Xango

So,
A couple of years ago I was introduced to a new company called 'Xango.' Meh... just another MLM with a product, right? I was WRONG.

I learned today that Xango is poised to join the ranks of Ebay, Microsoft, and other large companies as one of the fastest growing companies in the country. It is for real, check out this news story:



Well, after kicking myself for not ponying up and starting my own business several years ago, I am now a Xango Independent Distributor. In addition to enjoying the benefits that the Xango juice provides, I can now offer this same opportunity to others. Even if you don't want to have a business, and just enjoy better health, check out the Xango product at this website.

If you are interested in the business opportunity, and would like to join a 'team' of professionals who will help mentor you, contact me for more information.

I love the 21st century

So, this past weekend, my brother and I drove to Arizona from Salt Lake City. Since he is doing the driving, I did not have to take the day off work for the traveling. I was able to work on tasks for work. Since I have a Verizon Wireless Card, along the way I was also able to be online, receiving e-mails and handling customer issues for work.

Along the way, I was also able to share webcam with others on the instant messenger too. As I am typing this I am between Flagstaff Arizona and Page Arizona on the Navajo Reservation. There is virtually nothing around, but when the light is green on the 'Merlin XV640' EXPRESS CARD modem, I have an internet connection.

As I am using this, I was thinking how much it would have stunk to have lived my life at any other time. So, that is one of the things that I am grateful for during this thanksgiving season. Wireless internet on the Reservation. :-)

PS. After traveling through this wilderness areas, many of which I was not expecting any connection at all, I recommend the Verizon ExpressNet service. Right now, with a calling plan, the Unlimited Wireless Data is 59.99 per month. Great on Road trips (when another is doing the driving of course).

Apple Memory upgrade...

I think that I am going to start a new business. Here is my plan:

• Buy a load of memory from a place like Crucial.com
• Sit outside the Apple store with my table that says - "Memory Upgrades - 10% to charity"
• Charge 1000.00 to max out memory in a MacBook Pro
• Make 800.00 per transaction, donate 80.00 to some charity, pocket the rest.

WHY would the Apple store website charge me 1000.00 to upgrade, when I can order the memory for 200.00. I even found another site that had the chips (without a brand name) for 77.00 each.

I think that if I choose to go to the Apple store and upgrade, I should get a MacMini free. :-)

Vista on the MacBook Pro

The other day, I realized that my MacBook Pro was sitting on the shelf gathering dust. I started work in mid September, and was given a Dell laptop to use for work. The Dell was not a bad machine, however the specs are meager when compared to that of the new MacBook Pro.

With some determination, I nuked the Mac, to re-install OSx. I did this because when I previously removed the Boot Camp partition, the Boot Camp wizard would not set up again. The re-installation went smooth, and I was happy with it.

The Vista installation went smooth. As soon as Vista installed, I used the CD that Boot Camp created to install all of the relevant drivers. Vista runs really well. Booting natively of course allows Vista to run at full speed. Compared to running in Parallels, we are talking tortoise vs. hare.

Only one thing that I would like to have is being able to tap the touch pad. Can't have everything though right?

OSx 10.5, Leopard just came out. Apparently, it has the final version of Boot Camp. I downloaded the latest beta version, and it seems to be working fine. So right now, I don't see any reason to upgrade to Leopard, as Vista is my primary operating system.

Importance of the Thank-You Note in the Job Search

I have had a few students ask me about the ‘mysterious thank-you note’ after the career fair or interviews. Over the past few months, I have done some reading on various opinions that are out there. Thought that I would share (not that I am an expert) my point of view. I included some good links to Monster articles which may be valuable to those that will read them.

There are several reasons for the thank-you note, making sure to send a good one will help take advantage of its full potential.

1) Show the company that following the interview, you are still interested.

2) Show that you were paying attention, and interested in the company.

3) Negate any concerns about yourself that were raised during an interview.

4) Ask for a continuance in the hiring process.

5) Show your value to them.

Here is an example of a simple thank-you after a first interview that meets the goals of a thank-you note:

I wanted to thank you for the opportunity to interview regarding the position of with .

I found the work of very interesting, and I hope that the skills that I bring would be valuable. I hope that we can continue the process with additional interviews.

If there is any additional information that I can provide regarding myself, skills, or availability, please contact me.

After a 2^nd interview, the thank you note should be much more detailed. The goals are still the same really. Be sure to get contact information from all of those that you interview with. It may be that the person who needs to get another good impression of you may be the one that you forgot to get an e-mail address for.

Mickey, Minnie, & Donald,

I wanted to thank all of you for your time yesterday. I felt that our discussions provided a clearer picture of the opportunities that exist with .

