Parveen Kaler

New Year’s Resolutions suck.  According to Wikipedia, only 12% of people actually achieve their resolutions.

Setting resolutions is a tempting task.  Everybody is doing it!  Why shouldn’t I?

Other than the fact that setting resolutions is not effective, it can also turn into a big source of procrastination, pain, anguish, stress, and suffering.  In classic Buddhism, this suffering is called Dukkha.  We believe that we will be truly happy in the future when some goal is achieved.

The future never comes.

On one hand, the goal may not be achieved and we feel shitty about ourselves.  On the other hand, we achieve our goal and the happiness associated with it is fleeting.

I am more comfortable following a lifestyle based in Kaizen.  I wake up every morning at 6AM and try to be better.  On some days I suck.  I suck hard.  Most days I do end up doing better.

I leave for India in a couple days and I have been getting my affairs in order.  I thought I would take the time to refocus on being better.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bZqnqH9s1jk[/youtube]

Better Friend

People that are too kind for their own good call me driven, ambitious, and passionate.  Most call me arrogant, loud, and abrasive.  It’s tough being my friend.  At times, I am a bad friend and a bad boyfriend.

I am getting better though.

Better Developer

I have been writing code for more than a decade now.  I was completely sick of it a year ago.

Over the last year I have been focusing much more on user experience.  I’ve studied design, classic architecture, literature, typography, and a variety of other disciplines.  I stepped away from the computer so that I would be better when I sat back down.

Better CEO

This is the new role that I took on this year.  It has been a challenge.  I am a newbie again and I am making mistakes every single day.

There have also been great successes.  The business is making much more money than I ever have as a salaried employee.  I am also taking on projects that I can actually believe in.

Better Athlete

I had fallen off of the wagon at the start of 2008.  I was in the worst shape of my life.  I am almost 25 lbs lighter than my heaviest weight.

I played high school basketball and I used to view myself as an athlete.  This momentum remained through 1st year university when I was still in the gym six days each week.  But, slowly that commitment petered away.

I am back now and my commitment and resolve can only increase.

I will be in Seattle December 9th for Apple’s iPhone Tech Talk World Tour.  There is an agenda [PDF] available.  The topics seem fairly straight forward and basic.  However, it should be a good place to directly ask Apple questions related to iPhone development.

I am a prolific note taker.  You can read my notes from GDC 2008.  I’m not sure what will be covered under NDA.  I’ll do my best to post as much information as I can.

It should also be a great opportunity to meet.  If you are in Seattle that day, please contact me if you would like to meet.

Steve Wart has organized another meetup for iPhone Developers in Vancouver.  More information can be had at the Vancouver iPhone Developers Group page.  There is also an event up on the crazy, magical Facebook.

Here are the details:

BCIT
ROOM 353 – 555 Seymour Street

Vancouver BC
Thursday November 20 : 6:30PM – 8:00PM

Topics
- iPhone OS
- iPhone game programming experience and demos
- Introduction to Interface Builder

Admin
- how we can help can newcomers more easily find this group
- where and when we should meet next

The good people at Handi Mobility shipped the Translink App for the iPhone earlier this week.  One of the best features of the Translink App is its use of Location Services provided by the iPhone.  The user is able to find bus stops located near them.

Translink iPhone App

The App uses PhoneGap to bridge the data that Translink has on the web onto the iPhone.  I had a very, very, very small hand in fixing some bugs in the project.

I’m part way through rewriting the PhoneGap iPhone client.  I plan on release this rewrite to the community once I am done.  I can’t promise a timeline at the moment as this is a side project for myself.

Steve Wart is organizing the first meeting for the Vancouver iPhone Developers Group.  Here are the details for the first meeting:

BCIT Downtown Campus

555 Seymour Street

Room 353

Thursday, October 16, 2008

6:30PM – 8:00PM

This is the agenda that Steve sent for the meeting:

It’s open to anyone who is interested in iPhone development, in particular just getting up to speed with XCode, Objective-C, memory management, and some of the more important classes and frameworks.

1. Introductions
2. Discuss idea of an iPhone developer’s group in Vancouver
3. Walk through a hello world app using interface builder
4. Next steps: set a follow-up meeting etc.

