Professionally, I work as a Software Engineer at GoDaddy.com. The crazy Super Bowl ads and fun company culture are what attracted me to work there. The owner of GoDaddy.com, Bob Parsons, has a list of "16 rules for success in business or life in general" which I thought were worth sharing.

1. Get and stay out of your comfort zone.
2. Never give up.
3. When you are ready to quit, you're closer than you think.
4. Accept the worst possible outcome.
5. Focus on what you want to have happen.
6. Take things a day at a time.
7. Always be moving forward.
8. Be quick to decide.
9. Measure everything of significance.
10. Anything that is not managed will deteriorate.
11. Pay attention to your competitors, but pay more attention to what you're doing.
12. Never let anybody push you around.
13. Never expect life to be fair.
14. Solve your own problems.
15. Don't take yourself too seriously.
16. There's always a reason to smile.
Bob's motto is "We're not here for a long time, we're here for a good time". He has a video blog which has a lot of great material worth checking out. He also reads every comment and responds to a lot of them.
http://www.bobparsons.tv/

Labels: Personal

Last August I stumbled upon the personal website of Bjarne Stroustrup, the creator of the C++ programming language. I am a pretty big fan of his and it was great to read the articles and FAQ on his personal web site.
http://www.research.att.com/~bs/

I was surprised to see his email listed so I wrote him a quick message:
Hi Bjarne,

I found your homepage randomly today and wanted to let you know how
much I enjoy the C++ language. I own your book (which I've read
through many times) , "The C++ Programming Language", and I really
enjoy programming in C++.

This might be an odd request, but would I be able to get an
autographed photo of you? I would proudly display this in my office
everyday, especially if it had a silly line like "Brian, you'll never
be as good as me at C++ but thanks for buying my book - Bjarne".

I'm a 26 year old software engineer and my entire career was founded
on the knowledge I gained by becoming an expert at C++. If you were
up for that, it would mean a lot. If not, that's ok too. Thanks for
everything

Cheers
Brian
About a week later I was checking the mail and noticed a large envelope from TAMU
(click for larger).


"To Brian Clifton, All the best with C++"

Labels: C++, Personal

I found this old photo of myself on the internet when I was doing a search for my own name. It's pretty unusual to find that people sit around scanning highschool yearbooks and putting the pictures on the internet.

Hello ladies!

Labels: Personal

In October 2004, I was working for a local company writing probation and offender software. I had a lot of fun working there; everyone was really nice and the work wasn't too bad (although it was more bug fixing than engineering).

I still remember one guy there, Charles. He's a real big "UNIX / Slashdot" kind of guy. Some other co-workers and I opened up his computer before he arrived one day and put a huge summer sausage from Costco inside. He was completely dumbfounded when he cracked open the PC and found this (we disconnected his hard drive so he'd have to open it up). When I worked there I also met a really cute girl named Tammy who worked at a company across the hall. She worked at a law firm that handled settlements for fraud cases or something like that. Overall, working there was fun, but it was a job that didn't have any potential. There were 3 main people who obviously were there since day 1 and they pretty much run the show.

I recognized that quickly and started pursuing other interests within a week or two. I left there in December 2004 accepting an offer working for a payment processing startup company. I was one of three people in the company and I was responsible for all software development. It involved working at home everyday, 50 - 90 hours of work a week to stay on schedule, and it got pretty stressful.

Working at home is not all that it's cut out to be. At first, I thought it was a dream job... but long term it definitely takes a certain type of person. Almost everyone I talked to was big on the working in pajamas or being able to do small errands parts. In reality, not leaving the house often is not that great. I had a roommate the entire time I was working at home, so it wasn't as bad as it could be... but you definitely never meet new people at your own house. This led me to a lot of internet dating and is what got me going out all time. I would find excuses to leave the house during the day and talk to people at 7-11 for 30+ minutes. I started going to bars every Friday and Saturday and staying there until close.

I ended up giving a months notice this September (2005) and leaving the company in October. I won't say anything about the details, but I did my best to leave on good terms. I have a feeling that even though I finished all of the engineering involved and almost finished all the development (and even helped locate and train a replacement) that the company is going to scrap my efforts and start from scratch. One of the unique pitfalls of the software industry is that many programmers look at code aestheticly. There are an unlimited number of ways to write code that accomplishes the same task but if the code doesn't "look good" to one person... they would rather rewrite it than use the already complete working logic in the "undesirable" code. I gave up that method of reasoning long ago, but in the industry many folks think like this.

I left that company after accepting an offer from a major semiconductor company and so far I'm loving it. I don't really see myself wanting to leave and I really enjoy every day. All of my colleagues are very professional and very personable. Being able to go back into a cubicle is a great perk too, believe it or not.

Labels: Personal