A Whole New World.... again.

I'm typing this post on a new acquisition - a Dell netbook running the latest version of Ubuntu.  I got it because the company I work for has decided it's time for us to start properly thinking about the mobile space.   That means looking at iPad, Android, and Windows 7 apps.

Outside of it's tiny form factor (what is the DEAL with this keyboard!?) and the way my brain refuses to gracefully switch between the Touch interface and the more usual world of keyboards and mice, this one is necessary because I need a machine that can emulate the Android operating system.  I have to design for it, and I've never even see the thing run.  I played with some RedHat (or RedHate, as I and some of my colleagues referred to it) quite a few years ago but I'm way behind the times.   So here I go, starting over yet again.

That is one thing about this business.  You never just get set into a groove.  Every couple years the whole thing re-imagines itself. You get to make the solemn decision between letting yourself drift into a sort of technological eddy, or putting forth the skull-sweat to catch up with the times and hoping your boss agrees it's worth investing in it.  Your whole career consists of a delicate balancing act between those two forces.

I was swept into a deep, weedy corner when the kids and I got left on our own, and I've been sort of rescue-floating there until I could get the kids raised.  That's done. Nice thing is, whether you want it or not, it all comes back around.  Even that far out in the cattails the water doesn't completely stop moving. and I've drifted back out to the edge of the current.

So here I go, paddling out into the full flow again.  We'll see what this river looks like downstream.  I gotta find some way to work with this thing in the jumble of hardware on my desk, and study up.  Just getting this far has let me understand a couple of the "sudo" jokes I've heard.  That's progress, right?