“Before you speak, listen. Before you write, think. Before you spend, earn. Before you invest, investigate. Before you criticize, wait. Before you pray, forgive. Before you quit, try. Before you retire, save. Before you die, give.”

Wednesday, August 18, 2010

Sun Certified Enterprise Architect

Today I received a mail from Sun (well Oracle) stating that I have passed the architect certification .. one of my objectives for the year.
What does this mean ? It means I have passed the highest Sun Java certification enabling me to actually design and implement a solution for an actual business problem. It is an external confirmation of my worth as a professional and it makes me confident I can use my UML and design skills at my job.
It has been a lengthy process starting from I could say December 2006 (officially in October 2007 with part 1) and really ending in July 2010 (on 23rd) with the submission of the assignment.
How I took the parts
In October 2007 while working in France I took part I - easiest of all
May 2010 I received the assignment and started working on it.
Two months and a lot of work latter I submitted the assignment .
August 18th - received email from Sun confirming I have passed.

I was really busy and tried to stay committed to the goal while maintaining a busy work schedule and other social obligations. I think SCEA is a worthy goal for people with less than 10 years experience.

As I posted on the blog I was really motivated to do it as I had invested some money into it.
Now I am working on a GWT and Java application which will be running in the Google App Engine and which will be available to plenty of users (me especially). But that is for another post.

My Ruby love -affair is still on and on weekends using my wife's laptop I do some coding in Ruby also but for now I can't find anything relevant in the job market - not even project-based.
I had to cancel the master program (did not want to get into debt to finance it) but otherwise I am doing pretty good.

Tuesday, August 10, 2010

The failure

Ever had the feeling you know precisely what needs to be done and yet for an unknown reason you fail to do it ?
This is not about the failure of my SCEA certification .. I am still waiting for the results from Sun after having submitted it on July 23rd(although I might fail the cert too) , it's about failure to keep things over control.
The last months where a continuous and accelerated degradation of my life .. in more ways then I am willing to admit.
Although I am quite confident that a GTD style needs to be used and applied at work and in personal life, that diet food is better for me,that TV time is useless time e and that concentration on work things is mandatory I cannot do the right stuff.
I found myself procrastinating and browsing car forums despite my commitment to being car-lite or even car free.
I know debt is bad but I just applied for a credit card .. it is really unbelievable.
Here I am at 2.00 AM writing on the blog after not being able to sleep for 3h.
I blame the high daily temperatures for this (35-37 Celsius ) behaviour.
My mind is obsessed with 2 idiotic things : buying a laptop (and making the purchase look necessary) and controlling expenses ( I have been an avid reader of GRS)
Since working for one employer is a risky endeavours I am trying to find other income sources which can finance say a laptop purchase a month at least.So far not very successful with this issue.
I am looking at
1) Freelancing - slim chances in J2EE field
2) Google Android development - requires a 500 Euro investment in Android phone and offers
little profit guarantees
3) Doing something completely unrelated (driving a taxi maybe ? ).


In other news :
My Decathlon Triban Trail 7(trekking bike) is officially 3 years old .. and has only 3000 km on it .. I need to increase the mileage on it.
Today after 3 months I managed to see my weight going under 100 kg again - 99.9 kg.
My wife agreed to let me buy a road bike when I reach 90 kg so I must not give up.
Last but not least after spending a lot of money in our short holiday in Amsterdam we got to see that fascinating city. I got to walk and bike and .. yes smoke pot in Amsterdam :). I wish I could write more but all I can say after 4 days is that Amsterdam really is the city of freedom and it is fantastic for tourists a great place to spend some of your holiday.
On the other hand I realised that although it is a bike paradise ( you are king of the road with your bike there) it was not designed to be a bike paradise (neither was most of Holland) , the bike simply imposed as the best solution for the city transportation (the lands is very flat).
I have met another Romanian guy which as hired to work there this month. By checking the prices and the salary he quoted I know that it is better then what I make .. and many of my colleagues. Unfortunately for the moment such a thing is not possible for us.
Oh .. did I mention my English looks pathetic when compared to the English of people in Netherlands ? I should have... because I felt embarrassed there (this does not happen very often) for not spelling words right in English.

Well I wrote here for 30 minutes .. it's time to get some sleep and re-organize in the morning.