BarCamp Philly 2010 Summary - Opendata and beyond

When wrapping up the VIm talk @trevmex mentioned that people share their dotFiles on github. This blew my mind. I can sit in front of anyones desk and start using their eclipse and immediately be productive. The secret to VIm is the years of refactoring the configuration and shortcuts, known as the dotFiles. You probably couldn’t even execute a mapped command on my machine since I map the leader based on my keyboard....

November 17, 2010 · 5 min · Aaron Held

Jugaad - India's Agile style

I’ve been reading about India’s concept of Jugaad, possibly poised to enter our buzzword vocabulary since it came up in the context of what Obama can learn from that country. Where the Agile Manifesto starts with “Individuals and Interactions” the Harvard Business Review kicks off Jugaad with “Thrift not Waste”. All too often I’ve seen Agile work because a scarcity of resources (money, time or knowledge) pushed an otherwise waterfall loving group into giving Agile a shot....

November 14, 2010 · 2 min · Aaron Held

my Barcamp Philly 2010 summary

Every year Philly’s BarCarmp gets better. Last year I met great people and learned new tactics from my peers. This year I enjoyed a number of roundtable discussions where we taught each other and had my core paradigms challenged. (of couse still met great people, but that is implied) The day opened last night with a fantastic hosted party @indyhall. It had a vibe that reminded me of my college days where the future was bright and everyone you talked to has excitement around what they were doing....

November 14, 2010 · 4 min · Aaron Held

Cianfrani Park Dog Owners don't get it

After spending a day immersed in the utopian community of http://www.barcampphilly.org/ I came home to dystopian reality of dog owners in my local park. Basically Cianfrani park is a nice little community park that has been overrun by rude dog owners recently. I love dogs, having raised three. My dogs didn’t need a leash and I walked them daily off-leash, so I understand these people. The contrast in the community is striking....

November 16, 2009 · 3 min · Aaron Held

PPA ending 65mpg & free parking

A friendly PPA agent gave me some unpleasant news today. I was respectfully loading my bike and moving it from its unobtrusive parking spot on 20th and Market when he walked by. I’ve notices some motorcycle shaped parking spots on that corner and knew this news was coming. Turns out that if you charge 50% for motorcycle parking but put 4 bikes in a car slot you can still earn 2x in parking fees....

October 2, 2009 · 2 min · Aaron Held