6 '''Bernie''': Hello Easy!!! It's nice to be chatting here in the blog!
8 I saw this two photo some row below...
10 But all those OLPC at the roof, what doing?? Only for furnishing or for specific utility?? :)
12 '''Bernie''': Hehe... they're part of the WirelessMesh, for testing
13 purposes. An hispanic guy called Miguel (not the same of De Icaza)
14 sometimes fiddles with them. He's lucky because he's very tall.
17 The office is very beautiful and the Apple Cinema Display is really very big...
19 '''Bernie''': Yeah, that's the personal screen of my boss/team-leader ChrisBall.
20 It's 30". One day or another I'll bring here my 24" wide-screen from home.
22 Do you have some new news about your new work??
24 '''Bernie''': Sorry for not updating the blog... I've been *extremely*
25 busy. I will do it shortly... Promised.
29 ==== Trip to work ====
31 I still couldn't solve the problem of getting to work
32 quickly. I can't afford to waste over 2 hours every
35 By now, I've tried any possible solution:
37 * Car: the office doesn't have a parking lot and there's
38 no way to park within one mile from KendalSquare for less
39 than $18/day. Monthly fees start from $250.
41 * Bus: I need to commute in Dudley and take line no. 1 to
42 MassachusettsAvenue, then walk 15 minutes to KendalSquare.
44 * Bus + subway combo: The red line would get me directly
45 to KendalSquare, and there are several routes to get there,
46 but all of them require commuting at least twice. The
47 monthly link pass costs $75.
49 * Car + subway combo: there are some cheap parkings next
50 to the terminal subway stations where you can leave your
51 car for $5/day. Unfortunately, to get there I must
52 travel in the opposite direction. And the whole thing
53 will cost $75 + $5*30, about the same of the monthly
56 * Taxi: Costs $11-$14 * 2 every day, which makes the
57 monthly parking cheap in comparison.
59 And even worse, the red line stops running at midnight
60 and bus no 1 at 1AM. Which forces me to leave from
61 the office very early (for my standards).
63 If you want to play with the possibilities, I just
64 discovered that the transportation company has a very cool
65 web service that would have saved me a lot of time:
68 http://www.mbta.com/rider_tools/trip_planner/default.asp
69 From: 66 Maywood st., Roxbury MA
70 To: Kendall/mit Station, Cambridge
73 At the end of the day, the ultimate solution is moving
74 closer to the office or at least close to the red line.
75 Maybe I could afford to spend $600 for a room, but I
76 don't feel like moving right now. I already have enough
79 ''Have you considered to put a bicycle in your combo? You may replace a 10 km walk with it and open up new combinations (and ways to get wet...) -- PiroPiro''
81 ==== Awful Weather ====
83 Today it's raining lightly. Yesterday I took an extra shower
86 The WikiPedia was definitely right: weather in Boston can
87 change very rapidly. Must remember to buy a raincoat like
88 RichardStallman's and keep it in my backpack.
94 1. Get employed at OLPC
99 Just joking, but the truth is that I still need
100 to face a lot of new challenges now.
102 My next problem will be improving my communication skills.
103 After one month of full immersion, I can still barely
104 understand people talking quickly to each and I clearly
105 express myself using an inadequately poor vocabulary and
106 too slowly in some cases.
108 These things will improve over time, while my strong
109 Italian inflection is likely to remain forever. If
110 only I could find one, I'd attend to a course to
111 correct my diction now. Actors do them.
113 Another crucial problem I need to solve quickly is
114 getting a visa that allows me to work here permanently.
115 There are many possibilities, but none guaranteed to
116 succeed. For now, I'm not thinking about it: my
117 employer knows better than me and will help as much
120 Last but not least, my job is not easy and requires a
121 good amount of commitment. All my colleagues are extremely
122 smart and more experienced than I am. So I need to work
123 twice as hard to keep up with them.
125 A very nice workplace and very interesting assignments helps.
126 And, most importantly, I know that what we're doing here is
127 going to have a huge impact on the world.
129 '''Andrea Grandi''': Your words give me no hopes for my future :(
131 '''Bernie''': Are you planning to come here? Cool! :D
133 > All my colleagues are extremely smart and more experienced than I am
135 More than you? It's not a place for me then :D
137 '''Bernie''': It's worth trying even if you currently think you're
138 not up to the job. It's a very valuable experience even if you
139 end up returning to your home country for some reason.