Another attraction to the position for me is the fact that there is so much variety in working with a customized product. The aspect of variety in the job is important to me, and is another reason that I believe the position is a good fit for me.

I know that I would be able to quickly learn the ABC software, and be able to put it to work for the customers that are served. With additional reading on the website, I can see that there are many ways that ABC software can be implemented for the customers of . I am certain that finding individualized ways to implement ABC software for improved organizational efficiency will be one of the ways that I can succeed with the company as a .

Just remember that the key is to show the company how you are going to be valuable to them. Associating your good skills with the needs of the position will also show that you understand this value. Be honest too, if you are not feeling that your skills and abilities are a fit, then the position probably is not. These associations should come naturally.

If there are other interview sessions, it would be appropriate to thank those involved in the process.

More Reading on Thank-You notes:

http://content.monster.com/articles/3481/16541/1/home.aspx “Follow the Interview with a Thank-You Note”

http://content.monster.com/articles/3481/17560/1/home.aspx “The Power of a Simple Thank-You Note”

http://content.monster.com/articles/3481/18485/1/home.aspx “Write Winning Thank-You Letters”

Mac Update

I thought that I would write an update on how the Mac experience thus far.

I have been using the MacBook Pro (MBP) every day at school. Here is the list of my observations so far:

• The space bar squeaks. No kidding. I generally type the space bar with my right thumb, and when I do, I get a squeak. Perhaps it needs some lube. I may take it down to the Mac store and see if I can get that taken care of. I mean, it has only been a week.
• As for performance, I have been quite happy with the speed. One of the key things that I was looking for here was the performance of the Parallels Virtual Machine. I have loaded up my Windows XP, giving it half of the 2GB memory. Most of the work that I do with windows does not need extreme graphics, and I found that going with 16MB graphics in parallels (the max is 64) I get better performance. Generally in XP, I have MS Outlook running in the background monitoring my school e-mail, and then running whatever application I need for school. Working with VS2005 and the NORMA tool, I have not noticed significant slow downs when building the application over my Thinkpad. I think that having the 2.4GHZ DUO processor makes up a bit. The Thinkpad was 2.16GHZ.
• I tried the Boot camp, which worked great. I was even able to VM boot from the Boot camp partition. This is great, however, I immediately noticed the loss of the suspend ability in Parallels. Well, that feature is important to me. I installed VISTA on the Bootcamp partition, loaded all the drivers and the speed seemed really good. However, the purpose of getting the MAC was to learn the OSx and UNIX environments, so I removed my Vista install, removed the Boot camp changes to the HD, and I will be sticking to the Parallels VM of XP that I have for now. When I am done with school, I might do a Vista in Parallels, although I have heard that performance is not good with Vista and Parallels.
• I had read some reviews regarding the heat issue and the MBP. The left side of the machine stays warm. I would say that it has only gotten HOT in a couple of instances where the machine was under a workload for an extended period of time. When I am at school, plugged in, I am working in FULL POWER settings. I notice that when I lower everything to conserve power, that it cools a lot.
• Software: I have found a world of software that was inaccessible to me before. Lots of shareware and freeware too. All of the apps that I have checked out have been from recommended lists and have been good. Perhaps I will make a list and blog it sometime in the future.
• I have found the OS x user interface to be quite easy to use. I like the expose features that make switching between programs pretty easy.

Overall, I am happy. I feel like I have a quality machine, which is in a nice package. Quite literally, the only disappointment is the keyboard squeak. Hopefully that can be fixed under the warranty.

A MacBook Pro...

Ok,
So, there are many things that I have on my 'to-get' list. I did not think that the Mac Book Pro would move to the top of that list.

Well, after hearing great things from several friends who are using the Mac Book, and enjoying OS x alongside of XP, I thought, what the heck... I might as well give it a try. Also, Apple announced at the beginning of July that they were upping the CPU to 2.4ghz Intel Core Two Duo.

The MBP(as I have seen it abbreviated on Apple.com) arrived today. I downloaded a trial of Parallels, installed XP, and so I feel quite confident running my Windows software in XP and giving OS X a shot. I have already found Mac Versions for a lot of the things that I need.

Oh, Parallels with cohesion makes it feel like I am using both operating systems seamlessly. I have only had a couple of instances where the Windows felt like, well, windows... but not in a bad way. Even with Windows running in the background, OS X performs the tasks that I ask quite well.

I will write more as the experiences happen.