Autumn

There is a chill in the air.  I put on my fedora and rain jacket before stepping out the door.  The sky is gray and there are leaves on the sidewalk.  It is fall.

It’s amazing how fast the year has raced by.

There is something special about autumn.  It is a transitory season. I always find myself in an introspective mood.  Last year, I jumped on my motorcycle and disappeared for two weeks to think about where I was in life.

The answer did not exist on the beautful places that the motorcycle took me to.  The answer existed in the person that was guiding the motorcycle.

Mountains

I’ve always had mountains in my life.  The small town I grew up in was snuggled in a valley.  My childhood home was located on the Fraser River.  Across the muddy Fraser was a mountain.  It always loomed large through the picture window in the living room.

The mountain had been carved out of the landscape many years ago when the glaciers retreated after the last ice age.  It took an epic event to put that mountain there.

Mountains exist to remind one of the epic.

The North Shore Mountains sit directly north of the downtown core.  I always turn north after I put on my fedora and rain jacket and step out the door.  I take the time to pause for just a moment before I head out on my way.

Mountains remind me not to accept bullshit in my life.

I went to school at Simon Fraser University.  Choosing to go to school on top of a mountain just felt right.

I was 18 my freshman year of university.  Although the legal drinking age in my jurisdiction is 19, I was crafty enough to sneak by the bouncers at the university pub.

I recall walking back to my dorm room after one night at the university pub.  I recall standing on top of that mountain and looking down on the city.  I recall not wanting to be the person I had been the first 18 years of my life.  I recall wanting to be better.

I have been fairly successful over the last ten years.  But it was time to redefine my definition of success.

My last epic encounter with a mountain was at the Pemberton Music Festival.  Pemberton is also snuggled in a valley.  The house I was staying at was located on the slopes of Mount Currie.

I sat on the slopes of that mountain one night after bands had left the stage.  It was just myself, the Japanese Husky that lived in the house I was staying at, and the mountain.

I took out my Moleskine notebook and on the left page I wrote everything in my life that was unacceptable.  On the right I wrote everything that I believed in and everything that I’ve aspired to be.

Moleskine

I decided then and there to be better.

Investor Confidence

Recently, I have been told that the problem with the markets has been ”investor confidence”.  That doesn’t sound like a problem with the markets.  That sounds like a problem with the investor.

The biggest investment in one’s life is one’s life itself.

It’s taken me a year to gain conifidence in what I believe in.

Magnitudes Better

I want to be better.  Magnitudes better.  That’s why I will only work on things that I believe in.

I write this here because I want to hold myself to that promise.  Hold me to that promise.

Allow me to fail.  But don’t allow me not to try.

When teaching Objective-C, I’m finding that some have trouble reading method signatures.  Reading Objective-C methods can be made easier if proper spacing and indenting is used.

This is what a method looks like in Objective-C:

- (ret-type) keyword:(arg-type)arg-name keyword:(arg-type)arg-name

It is much easier to read if it is typed as such:

- (ret-type) keyword:(arg-type)arg-name
             keyword:(arg-type)arg-name

In the above signature, the minus sign implies that the method is an instance method.  Class methods are prepended with a plus sign.

The first keyword can be thought of as the method name.  In concrete terms, a method would look like this:

- (void) insertObject:(id)anObject atIndex:(NSUInteger)index

This is much easier to grok, if it is pictured like this:

- (void) insertObject:(id)anObject
         atIndex:(NSUInteger)index

And it can be read as “insert an object of type id at an index”.  This is easier to read at the point where a method is called.

Array* array = [[Array alloc] init]];
[array inserObject:anObject
       atIndex:0];

The above can be read as “insert an object into array at index 0″.  Objective-C is designed to be a self-documenting language.  Interfaces are generally designed such that they can be read in real English.

I bookmarked this video on YouTube earlier.  But really, it deserves a full post.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ci2VGxweA7E[/youtube]

We know that money comes and goes.  We know that possessions become a burden.  They really become a burden.  But story, story is so valuable and is painless to carry with us and it’s something that we share.  And the pixies were pure story.  And my grandparents, at this point, are pure story.  Because six months after my grandmother died my grandfather died.  And I would venture that ultimately the most important things in your life are going to be stories.