Weekly UlyLee

Riding The Wave

2009-12-03T10:38:00.003+08:00

Last week I finally received my invite to try Google Wave, thanks Kelay, and was trying it out but it seems slow in updating the wave. Even marking a message as seen takes a while. I was expecting it to be fast just like the ones in the video of the product launch, maybe its in the connection or something, I don't know.

A New Cat is Out of The Bag... And Its Cheap

2009-06-10T14:56:00.003+08:00

Apple's website announces the release of it's newest operating system, Snow Leopard... Shipping it with new Macs starting September 2009... old Leopard users can upgrade for only $29 USD.

Wish MS will offer a competitive price on their Vista to Windows 7 upgrade...

Sutured

2009-06-10T14:40:00.003+08:00

Sutured - The process of joining two surfaces or edges together along a line by or as if by sewing. (http://www.thefreedictionary.com).

Just got stitched last Friday... hit by an opponents elbow during a friendly basketball game. Wasn't a big deal, I went to VRPMC emergency to have it taped up, but eventually the doctors there want it sutured (2 out of 3 wanted it stitched-up).

Got an earful from Daisy... worst, the following day got an earful from Nanay Donna...

Lesson learned??? Look out for wayward elbows... Playing again on Thursday....

Freelancing

2009-06-03T15:45:00.002+08:00

Sometime ago, I was asked by a friend if I can do a freelance training on XSLT, the pay was good so I said why not. This experience led to another freelance job, XML conversion of some law documents.

Being involved in many XML conversion and design projects in my current job, I finally convinced myself to advertise my skills and accept jobs, aside from acquaintances, as a freelancer.

So anyone has some XML conversion jobs that they want to outsource, they can get in-touch with me through this blog or mail me a jeff dot sese at gmail dot com

Deon's Recognition Day

2009-03-19T12:58:00.006+08:00

Been a while...

Last week my eldest finally graduated from pre-school, at the local Barangay Child Learning Center. A month before, their teacher told us that Deon would be one of the top 4 students in her class, the class was divided into 2 groups, ages 5 and up and 4 year olds, and Deon is part of the later group. The teacher would not tell us Deon's actual placing in the the top 4, telling is its a surprise. That's a month of suspense for you...

As a parent, you would love to see your child get the top honors making you proud and all, but it never really mattered to me as long as Deon learns what she has to learn and go forward to the next step. Unfortunately, Deon only got the second spot, the award given was "Most Creative" with the top being "Most Outstanding". But she did go home with the most medals... 3 in all... "Miss Daycare", the one who usually wins in school competitions; "Top 2", top 20 students got a medal and "Most Creative".

Before, I made an agreement with Deon that I would buy her a bike if she was the top of the class, so I had to explain to her that she won't be getting it because she was only second. But I promised her that I would get the bike a birthday gift instead... and that made her smile.

Next stop would be Prep... schools won't accept Deon in Grade 1 because she's only turning 5 this August.

I'll be posting pics of the recognition day on my next post...

Update: Here's the pics...

UN Parade 2008

2008-10-24T09:59:00.001+08:00

Paligsining 2008 -- Finals

2008-10-23T17:52:00.002+08:00

IDML is InDesign Limitless

2008-10-16T11:16:00.004+08:00

One new feature of InDesign CS4 is its ability to import/export IDML, InDesign Markup Language. Basically Adobe tells that IDML is INX, just human readable and documented.

Having this allows developers to automate workflows and speed-up production time and thus limiting costs... Imagine, creating InDesign from XML content without going through the limited XML support of the InDesign IDE... you can even make InDesign documents from a web application that sends XML content... RSS feeds perhaps...

More of the features of IDML in this blog entry from Tim Cole of Adobe...

http://blogs.adobe.com/indesignchannel/2008/10/the_most_important_new_feature.html

Browser Wars -- A New Player

2008-09-05T12:42:00.006+08:00

Google has now entered the browser wars with Google Chrome... And from what I read from features... I think we might got a winner here...

http://www.google.com/googlebooks/chrome/index.html

What I Do?

2008-07-31T15:01:00.002+08:00

I generally do XML stuff like DTD/Schema analysis and design and XSLT transformation. I also create workflow that involves XML and InDesign... automation of the layout. Creation of scripts in InDesign the speeds up the layout and composition work.

I'm currently immersing myself in plugin creation for InDesign... again to help automate the layout process.

Tools are essential in the daily activities of my employer as speed and quality is important to our clients.

It's Jeferson -- With A Single 'F'

2008-02-20T19:46:00.003+08:00

Last Friday 02-15-2008, I went to the DFA to do my personal appearance for my passport application. They said it was needed especially because I'm applying for the new machine readable passport that the DFA was issuing. My employer commissioned a travel agency to process my passport, that way it will faster and less trouble some for me (Means I will not skip work just to apply for my passport).

I was to meet the travel agency's liaison officer so that he can assist me for the personal appearance. I was there around 8:30 am, a large crowd was already there, all applying for a passport. In fairness, the liaison officer was very accommodating and I was inside this room where you have to check the details of your application, by 9:30.

However upon checking the encoded information in my application, I saw that my name was spelled incorrectly. Wasn't surprised by this in any account, my name is usually spelled incorrectly especially if you're not going to check it against the form because it is commonly spelled with a double 'F'. So I went up to the DFA personnel an ask them to correct the info, they took my form and told me to wait.

An hour and a half later, my form is not yet returned from the correction. How can it take so long if the correction will only involve deleting a single character from my name. I confronted the DFA personnel and ask how could it take that long, around 50 people that was behind me in the line already passed me and yet no correction?

To cut the story short, my application took that long to correct was because it was encoded again from the start and was placed at the end of the queue. I don't know what was the purpose of doing this, but correcting a single character that was already encoded should not take that long. All my day wasted just because an encoder cannot key-in an information that has at least 3 correct versions (I provided 3 valid IDs, a birth certificate, a marriage contract and the application form all of which shows the correct spelling of my name... Jeferson with a single 'f') in the application.

Of Vacations and Fiestas

2007-05-25T17:23:00.000+08:00

Have been a busy week for me... I went to the province to fetch Deon who was on vacation at her lola Donna's place. And seeing me, she totally won't leave my side... I left her there for one week right after the town fiesta...

Speaking of the town fiesta, the event was actually rumored that it will not push through because the local parish would not allow a fiesta celebration that is not the same as the patron saint's feast day which was on a September. The town fiesta was traditionally celebrated every second Sunday of May and coincides with mothers day. I went to the province with the knowledge that there was no fiesta in May this year and was surprised to find out that it did push through (I heard that the senior citizens convinced the local parish priest to reconsider his decision).

Back to Deon, so we went back to Manila together last Sunday and got home about 7 pm. She missed her mom and sister so much that she totally forgot about me... well that how children are!

Plans for the weekend:

People from work are planning to go to the Eco Park in LaMesa Dam this coming Sunday... can't come, to far away and I want to spend the weekend with family (I thought of bringing them along, but again to far specially for Euan who is just 3 mos old).

Alternative... go to Baywalk on Sunday morning to jog... but then again, it all depends on the weather...

Most probable.... spend the weekend watching cable... NBA semi-finals baby.....

Another Attempt

2007-05-18T12:47:00.000+08:00

My second attempt on writing a blog, the first attempt lasted upto 3 entries only (i think). I never had the time then to sustain the blog but part of it was never having the material to enter.

But this time, I'm hoping that with the little free time I have, I'll be able to at least put up an entry at least once a week (Thus the title WeeklyUlyLee). Maybe in a week of existence I can gather up interesting materials to blog upon. Hehehe!

See you next week then! :D