Article: Five Cool future IT positons

http://www.networkworld.com/news/2007/050707-it-reorganization-five-new-it-jobs.html

I found this article to be quite interesting. The IT world seems under a constant state of evolution, and new positions are opening up all the time. As one who is entering the job market this is great news.

Name Rank...

Name Popularity

There are
Andrew Cordes listings in the USA.

Cordes listings in the USA:

So it turns out that my name ranks 1,157,182 of 47,650,978 at whitepages.com . I thought that it is cool. So to all the others out there with the same name: BooYa! :-)

Just my random thought for the night.

Free Music Downloads - Music Promotion - We7

Free Music Downloads - Music Promotion - We7

I was browsing the net today, and found a project under way called 'we7.' Their business is "music:free, safe, legal, share."

I hope that this project is successful. Basically, they put an ad on the front of a DRM-free mp3, and give it to you. So the idea is that the ad is supporting the download. But, it is not just a random ad. They are saying that their software can target specific users. So if a company wants to target certain users with their ads, then the software would do that based on the user's profile.

Go and check it out... if you think it is a good idea, support it! Hopefully the project will take off, and this would be the future of online music. Down with $0.99 per song! :-)

WorldNetDaily: 25 years murder-free in 'Gun Town USA'

WorldNetDaily: 25 years murder-free in 'Gun Town USA'

This article is a good example of how MORE guns can decrease crime. It is LOGICAL. Here is a 25 year example, paired with a town which outlawed guns. Very interesting.

DOWN WITH INCOME TAX!

I just heard about a grassroots movement that started in 1995. FairTax.org is a group that is advocating for the removal of the Federal Tax system as we know it, and replacing it with a national sales tax. How could that work? Well, they have a great video that is on youtube.com and explains the whole thing.

IT MAKES SENSE! Spend money, pay taxes. No more fileing taxes, or people getting away with tax evasion. Another great idea is that the FairTax only is taken one time. USED goods are not taxed twice. Does "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle" sound like a good idea now? But that is not all. Because the producers of goods pay less taxes, the cost of goods will acutally go DOWN... Watch the video... this is a great proposal in congress.

GRASSROOTS ACTION! --> IF you agree with this idea, e-mail or contact your congressional leaders and tell them. If they don't support it, vote for people that do. This is not going to happen overnight, but long term, it will. The website, http://www.fairtax.org/ has all of the tools that you will need to find if your representatives and senators support this legislation.

If there ever was an issue that I feel motivated to support, this is it! Because it directly will impact every person that I know. Our country would be better off with a FairTax system.

-ANDY

I would love to hear your comments... please view the video first though. :-)

Project Managers... In Demand...

Today, there was an encouraging article in Computerworld regarding Project Managers being in demand. This is good news for me, one who is looking toward being a project manager.

The article also gave some great ideas on how to stand out in the crowd as a project manager. Some of the suggestions that were included are to get certifications, know how to deal with crisis situations, and how to be fiscally responsible in projects.

It is a good article, and I thought that I should post a reflection on it. It can be found at: http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=printArticleBasic&articleId=284769

-AC

Software Developers!

Yesterday, I went through and updated my Facebook Profile. Then, to my amazement, I found that Facebook can now interface with my blog! (See previous post...) Obviously, I thought that this is way cool. Thanks to the software developers that implement features like that. :-) So, there may be more posts from me on my blog.

There was also a pretty good snow storm that rolled through the Salt Lake valley yesterday. It was not as bad where I am as what the weatherman said, but it was good. The forecasts also predicted that there would be snow today... however all that I am seeing outside is lots of sunshine!

Sometime ago...

You know it is interesting how many different sites I maintain... I have a MySpace page, I have a personal website (professional portfolio) that I maintain, I have a profile on Facebook, plus some other social sites. Between all of these, how does one keep all of them current? I have not found a good way to do it, however, I am considering copy and paste. I suppose that if I write something here, and then run around to all of my different profiles, that I can then copy it to the other places. Just a thought.

As for this blog, I have not kept up with it. I was browsing the new features of Office 2007, and I found that there is a blog publishing feature. Well, that just brought to mind the fact that azputerman.blogspot.com has not been updated in some time. I will check out that Word feature in the coming weeks... for now the web based posting feature will do fine.

I am doing well in my school work and Neumont University. The website that I mentioned before, is andrewcordes.com , which is a professional portfolio site that I put together. I have given the address out on my resume, and the site has gotten a number of hits. There is still some work to do, and I want to fill it up with additional info.

I am planning to graduate in September. This has been a long time coming, however, with the beginning of the new year, it really sunk in that I am almost done with this phase of my education. I am really glad that I chose to come to Salt Lake and get my degree. I am looking forward to the opportunities that await me.