iHaochi

Twenty One

Haochi Chen — Tue, 01 Nov 2011 02:54:24 +0000

This is supposed to be the "big" birthday for many in the U.S., but it's just another day for me. As Rocky have told me in the past, it's just a number.

I went about my day as usual, the only thing new is starting my internship at Skreened as a web developer. I am still pretty lost after a few hours there and still struggling to remember everyone's name.

This past year has been a pretty decent year for me, but I know it could've been better if I had worked harder and spend less time on Reddit. :D I learned and experienced quite a bit. I might write about what I've learned and experienced later on this blog, but if you have me on Facebook you should have at least seen those skydiving photos. :)

I've rewritten and redesigned this blog a while ago and the subtitle has been changed to "War on Procrastination." Hopefully in the next year of my life I can be more productive and have a positive impact on the society, be it big or small.

Google Suggest for jQuery

Haochi Chen — Sun, 07 Nov 2010 19:23:21 +0000

On OSUTrade, when the user starts typing on the search input, a list of relevant suggestions will show up for the user to select, a la Google Suggest (or any other modern search engine). This is possible through the use of the undocument Google Suggest API and jQueryUI's autocomplete widget (although you can use pretty much any other JavaScript libraries out there, or even write you own code to accomplish the same).

This past week I have been working on refactoring the backend/behind-the-scene code for OSUTrade and moving away from Google App Engine's webapp framework. While I was refactoring the client-side of the code, I thought that there might be people who are interested in having the auto-suggest functionality on their site as well, so I wrote a jQuery plugin from the code that I had. I think people with shopping sites will be most interested in using this with the holiday season coming up (the Suggest API has an option to list only suggestions from Google Products).

Check it out on Google Code if you are interested and your feedbacks are welcomed, as always.

20 is Just a Number

Haochi Chen — Sun, 31 Oct 2010 19:06:27 +0000

I still remember the comment that Christian left on "Nineteen", "I wouldn't be too excited about turning 20... That's half-way to 40."

I can't believe it's another year already, it seemed so quick. Christian's prophecy has been fulfilled; for I was not too excited to turn 20 in the days coming up to my birthday. I was not ready to give up my "teen"-title, even as it might have became meaningless after my 18th, or even 17th birthday.

Today is my birthday, it has been a tradition for me to write a blog post here every year on this day. If you have been reading this blog long enough, you probably have noticed that I hadn't been enthusiastic about such occasion. This year is even worse, coupling with my quarter-life crisis.

But that all went away last night, when I received a message from Rocky wishing me a happy birthday. The message was short, but it helped to ease a lot of anxiety I had about turning 20. Twenty is just a number.

I would like to thanks to everyone who wished me happy birthday, and thanks to Christina for taking me to the zoo today. :)

And yes, Christian, I am half way to 40, but as Carey said last year, it's "just another step." Plus, you will be there in a few months as well. :p (FYI, you have been an amazing friend to me these last few years.) I am so glad to have all my awesome friends IRL and online.

Chinese American

Haochi Chen — Fri, 25 Jun 2010 23:50:47 +0000

photo by ayblazerman, used under a cc-license

This past Wednesday I became a naturalized citizen of the United States.

That's all for now, thanks for tuning in!