Something Happened

Looking back, looking forward

2011-03-31T21:32:00.000-07:00

This spring roughly marks the 5 year mark from when Libranet shut down. Looking back, a lot has happened over the past half-decade, and I think I now have enough distance from the events surrounding the ending of the Libranet project to sit down and write a little bit about what happened.

Background

Libranet GNU/Linux was a Linux desktop system envisioned by my father Jon as the result of a search for a better, more rewarding computing experience. Towards the end of the 90's Jon found himself in the position of looking for a new project for Libra Computer Systems, a business he founded in 1984. His current projects had wrapped up, and he found himself drawn towards the world of Linux systems. Pushed away from the Microsoft world by the poor quality of engineering, and pulled towards the Unix-like GNU/Linux operating system Jon found himself installing Debian GNU/Linux as an initial point of exploration. After several painful hours of installation, configuration, and exploration Jon realized that he had not only found himself an alternative operating system, but had found a project to work on. The goal: build a complete GNU/Linux desktop OS that was easy to install and maintain. And so Libranet was born, a project designed to build off the amazing Debian community and bring a polished desktop system to the world.

The Atmosphere

In the late 90's into 2000 and before the dot com bust in 2001 the tech world felt a little like it does now a decade later with lots of money an optimism around. Hair-brained ideas with little business sense were being drowned in venture capital, and it seemed like the world was about to dive head-first in to an entirely new digital age. Jon took a different approach with Libranet. We were a self-funded project with him and I spending countless hours conceptualizing and building the product while simultaneously learning what we needed to build a website and store for Libranet, produce some graphics and marketing material, and sell and support the product. This approach was difficult as it required both of us to learn how to do things we had no prior experience with, but at the same time it allowed us to maintain and control the scope of our project and remain self-supporting.

The Product

Libranet was the outcome of many small things done well. The Linux kernel, the GNU system, and the Debian distribution were and are very solid projects, and they provided us with the building blocks to end up with a complete and usable system. It was up to us to streamline installation and setup of the system, curate the contents of the system, and provide email support to our users so that they could overcome any initial difficulties. The fact that we were the development team and technical support rolled in to one meant that any support issues immediately became issues to address in our next release. By our last release, Libranet 3.0, we were providing a fast streamlined installation, streamlined and comprehensive system administration, all backed up by a solid set of online documentation and an engaged user community.

The Work

Working on Libranet was all consuming. For most of the project's lifetime all of my energy and time was primarily directed towards work on Libranet. The majority of my waking hours for 6 days a week would be dedicated towards providing support for our users whilst designing and developing our next release. I wore many hats: software designer, tech support, sys admin, web designer, print designer, tech writer. I don't claim to have done an expert job in all of these fields, but there was work to be done and we had only ourselves to do it.

Learning

I started Libranet without any software development skills, having never used a Linux system, and without any business experience to speak of. Jon mentored me, passing on all of his skills and knowledge of software systems design and giving me the tools to grow and expand as Libranet did. I began as a neophyte and ended the project with a solid working knowledge of software design and management.

Sickness

Late in 2003 Jon was diagnosed with cancer. Needless to say this was devastating to our whole family and put us as a unit into crisis management mode. Nevertheless Jon, and the rest of the family maintained a determined optimism that he could make it through this illness and survive to continue on. As the months progressed and Jon's health deteriorated Libranet continued on with more and more of the day to day running of the business that Jon had always taken care of falling on me. All the while development of Libranet 3.0 continued at as best a pace as it could.

The Final Release

Libranet 3.0 was released in the spring of 2005 a few short weeks before Jon passed away. It was a release that we were immensely proud of not only due to the technical achievement, but due to the struggle we overcame to finally get it done. Towards the end Jon was in no state to be able to handle much of the business, and helping the family take care of him became as much my job as running Libranet was.

Family

Any family that has experienced severe illness can attest to the toll it takes on a family as a whole. Thankfully ours was a family that pulled together in this time of need, all of us doing our part to care as best as we were able for each other and make it through the roughly yeah and half of illness. Despite the fact that Jon did not survive I truly feel that we strengthened as a family during this time and it was a time of many life lessons and growth.

Business

After Jon's death in June 2005 running Libranet fell solely to me. I had many dreams and desires surrounding Libranet, but I found that I was unable to run the day to day business while working to develop the product further. After 5 years of working on Libranet and the death of my father and mentor I was physically and emotionally incapable of continuing the project. I placed the project on hold to do some soul searching only to finally end the business early in 2006.

Passing Libranet On

After deciding that I was unable to continue with Libranet myself I was left with the decision of what to do with the project. In 2005 the Linux desktop market was somewhat changed from our first release in 1999. The Ubuntu and Fedora projects were beginning to catch up with Libranet in terms of ease of use and installation, and at a price (free) that we could not hope to match. Members of the Libranet community offered to take up the project, but I was reluctant to give up the name and legacy of Libranet, a project that had so many hours of my own and my fathers efforts poured in to it. Libranet 3.0 was a solid, competitive release, and I'd seen many open source projects get passed from initial creator into community management only to flounder and die a slow death. Part of me wanted the final release that Jon and I oversaw to be the final hurrah, and I also felt that I would feel bound to spend a lot of time with any community project, something that I felt I was unable to do at that time.