141 '''Rasky''': But can you get a perm visa even without an university
142 degree? I thought that was absolutely out of question... I knew that
143 people without a degree could just get some 1-year temp visa.
150 Here are some more pics of MyOlpcDesk.
154 ==== Office Space =====
156 Here are a few pictures of the OlpcOffice!
158 ==== Hack Hack Hack ====
160 I've been assigned a problem with an invalid serial port baud
161 rate after resume from software suspend.
163 I started investigating the hard way, until ChrisBall pointed
164 me on IRC to talk with the KernelHacker DavidWoodhouse, who
165 obviously had a solution in a few seconds. Unfortunately,
166 it didn't work as we expected and MitchBradley of OpenFirmware
167 joined the conversation to help.
169 Having all the subsystem gurus available to fix your bugs makes
170 things a lot easier... Hehe, I think I like it ;-)
172 And so tomorrow I'll get back to work on a MandelBug with the Xorg's
173 driver for the AMD chipset. When XVIDEO is enabled and you
174 rotate the display with XRANDR, sometimes the X server crashes,
175 sometimes it just hangs and sometimes it survives with a corrupted
176 display. And the bad news is that gdb also hangs.
178 How will I fix this? Easy: I'll go looking for the driver authors
179 first thing tomorrow and beg them to send me a fix :-)
181 By the way, lately I've been hanging regularly in #olpc on FreeNode.
182 My nick is _bernie. Come over to see what's going on!
187 ==== All Night Long ====
189 At 9PM, I'm still here and plan to stay as long as I can :-)
191 <please link to the song "All Night Long" here>
194 ==== Buried In Work Already ====
196 '''WARNING''': Technical AbraCadabra ahead!
198 Today I met most of the team members and bothered a few of them,
199 starting from DanWilliams who helped me debug a problem with a
200 simple mesh networking scenario involving three laptops.
202 Today I've also been assigned some work from ChrisBall, who also
203 helped me out with many small things such as a dead battery,
204 accessing the serial console, etc. I'm currently adding a
205 KernelDebugger command to display the ModelSpecificRegister's
208 But it seems like I will also refer to RedHat's ChrisBlizzard
209 to be assigned more work. We talked about optimizing the
210 video driver for the AmdGeodeCpu, getting the resistive
211 tablet to work and maybe adding "tapping" support to the
214 As you know, I like it even more when I'm allowed to ramble
215 through a zillion different things like this!
218 ==== Sneaky Preview ====
220 I'm writing this from within the OLPC headquarters. I came today for
221 a second interview and to get a few tasks assigned to me :-)
223 I have no time to be more specific. Will tell you the details a little later.
228 '''TODO''': will tell you later
232 '''TODO''': will tell you later
235 >MUM< creepy mummy virus it's taking control here.... :-) WRITE SOON OR IT/SHE WILL DESTROY EVERYTHING!
236 ==== Quite a Trip ====
238 Today I'm leaving the safe and familiar BostonCity to boldly go where I've
241 The current plan is to drive south to ProvidenceCity, BrdigeportCity, NewYorkCity,
242 PhiladelphiaCity, BaltimoreCity and, finally, WashingtonCity. Maybe I'll even
243 push myself down in FloridaState to go see the SpaceShuttle!
245 I could use a GPS. I've seen a few TomTom's, but $299 seems way too
246 much to me for a talking map. Maybe I'll buy a traditional map for
249 Ah, and I will sleep frugally, of course. Hostels and motels when I find
250 them. So, over the next few days I'll be lucky if I have intermittent
251 Internet access and, consequently, I won't probably be able to sync the
257 '''Babbo''': Ma fino ad oggi con quali danari hai vissuto dato che sei partito con 10€ liquidi?
259 '''Bernie''': Ho prelevato i soldi dall'ATM... con il bancomat delle poste! E vedo dai movimenti
260 sul conto che hanno applicato un buon cambio e nessuna penale strana.
