Ayayay! More than half a year of inactivity :(

But now i'm back! Watchout for updated post on my recent adventures. Stay tuned friends ;)

I've been keeping this for months now because I wanted to announce it at this years Thanksgiving... :) 

On June 7, 2008 we learned about this wonderful news:

Yup, I'm going to be a father soon! :) My wife and I are very excited about this blessing to our family. We can't wait to see our baby on February 2009.

Below is the first picture of our baby taken at 6 weeks:

Next is our babys picture at 20 weeks:

I don't have her new picture scanned yet but I'll post it a soon as I have them.4 weeks ago we learned that we are having a baby girl. Sweet! 

As with all first time dads, there's a lot of things to learn. I'm learning a bunch of new stuff everyday and I highly recommend going BabyCenter.com. BabyCenter.com is a site dedicated to babies and parenting in general. They have a ton on articles about babies, pregnancy and parenting which i really love. I go there everyday to check out articles and information that will help me become a great dad. Also, JustMommies.com is a great site too. They have this calendar thingy where you can check out the progress of your baby day-by-day which is pretty cool!

This is what me and my wife are thankful for this Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! God Bless!

and now I respect him even more...

http://sports.espn.go.com/broadband/video/video?id=3569702

I just wish more and more athletes can be like this guy. A lot of the athletes nowadays are either drunkards, gamblers or womanizers which is pretty sad considering that a lot of kids in this generation look up to sport professionals as their role model. 

Tim Tebow is different. He keeps himself grounded and models the message of his faith to people around him which makes him a step above and beyond among his peers.

Thanks and God Bless Tim for being a model to this generation!

My friend Marlon Ribunal who is a developer and an avid SQL Server blogger needs your help... Her mother who is in the Philippines got diagnose with Leukemia yesterday and he needs financial help to get her mother decent medical treatment. Below is his message posted on his blog:

God Bless You!
 
I am in need of financial help for my mother who has been diagnosed with Leukemia. She is in the Philippines right now. She is only 55 years old.
 
I am sending this email to people who, in one way or another, might be willing to help. Our primary need is Financial, but a sincere Prayer for the recovery of my mother is likewise important.
 
If you know groups of people or organizations who are doing Charitable works toward families in need of financial help, please send me information on how to contact them.
 
Few years ago (2002), I came here in America through my wife's petition. But all through out these years we've been struggling financially. My wife got laid off from her work because their company can no longer support their business and decided to close down.  Our family's financial resources are not enough to put our mother under decent medication.
 
If you know anyone who can help us financially, please contact me immediately. My information is below.
 
 
Sincerely,
Marlon Ribunal

US Info:

Marlon Ribunal
(562) 989-5406 [ Home ]
(562) 786-2889 [Celphone ]

mribunal @ verizon.net

Philippines Info:

Mario Ribunal, Jr.

09215102848

Please help Marlon. Thanks and God Bless!

I saw this post from Mahesh today and it taught me something that I know I'll put in good use in years to come...

Former President of India APJ Abdul Kalam at Wharton India Economic forum , Philadelphia, United States March 22,2008)

Question: Could you give an example, from your own experience, of how leaders should manage failure?

Kalam:   Let me tell you about my experience. In 1973 I became the project director of India's satellite launch vehicle program, commonly called the SLV-3. Our goal was to put India's "Rohini" satellite into orbit by 1980. I was given funds and human resources -- but was told clearly that by 1980 we had to launch the satellite into space. Thousands of people worked together in scientific and technical teams towards that goal.

By 1979 -- I think the month was August -- we thought we were ready. As the project director, I went to the control center for the launch. At four minutes before the satellite launch, the computer began to go through the checklist of items that needed to be checked. One minute later, the computer program put the launch on hold; the display showed that some control components were not in order. My experts -- I had four or five of them with me -- told me not to worry; they had done their calculations and there was enough reserve fuel. So I bypassed the computer, switched to manual mode, and launched the rocket. In the first stage, everything worked fine. In the second stage, a problem developed. Instead of the satellite going into orbit, the whole rocket system plunged into the Bay of Bengal. It was a big failure.

That day, the chairman of the Indian Space Research Organization, Prof. Satish Dhawan, had called a press conference. The launch was at 7:00 am, and the press conference -- where journalists from around the world were present -- was at 7:45 am at ISRO's satellite launch range in Sriharikota [in Andhra Pradesh in southern India]. Prof. Dhawan, the leader of the organization, conducted the press conference himself. He took responsibility for the failure -- he said that the team had worked very hard, but that it needed more technological support. He assured the media that in another year, the team would definitely succeed. Now, I was the project director, and it was my failure, but instead, he took responsibility for the failure as chairman of the organization.

The next year, in July 1980, we tried again to launch the satellite -- and this time we succeeded. The whole nation was jubilant. Again, there was a press conference. Prof. Dhawan called me aside and told me, "You conduct the press conference today."

I learned a very important lesson that day. When failure occurred, the leader of the organization owned that failure. When success came, he gave it to his team. The best management lesson I have learned did not come to me from reading a book; it came from that experience….

Thanks Mahesh for sharing such a wonderful inspiration to us...

I know. I know. I know. I wasn't able to post anything this past few weeks. It's been really busy and the amount of task that i would be dealing in the next few days is going to get crazier because of my current project. I'm currently working on a KPI project that involves building custom dashboards using Dundas Charts, Microsoft Reporting Services, ASP.NET and alot of SQL Server data. Much of the task has been data mining and making sure that data represented on the screen matches the actual amounts stored in the database.

All I can say is that it's a tedious and messy process.

Currently we are in the last leg of development and QA should be underway in the next few days. Hopefully by that time I would have some extra time to resume my blogging activites (hehe).

So, what should you expect in the next few days? Well, I have a few things listed in my notepad that I am planning to post once I get my much covetted free time. Here's some things that i have on my list: the ADO.NET walkthrough I promised Marl, a real-world example on Lambda Expressions (jakelite has my favorite explanation about Lamda), some more LINQ stuff and an ASP.NET AJAX sample application that I have been brewing in my head for more than a month.

Oh well, time to work again. I'll keep you guys updated! Later!

Woohoo! That was a great Code Camp. Thanks to Woody and the gang for making this event happen. It was a fun and knowledge-filled event. I even got swags (a few books, a shirt, a small bag and a gym cup from Avanade)...

Me and my wife will be at the Code Camp in Fullerton tommorow and we are excited. Code Camp is a great time to get together, learn new things about technology and network with people with the same mindset about technology and that is passion for learning and enriching knowledged. We are driving tonight to Fullerton so that we can be early tommorow.

There are already a few sessions that I am eyeing to go to. One of them is the session of John Bowen regarding WPF DataBinding and WPF controls. I met John Bowen 3 years ago in the .NET Rocks roadshow bus. I think this session is going to be awesome. I've been playing with alot of WPF lately and I'm interested in seeing and learning cool things about this technology.

Another session I'd love to see is the topic "Branching and Merging Guidance for VSTS 2008 and Team Foundation Server" presented by Mickey Williams. I haven't done anything with VSTS before but I know its going to be a great primer for me because merging and branching is one of the things that happens alot when you are in a team development environment.

Oh boy! This is going to be a great Code Camp. Time to go home and get ready for this event. See you there!

I've been hosting with IPower for 3 years now and man i'm getting really really really really really frustrated with their hosting! 2 years ago I had the same experience with them and it drove me crazy to the point that I was already shouting at their technical support agent. Imagine hearing this words "we don't have any backup of your site" in a time when you are getting really mad. Intense huh? Eventually my site was restored because "they actually" have a backup system in place. But this week is a different story...