Life Moving On

In December 2005 I met and fell in love with Ilana. It was clear to me at this time that I needed to move on from Libranet and put my face towards the future, keeping the knowledge and lessons of the past while looking forward to new opportunities and adventures.

Looking Back

I do not regret how I handled the end of Libranet's life. I handled things within the emotional context of that time and with the tools I had at my disposal, and I do not think that at that time there was a better way for me to have done things. That being said, with the clearness of hindsight, I would have handled passing on the project slightly differently by at the very least releasing our administration tool and installer under an open source license, perhaps under a name other than Libranet.

Jon

As well as being my father, Jon was my friend, teacher and mentor. I learned so much from him that I will always be grateful for. I had the opportunity to work with him on what was to be his last project, and together we produced something we were proud of, and he was able to pass on to me his expertise and skills which I continue to rely on and build from.

Thanks

Towards the end of the Libranet 3.0 release cycle I had the privilege of working with a talented man by the name of Daniel de Kok. Jon and I recognized Daniel's talent in his frequent contributions to the Libranet user community. We hired him initially to take up some of the tech-support load, but Daniel's software development talents quickly become evident, and he was a big help in finalizing the Libranet 3.0 release. This post was in part inspired by Daniel's retrospective blog post.

Coffee Sanctuary

2011-01-03T16:53:00.001-08:00

Over the past year or so I've become ever more addicted to coffee... specifically the amazing type of coffee that one gets from Third Wave coffee shops. Third Wave coffee shops serving carefully selected and roasted beans with an artisanal flair have become a refuge for me both in the city, and when traveling. They are a place to relax, sip a good brew, and work or read a book.

Vancouver has its share of amazing coffee shops including Elysian, 49th Parallel, Bump N Grind, and the newly opened Kafka's Coffee and Tea. The owners of these shops take coffee to a new level, making sure that their staff are well educated and trained on how to best serve the coffees offered. When traveling it's always a pleasure to find coffee shops with the same level of commitment and quality. Portland has Stumptown, Barista, and red e. San Francisco has Four Barrel and Ritual. Seattle has its own Stumptown locations as well as Victrola, Bauhaus Books & Coffee, and Vivace. Edmonton has a growing scene with Transcend at the centre, and Calgary has the YYC Coffee Disloyalty program encouraging people to visit local coffee shops of which we've been to Phil & Sebastian, Kawa Espresso, deVille, and in Canmore Communitea. We've found these places by chance and by recommendation, and it's always a pleasure to sit down to an amazing cup of coffee and take a load off.

The unfortunate side-effect of discovering good coffee is that I no longer enjoy the mediocre cups of coffee that can be found in the big chains (Starbucks, Second Cup, etc.), and when traveling between cities it can be hard to find a satisfying cup of coffee.

I look forward to more travels, revisiting old discoveries, and making new ones along the way... finding refuges of coffee, snacks, WiFi, and a place to rest between and at destinations.

Bike Maniac

2010-08-11T17:51:00.004-07:00

For the most part I've tended to limit my blog posts to longer, more time consuming content, and while I enjoy writing longer posts, I don't always have the time or energy needed to sit down and write, revise, and edit posts. In the effort of increasing my posting frequency I'm experimenting using a Tumblr blog to post short messages, links, and photos on a more frequent basis than I update this blog. You can find this new "Tumblog" at bikemaniac.ca, and I'm also Tweeting as @taldanzig. I'll continue to post longer entries on this blog, likely as infrequently as previous posts have been.

Pacific Populaire

2010-04-05T18:00:00.003-07:00

Last Sunday Ilana and I completed the BC Randonneurs Pacific Populaire bike ride. We did the 100km route starting from Riley Park, looping past UBC over the Arthur Laing Bridge to circumnavigate Richmond, back into Vancouver over the Canada Line bridge, looping past UBC again to end up back at Riley Park. Including the ride to/from the start point we did 107km in a little less than 5 hours. That day there was very strong wind coming from the East meaning that on several stretches of road we were battling 30-40km/h sustained headwinds. It was a good start to doing some longer distance rides and it made for a nice shakedown ride for my new Brodie Elan touring bike (more on that in another post). Having never done any riding in the Richmond area, I was really pleased with the route the ride took. Most of the time we were on quiet streets or streets with plenty of shoulder space to ride without having to worry about being buzzed by cars, and several parts of the ride wound through scenic views of the Fraser River delta. I'm always on the lookout for new routes to ride, especially ones that combine significant distance with relatively low traffic, and I suspect I'll ride all or part of this route again this year.

