and are very heavy. Let's assume a two-foot square opening and a ledge width of 1-1/2 inches. In order to get it to fall in, you would have to lift one side of the cover, then rotate it 30 degrees so that the cover would clear the ledge, and then tilt the cover up nearly 45 degrees from horizontal before the center of gravity would shift enough for it to fall in. Yes, it's possible, but very unlikely. The people authorized to open manhole covers could easily be trained to do it safely. Applying common engineering sense, the shape of a manhole cover is entirely determined by the shape of the opening it is intended to cover.
Interviewer (troubled): Excuse
me a moment; I have to discuss something with my management team. (Leaves room.)
(Interviewer returns after 10 minutes)
Interviewer: We are going to recommend you for immediate hiring into the marketing department.
Keith Michaels
krm@sdc.cs.boeing.com
Saturday, Apr 19, 2003, 8:38 PM in .NET
New OpenGL binding for .NET
From Randy Ridge: New OpenGL binding for .NET from the CsGL people, supporting GL 1.1, GLU 1.3, and GLUT 3.7.6. CLS-compliant, cross-platform, yada, yada.
Saturday, Apr 19, 2003, 12:24 AM in Interview
My Interview At Microsoft
I had an interesting two days interviewing at Microsoft. Bottom line: I didn't say whether I accepted their offer.
Friday, Apr 18, 2003, 11:37 PM
Blog Entries as "Flair"
Here. This slayed me…
Friday, Apr 18, 2003, 2:03 PM
Brian Valentine talks Windows Server 2003
Here. From Keith Wedinger: Interview with Brian Valentine, Senior Vice President of the Windows team at Microsoft regarding the development of Windows Server 2003. What's interesting is Brian's comment about the possible use of managed code within Windows itself.