Night Riding - Solitary Pleasure

2010-04-02T16:14:00.000-07:00

A couple nights ago I did something that I haven't done since last summer: I went on a mediumish length solo night ride. My ride was a loop starting from home, taking the Seaside Bypass bike route along Vancouver's Northern shore all the way up past Spanish Banks, along South West Marine Dr, up the Cypress bike route to 37th Ave, and back East then North along Cambie and home. The distance was somewhere around the 35-40km mark (my bike computer needs a new battery) making for a 75 minute ride at good pace. I haven't been riding as much as I'd like over the past couple of months especially since my commute to work is no longer long enough to justify biking over transit (ironic that too short a ride puts me off cycling to work), so it was nice to be out for a decent ride where I was able to push a bit.

Night riding is a great way to get out with minimal traffic interference as long as you have sufficient lights to make sure you can be seen. My route took me through a few unlit stretches where I really wished for a better front light. I'm riding with a BLT Super Doppler DX LED light that I've used since 2006. This light is great as a bright "being seen" type of light, but falls short as a true headlight on an unlit road. I'm still figuring out what to get as a proper head light for night rides, but until then this light will do.

Heart Rate

2010-03-23T09:30:00.006-07:00

30min later and my heart rate is still up from my morning commute. Nothing like bad drivers to get the heart rate up when riding to work. First I got buzzed by a motorbike (you'd think our two wheeled motor powered brethren would know better), got passed way to closely by several cars, got overtaken by a car only to have it make a right turn and cut me off forcing me to brake heavily to avoid smacking into the back of it, and to cap it off I got passed by a guy in a convertible with mere inches between my handlebar and his wing mirror. I caught up to him at a light, told him he was way to close only to have him tell me that I should move over (into the parked cars presumably). Sometimes the lack of respect that cyclists receive from motor vehicles just gets on my nerves.

</rant>

Riding for a cause

2010-02-16T00:55:00.000-08:00

This summer my wife, Ilana, will be cycling from Vancouver to Seattle to raise money for cancer. Over the past two years Ilana has made the transition from a good weather recreational cyclist, to a committed, year round cycle commuter. When the opportunity came up to join thousands of other riders she jumped at the chance. Here's how she put it in her own words:

Dear Friends and Family,

This summer I will be taking part in a 2-day bike ride from Vancouver to Seattle called the Ride to Conquer Cancer. This is approximately a 230km ride to raise money for cancer research, treatment, and services. All donations go to the BC Cancer Foundation, a leading comprehensive institution devoted to cancer research and care.

I'm so excited to be on the road joining forces with thousands of cyclists raising money for a cause that is so important. Cycling is a huge passion of mine, and I'm thrilled to be able to use this passion to make an impact. Cancer touches so many of our lives, in so many ways, and I am eager to do what I can to help the fight.

As a participant of this ride, I am pledging to raise a minimum of $2500 in donations. Please consider helping me to meet this goal. Donations are tax-deductible, and can be made online at my page on conquercancer.ca

If you prefer to send a cheque, the website link above has printable forms that can be sent in with the cheque. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to contact me.

Thank you so much.

Ilana

I'm very proud of her commitment and her choice to dedicate her time to this cause.

Google App Engine File Permission Oddity

2009-10-13T03:38:00.000-07:00

I'm posting this in the hope that it may help any poor souls who are struggling with a Python Google App Engine application at the moment. Google App Engine is a web application framework created by Google that allows developers to write Java or Python web based apps and host them on Google infrastructure. I'm working on a project using GAE and ran in to the situation that my application worked perfectly in my local development environment, but running hosted would return a blank page with no error message. Unfortunately there was also nothing in the logs, nor did any of the postings that turned up in my searches seem to help. At any rate, the problem breaks down to two issues:

1. Python scripts must be executable

That is the UNIX executable permission bit needs to be set for the Python script to run. I can't find anywhere in the docs that states this, but it seems to be the case. So Linux or Mac users, make sure you chmod +x your scripts before deploying.

2. Deploying a script with different permissions doesn't change the on server permissions

I ended up having to rename my script file because the permission change wasn't taking effect on the server. Changing the app version made no difference.

Other than the head-meets-desk struggle that the problem described above induced, learning to use Google App Engine has been a thoroughly pleasurable experience, and I look forward to using GAE in ongoing and future projects.

Mini-tour

2009-09-13T23:33:00.000-07:00

Before the weekends get too booked up and hectic Ilana and I decided to scoot off for a quick one-night camping trip. So on Saturday morning we headed off on a 65-70km trek to Golden Ears Provincial Park for a one night biking/camping excursion.

It wasn't a hard ride, with the only real elevation gains taking place in the last 20 or so km. However, the ride did present it's own challenges: We decided to take the most direct route out of Vancouver all the way to Coquitlam, that is to say we rode along Lougheed Highway. While this was a quick route with a decent shoulder most of the way, it wasn't the most interesting or quietest of roads. At some point we just got tired of dealing with the noise and traffic and turned off onto a quiet side path that got us all the way to the Pitt River bridge, all the while warning us that there was absolutely no way for bikes or pedestrians to cross the Pitt River bridge due to construction.

Well, we hadn't come all this way just to turn back and go home, so on reaching the end of the trial complete with dire construction/detour warnings, we decided to tough out the two or three hundred metres across the Pitt River bridge by pretending we were car traffic. This somewhat annoyed some of the drivers we held up, though to be honest we were as polite about it as we could safely be. Since there was no side walk or shoulder to speak of, we simply took up all of one of the two East bound lanes, endured a few honks and pedaled hard to get over the bridge as quickly as possible. Just think of it as a critical mass of two.

That messy bit done with we got off the highway again and rode through lovely Pitt Meadows farmland, on to a riverside lunch stop in Maple Ridge, and into the midst of Golden Ears park, where at twenty to six in the evening we pulled in to a camp spot to set up for the night. Not a bad days riding considering we were taking it pretty easy and had left at one in the afternoon after a slow morning start.

After setting up tent and eating our pre-prepared camp dinner, we headed into our tent to read for a while before settling down for the night.

Unlike the slow start on Saturday, on Sunday morning we woke up early, had a quick bite to eat, broke camp and hit the road by 8:30am. Backtracking through Pitt Meadows we found our way at the Pitt River bridge for a second time, only to find that not only was there a shoulder, but an actual sidewalk that we could use to cross the bridge without bothering the impatient car traffic. If only the detour signs had pointed us here instead of indicating that we wouldn't be able to cross!

After crossing the bridge we again found ourselves on the shoulder of the Lougheed Highway which we stuck to until it disappeared leaving us to make our way through the mostly calm streets and paths of Port Coquitlam and on to Port Moody. From Port Moody we took the wide shoulder of the very scenic Barnet Highway into North Burnaby where there was a bike route to lead us all the way back home.

Now that we've done it a few times, packing and unpacking the bikes is becoming much easier, and it's nice to be able to take off for a self propelled weekend jaunt. Hopefully it won't be the last camping trip of 2009!

The "Mini-Tour" 25 Hour Bike Camp to Golden Ears

Summer Recap

2009-08-29T18:45:00.012-07:00

So summer is almost at an end, my Google internship is over and it's time to start thinking about school again. My internship ended August 14th, which puts me me at the end of week two of a three week break before I start classes at UBC again.

The Internship

Working at Google for the summer was a blast. The people I met at Google were not only first rate engineers, but people who genuinely seemed interested in spending their time writing useful, good, useable software. While I can't talk specifics about the project that I worked on (an as yet unreleased Google product), I can say that in the three and half months that I worked with the team I saw a tightening of focus and goals, and a real drive for improvement and towards release.

Summer Cycling

This summer I started with a goal to bike as much as I could, and I'm happy to say that at this point I'm at roughly 2500km since I started tracking in May this year. Most of the riding was done the area East of Lake Washington (the Kirkland, Redmond, Bellevue area), an area that doesn't have a lot of flat. My commute to/from Google was less than 10km, so I came up with routes that would give me long rides. I had a 38km route home, and a 18km route home so I could vary the effort and distance. Notable rides include looping around Lake Washington (90ish km), the Seven Hills of Kirkland (158km), the Seattle Century (~145km), and many other random rides mostly done solo.

5 days, 330km, 4 ferries, 1 gear, many hills, many many dried dates, much sun, and a lot of fun.

To cap off a summer of great rides, Ilana and I went on a five day bike tour of the Sunshine Coast and Vancouver Island. Day one took us from Vancouver to Horseshoe Bay, and then Gibsons via the Langdale Ferry with a final short, but very steep few km to a friend's place where we stayed the night.

Day two was a lovely 80km all the way up from Gibsons, through Sechelt, and a final 6km off of Highway 101 to Egmont to spend the night at a small harbour campsite.

Day three started with a trail ride (with fully laden bikes no less) to see the amazing Skookumchuck Narrows, a site with some of the fiercest tides I have ever seen. The way back to the ferry that would take us to Powell River would set us up for the hardest (though one of the shortest) riding days of the week. We dubbed the road from Egmont to Earls Cove with its short, but very steep hills the "6km of agony". At least we had a pleasant lunch and wait for the ferry before tackling another set of hills up from the ferry landing at Saltery Bay. Luckly the rest of the ride to Powell River was pretty tame, though the combination of a hot and mentally challenging day left us cursing the sharp climb up from the coast to our Powell River B&B that was our destination for the night.

A beautiful morning ride from our B&B after a fantastic vegan breakfast (with fresh local ingredients) was to set the tone for day four, our longest riding day at 100km. After landing in Comox with a quick stop for groceries, we started South down the scenic costal Highway 19A. With our legs "broken in" from the previous days, the climbs were enjoyable rather than a grind, and the kilometers seemed to roll by quickly. As on previous days, we stopped for snacks and water as opportunities presented themselves, often with amazing beach vistas for us to gaze at as we dug in to our stores of dried fruit snacks, fresh local fruit, and some hummus, pita, pepper, and for the non-vegan some cheese, making for a great on-the-go lunch. During the day while resting at the top of a hill I waved hi to a fully laden rider going the other way. It turned out he was here from Germany for the summer riding all across the country from Vancouver to Jasper and Baniff, down to Yellowstone, and now on the Island, completing, as he called it, "the best summer of my life". By the afternoon we were passing through Qualicum Beach and on to Parksville where we made our camp at Rathtrevor Beach Provincial Park. After a ride back into Parksville for a nice dinner, we settled down for the night.

Day five took us off the quiet Highway 19A and on to the main Highway 19 where a generous shoulder was small comfort from the noise and bustle of the busy main highway. In comparison to the relative quiet and amazing scenery from the previous days, the busy highway and roads all the way to the Nanaimo ferry terminal weren't much fun. The ferry ride back to Horseshoe Bay left us contemplating the past few days, and looking forward to future tours next year and perhaps even this fall. We were both dreading the hilly, albeit scenic, lower Marine Drive route from Horseshoe Bay back to the Lions Gate Bridge, but we both found that the previous few days had turned challenging hills into a rolling pleasant ride that was a perfect way to cap off the tour. After crossing over in to Downtown we opted to take the slow scenic Seaside bike route back home rather than cutting directly across town. As we meandered back home with our somewhat out of place fully laden bikes we reflected on the beautiful and amazing past five days that aside from the ferry rides took us 330km self propelled around some of BCs great scenery leaving from our front door on a Monday and returning Friday afternoon with time to spare to end the week with an impromptu family Shabbat dinner.

For more photos check out the online album for the trip.

Critical Mass

2009-08-29T16:24:00.004-07:00

Went to Vancouver's Critical Mass (also see their Facebook group) this last Friday. It was lots of fun riding with a rather large group of fellow cyclists through Vancouver's streets and bridges. I ran in to Robert of Bikes On The Drive Tree blog fame, and we chatted for much of the ride. I also ran in to Bill McGrath who I'd met before when I did my Libranet presentation at VanLUG. He was distributing leaflets concerning Canada's new copyright legislation for the Vancouver Fair Copyright Coalition. The ride was a pretty positive for the most part, though I was rather put off by the several people I saw drinking while riding. As far as I'm concerned, drinking while riding a bike is just as bad as drinking and driving, and doing it during an event like critical mass sends a bad message and creates negative press. I wound up the evening with a mellow sunset ride home through Stanley Park and along the Seaside bike route all the way around False Creek.

PS Oh yeah, I should probably mention that one of the guys I spoke to on the ride had ridden 125+km for the day by the time we reached the Lions Gate Bridge. He and his electric assist bike hailed from the Sunshine Coast.

Seattle "Century"

2009-07-27T10:38:00.002-07:00

Last weekend I road the Seattle Century, a 160km (100mile) (supposedly, more on that later) ride around the Seattle area. Starting at Magnuson Park on Lake Washington's western shore, the ride looped north of the lake heading east to Bothell, south to Redmond, east again looping through Duvall, Carnation, Fall City, Issaquah, and Bellevue before finally crossing Lake Washington over the I-90 to Mercer Island and back in to Seattle. The organizers and volunteers did a terrific job of providing food and hydration at the start/finish and at rest stops nicely spaced along the route. I was going at a good strong pace for the first 90-100km or so and before I started to slow down. I finished the ride in 6.5 hours and calculated that I spent about 50minutes off the bike in rest stops. In retrospect, had I eaten better during the ride and spent less time in the stops I would have finished stronger and with a much better time.

The part of the event organization that really fell down was their route marking. There were several parts of the ride where the Dan Henry markings used were ambiguous or too close to a lane changes and turns in traffic. There were several riders who got lost at various points on the ride. The markings used were also inconstant in that at least two different Dan Henry variations were used and they were painted with differing paint colours. The 7 Hill of Kirkland ride that I did early in the year was much in this regard. In addition, whoever calculated the route distance was a good 16km (10 miles) short of the advertised distance.

The route itself only had 3 or 4 big climbs, but in general was up and down most of the way with few flat parts. Rather than being a tour of the sights of Seattle as billed, this ride is more a tour of the scenic areas east of Lake Washington.

The fellow riders on the trip all seemed enthusiastic and friendly as well as observant of good road riding etiquette. At several points I was riding with groups of riders in what could have almost been called a loose pace line which was not only fun, but a great way to cover distance quickly, though this only happened for small chunks of time given the general hilliness of the ride, the lack of organization in these groups, and the varying levels of rider ability.

All in all, a fun days event and a good opportunity to ride some nice roads with hundreds of other cyclists.

Riding for Agents of Change

2009-06-03T23:44:00.004-07:00

Last weekend was the pledge/send-off ride for Global Agents for Change's 2009 tours. The Pacific tour was leaving from Vancouver on their way to Mexico, and members of the Europe tour were riding to collect pledges. Global Agents for Change is an organization with goals of inspiring social change, and they are currently doing a drive to raise money for microcredit with their Riding to Break the Cycle campaign.

My sister, Shani, is doing the Europe ride this summer starting in Amsterdam and ending up in Istanbul; a ride of about 4000 km. To learn more you can hit up the Global Agents website, find them on Facebook, or contact me and I can put you in touch with my sister. If you would like to donate to her campaign, you can do so on the Global Agents website.

AOC send off 2009

Riding with a group is always a blast, and the pledge ride with a cohort of committed riders was no exception. The Mexico tour riders headed out to White Rock on the first leg of their journey after enjoying some time at Grandview Park (or doing last minute bike fixes!), and a number of the pledge riders joined them. Unfortunately I wasn't able to stay with the group all the way to White Rock (darned bus schedules), but Shani, Ilana, and some of the other riders rode with the group the whole way.

I'm super excited for Shani's ride this summer, and I'm impressed with what Global Agents is trying to do.

7 Hills

2009-05-25T20:27:00.000-07:00

This past Monday (May 25th) I completed my longest ever bike ride. Weighing in at 160km, it's not exactly record breaking, but 7 hours on the saddle was a new challenge for me. The ride was part of the 7 Hills of Kirkland event I referenced in my last post.

My day started with a 5:40 alarm wake up and a breakfast of oatmeal and a Brendan Brazier style smoothie. I loaded up my gear headed down the hill to the registration area then dropped off my backpack at the office (which luckily was just a km or two away). By about 6:45 I was back at the start line (having ridden 7.4km already) and on my way along with the rest of the early risers.

The start of the route climbs up hills along the North Eastern shore of Lake Washington before looping back along the Burke-Gilman trail for a short jaunt before exiting back in to the road system for another climb. At somewhere not to far beyond the half-way mark for the 40 mile route riders the century riders branched off for the extra 100 km and 1200 meters climbing.

At 70km and the tough Union Hill climb I began to despair, but a fortunate stretch in the draft of a speedier rider and my first stop at one of the several well equipped volunteer food stops re-energized me to continue in good spirits. Once the route diverged from the main 40 and 60 mile routes I was on my own most of the time with stretches here and there riding with one or two other riders. The route was well marked with Dan Henry's and at no point did I feel lost.

Once past the 80km half way mark I began to feel a bit better, and by 100km I knew with decent certainty that I'd finish in good shape, and by the time I started up the final hill with about 20km to ago I was feeling quite good, and I even had the energy to kick myself back over the magic 30km/h mark for the final few km to finish strong.

My goal wasn't to finish with the most amazing time (I averaged 22.4km/h including rest stops), but to finish in good shape having gone at a steady pace, and while my pace did decline over the course of the ride I never got dehydrated or ran into an energy wall. Infact I wasn't terribly sore after I got off the bike, and the next day, though I could feel my muscles, I wasn't in any discomfort. Even more importantly, my new Brooks saddle held up extremely well; I've had less comfortable 7 hour road trips in a car.

I was impressed by the other riders I saw on the course, many who were very strong riders keeping up a pace decently quicker than my own. Also impressive was that on the entire ride I only came across one discourteous driver (he wasn't impressed at having to share the road, or perhaps it was just my pink handle bar wrap). Other than the few small exceptions I've found that drivers in the Seattle area (at least on the Eastside of Lake Washington) are generally cycle aware and decently careful.

All in all a very enjoyable event that left me wanting more. Hopefully this summer will provide opportunities for further cycling adventures.

The massive Google, Kirkland, Cylcing update of great glory

2009-05-23T22:41:00.002-07:00

Here it is the long awaited Google/Seattle(Kirkland) update. I've been down in Kirkland for three full weeks now, so I figure it's time for a proper update.

So far my internship at Google is going very well. The work environment is fantastic: relaxed in the right ways and intense where it should be. The focus is on good product done well as should be evidenced by the many Google offerings we all use on a day to day basis. I don't really know what else to say (that isn't covered by NDA), other than that I'm really glad I stepped up and applied for this internship.

Google has three offices in the Seattle area, two in Kirkland and one in Seattle's (very cool) Fremont district. I'm in one of the Kirkland offices overlooking Lake Washington with quite the view. The Kirkland/Bellevue/Redmond area has a suburban feel and is fairly spread out. Surprisingly everything is well connected by streets with bike lanes making it easy to get from place to place by bike. The problem comes when busing or trying to get over the lake to Seattle. The bus system isn't great with buses coming at most every 30 minutes going to every hour in the evenings. Getting to Seattle is a minimum of two buses taking at the shortest over an hour. Cycling to Seattle is doable, but is a long enough ride to be discouraging for purposes other than the ride itself. With all that said, there is enough on this side of the lake that all my needs are pretty much taken care of.

Before heading down to Kirkland I made the decision that 2009 was going to be the year of the bicycle for me, and so far I've been keeping it up with time spent on my bike 14 out of the last 17 days. I've discovered that they don't know from flat in this part of the world. It's not that Vancouver is flattest terrain in the world, especially when compared to Edmonton for example, but here it's a whole new scale. Basically any ride from where I'm living involves at minimum a hill climb on the way home, and most likely more than that. It's actually a lot of fun, and my fitness on the bike has already improved in the three weeks I've been here.

When I arrived one of the other interns mentioned that Kirkland has a yearly cycling event called the 7 Hills of Kirkland, so of course I couldn't help but enter. There are three distances: 40, 60, and 100miles. In a moment of insanity I registered for the 100mile distance, so in two days from now I'll be setting out in the morning to ride 160 km over some of decently impressive hills to the tune of about 2100 meters worth of climbing. Should be fun, and considering the longest continuous ride I've ever done was just over 100 km a big challenge as well.

I've also recently switched to a Brooks B17 Narrow saddle which so far is completely amazing. It's orders of magnitude more comfortable than the stock saddle it replaced. I'll report back after my ride on Monday, but so far I'm not looking back.

The only real downside to this summer internship is being away from Ilana for the better part of 14 weeks. While we'll visit on the weekends, being apart makes for some long evenings and large phone bills. Other than that I'm enjoying my summer thus far, and this internship is a nice change of pace that I'm hoping will leave me energized for the upcoming academic year.

I'm going to try and update this blog every couple of weeks, but, as past posting frequency might indicate, no promises ;)

Dear Rogers......

2009-04-03T00:31:00.004-07:00

.... would it really be to much to expect a usable, easy to navigate web site? Also, do you really consider $0.90/min a reasonable roaming rate for the US?

Questioning Social Networking and Giving In All At Once

2009-03-26T21:51:00.002-07:00

While I wonder about the value of blogging and social networks, twittering, etc. I can't help feel the appeal. From an active participation standpoint, I question whether this is simply egotistical narcissism in thinking that other people actually care what I think or what I'm doing. From the passive role of reading and following others I wonder if I enter into the role of voyeur. Yet I continue to buy in more and more from my blog, to my initial entry into the Facebook fray. Perhaps it's a question of the whole being more than the sum of its parts with the delude of posts and comments and discussion somehow leading to insight and enlightenment, or perhaps it's just drivel.

Coffee shop procrastination

2009-02-27T00:00:00.002-08:00

I'm sitting in a coffee shop with some work to do. Naturally since it's just after midnight the urge to procrastinate strikes, so I thought it would be a good time for a bit of an update. Since my last update I'm now an undergrad at UBC doing my CS major. It's a bit of a strange process at the moment since none of my classes are at all software related, but I'm told that things get more interesting, so I'm hanging in. Having not been a student for a while it takes a bit of mental effort to switch from a work mentality to a student mentality. So far I prefer the former, but I'm doing my best to adapt to the latter. Speaking of which, back to it.......

.... and time goes by

2008-07-07T11:38:00.003-07:00

Well here I am back in Vancouver, though I guess back isn't technically relevant since I previously lived in North Vancouver, not Vancouver proper. Edmonton was good, but Vancouver is better. We're living in the Mount Pleasant neighbourhood. There is a really vibrant community around here with so many interesting shops, cafes, and restaurants within a few minutes walking distance. Having lived in Edmonton, the most car dependant city in Canada, our neighbourhood is a real revolution, so much so that we're getting rid of our car. Transit makes it super easy to get around when we're not on our bikes, and yes, the traffic in the city is pretty terrible if you're stuck having to drive around. That being said for the times that we do need a car I've joined the Vancouver Co-operative Auto Network.

Ordinarily late (or w00t it's a blog post)

2007-05-18T19:13:00.000-07:00

Yeah, yeah, it's been a long time. But who reads this blog anyway? The Great White North has thawed leaving the city with rather nice weather (the freakish snow in the beginning of April aside). I've finally joined the ranks of cyclist commuters. Edmonton's river valley is really quite spectacular and makes for a pleasant morning and afternoon ride. Who'd have thought I'd be the type to wake up at 6:20am and cycle to work never mind in sub-zero (okay, barely, and not any more, but still) temperatures.

Work has been going really well. I've been quite busy, but I'm keeping challenged and learning new techniques and technologies. I'm far more buzzword compliant then ever before. Recently I've been doing some web interface programming using Javascript, XML, and all that AJAX kind of stuff. It's a really quick way of turning an annoying, almost unusable, web based interface into something much more dynamic and enjoyable to use. IE of course rears its ugly head now and again, but the Google usually finds a solution. Firebug is a truly amazing Firefox extension that I've been using for debugging. Anyway the short of it is that I'm enjoying my new work, and I feel like I'm making an impact in my company.

My Israeli dance class is still going strong. We get a good following showing up every Wednesday night. I'm going to attend a dance camp in LA a couple of weekends from now which should be a blast. Hopefully I haven't forgotten too much and will be able to keep up :)

A few weeks ago Ilana and I went to see Forever Tango. It was an amazing evening, albeit all to short. The level of dancing compared to where we are, and even the best of the Edmonton tango community, is just incredible. The evening before the show we attended a workshop and milonga with Jorge Torres, the dance captain of the show. He's a man who lives and breaths Tango, an amazing dancer who is only too happy to spend time in the community passing on his knowledge and experience.

Winter is ending

2007-03-08T11:24:00.000-08:00

Who would have ever thought that I'd be the least bit sad by that? Having gotten into cross-country skiing this season for the first time ever, I'm going to miss the ski season. Oh well, there's always next year to look forward to.

The unfortunate side-effect of warm weather (by which I mean temperatures in the 0-10°C range) is streets full of slush and a very dirty car. At least Edmonton recycles the tonnes of sand used every year to keep icy streets drivable. Here's hoping for the weather to get warm enough for cycling, and more importantly street clean enough to ride on!

My Israeli dance class at the Edmonton JCC is going fantastically well. We now have a strong base of regulars who come out every week. I'm really enjoying teaching the class which is a real learning experience for me as I learn how to teach dance for the first time. Along with tango classes with Ilana, and practices for Aviv Dancers (an Israeli dance performance group) this means I'm dancing at least three nights a week.

It's freaking cold up here

2006-11-28T08:21:00.000-08:00

... in the frozen North. Yeah, it's getting to me, what can I say. The human body just wasn't designed to operate in temperatures of -28°C. Oh well, by Thursday a high of -7° is expected, practically tropical compared to the temperatures the past few days. Oh, and did I mention the current wind chill here in Edmonton is -40? At we can drink the water, or at least that's what people keep telling me.

Quarterly update

2006-10-28T08:58:00.000-07:00

And, no the post title is (hopefully) not an indication of my planned frequency of updating this blog :)

I was back in Vancouver for a holiday a couple of weeks a ago. It was nice to see the old sites and sounds of my former city of residence. I somehow thought that the week would be relaxing, but with one thing and another it really wasn't. It was great to catch up with friends and spend time with family, and with all that going on a week went by pretty quickly.

I spent some time at a friend's new warehouse/shop. She spends a lot of time India, Nepal, and Tibet and has started and import business to sell some of the magnificant goods from the region. The image at right is from her warehouse.

I'm also newly engaged! Ilana and I got engaged beginning of September. It was quite the exciting event!

Work is going well. For the first few weeks I was a little frustrated that they couldn't keep me busy enough, but lately I've been decently busy which is far more enjoyable. The transition from being self-employed to working at a medium size company is a challenging one. I very much enjoy that I no longer directly deal with the business side of things, though I think that my experience in that area has been valuable to me. It's also interesting working in a company where software is not our product, but rather something used internally. Not that some of our software isn't exposed to users outside the company, but the requirements (especially from the setup and customization standpoint) are completely different than Libranet, a product that was basically off-the-shelf software. So then my exposure to the world of corporate information technology is an interesting journey thus far.

Up the walls and down again

2006-08-22T19:07:00.000-07:00

So it's been quite a while since I've posted here. What's changed? I'm pretty well settled here in Edmonton now, and I'm enjoying Summer while it's still here. I've found work at a company in downtown Edmonton (and they are open source friendly to boot).

Since my move I've yet to get a chance to visit Vancouver again, but my girlfriend and I have been spending several weekends in Calgary with her parents. They live on the West side of the city making it a short drive to some very beautiful hikes in the Rockies.

As the picture above indicates I've taken up indoor climbing. My girlfriend and have been managing at least one climbing season a week since we started in June. It's a great way to keep fit and a pile of fun to boot. (In case you are wondering why I'm not roped in the picture, it's because I'm bouldering below the 3 meter line.)

Oh yeah, and I've got an Israeli dance class starting at the Edmonton JCC in September. I'm quite excited about this opportunity to teach and pass on this great activity.

Unpacking is fun

2006-06-11T11:15:00.000-07:00

The process of unpacking has mostly ended. It's been long process, but there are only a few odds and ends left to be put away.

Oh, and on the way from Vancouver my little blue car got rear-ended on the highway. Luckily the relative speed between us and the vehicle that hit us was relatively low, so the impact was not extreme. Still, it was enough to spin out the car and send us across the left lane into the grassy median in the center of the highway (Alberta's highway 16). It's really more of a hassle than anything else.

The weather here in Edmonton has been terrific the past few days and I've been getting out on my bike for short rides a fair bit. My girlfriend and I took an indoor climbing course this past weekend which we both really enjoyed. It's a challenge for sure, but one that I look forward to doing more of.