264 Today I finally rent a car. It's a SaturnIon, a brand and model I never heard
267 http://www.edmunds.com/media/seo/500/2006.saturn.ion.jpg
269 I felt very comfortable driving all over Europe: Italy, Swiss, Spain, France,
270 Germany, Belgium, and even Greece... But, for some reason, I was quite afraid
271 of driving a car here in the States.
273 Maybe it's because the road signs are somewhat different and there are a few
274 subtly different rules, such as turning right on red, not parking in front
275 of hydrants, etc. Most probably, it's because I've seen way too many movies
276 where people get stopped by police and thrown in jail quite easily!
278 Well, so far everything went very well. I mean, except for parking. Parking
279 in downtown is easy if you're willing to pay $10-12 for a few hours.
280 It's a big pain in the ass otherwise... The best way I've found so far
281 is to park near a minor T station and then get the T to downtown :-(
283 And, of course, the car has AutomaticTransmission, which I managed to learn
284 quickly: the trouble comes when you switch the other way around ;-)
286 Ok, today I've driven all around Boston just to get used to it. Tomorrow
287 I'll probably dare getting on the highway to see around.
290 ==== Business Visa? ====
292 Today I've re-read detailed information on the
293 available US visa options:
295 http://travel.state.gov/visa/temp/types/types_1262.html
297 Looks like a ''B-1'' Business Visa would do. To get one,
298 I should go to a US ambassy, and ambassys are usually
299 located abroad. Instead of returning to Italy, maybe
300 I could get an appointment in MontrealCity, which is
301 near to the border and also an interesting place to see.
308 Yesterday I applied for this great service: http://www.zipcar.com/ .
309 Isn't it a good idea? Costs less than renting a car and is almost
312 <rasky> http://www.carsharingfirenze.it/ :)
314 Today I walked to their offices to give them my documents
315 and get the magnetic card. They said they will enable it
316 first thing tomorrow *if* the "insurance risk declaration"
317 I got from Italy suffices.
320 ==== Simple shopping ====
322 Consumers must be very simple minded here. First, most
323 shop names are simply dumb: '''Pay Less''', '''Save-A-Lot''',
324 '''Big Deal''', and so on.
326 ''Sounds very '''meno tasse per tutti''' to me... -- PiroPiro''
328 Second, they try to subtle deceptions such as: "take 2 for $24.xx",
329 and, next to it: "take 3 for $21.xx", Which of course is
330 impossible. It's a trap! The little figures placed
331 exactly where you would expect to see the cents, are
332 indeed a small notice: ''EACH''.
334 Today I bought a dozen of razor blades ($1.50), a
335 bottle of shampoo ($1.50) and shower gel ($1.50).
336 But I spent $12 for adjusting the two pair of
337 trousers I had bought a few days ago in the mall!
338 $12 ''EACH'', I mean.
341 ==== Bad Neighborhood ====
343 Walking home alone in the night, I may encounter some ''bad'' guys:
345 http://bender.codewiz.org/wikidata/text/FunWithWeapons.jpg
347 Better be careful :-)
352 ==== Veni, Vidi, ???? ====
354 This morning I shown up at OneLaptopPerChild's headquarters. It's again next to KendallSquare,
355 in OneCambridgeCenter.
357 JimGettys was very kind: he took me to LegalSeaFood for lunch, repaired my ExOh's keyboard (two
358 keys were dead) and introduced me to the team members.
360 They left me with the usual Hollywood formula: "don't call us, we'll call you".
361 But in this particular case, I felt they were sincere :-)
363 I hope to be soon a member of the OLPC core team!
368 ==== Alea Iacta Est ====
370 As promised... Yes, indeed. Everybody please cross their fingers.
372 Babbo:Pregherò perchè tu possa ottenere quello che cerchi.
374 Camy: Mannaggia a voi due ( Bernie e Alberto ) siete cosi..."teneri". Come ho già detto tante volte a Bernie, è fortunato ad avere un babbo cosi! Lo so, lo so che non c'entra nulla con lo stile di questo blog, ma io sono cosi, impulsiva e Bernie lo sa e mi perdonerà.
375 A dire il vero anch'io sto in ansia per lui :-) speriamo bene...
377 Bernie: Via, non fatemi venire il magone voi due :-)
381 ==== International Dinner ====
383 FedericoLucifredi and his wife Irena were so kind to invite me at their place for a
384 fine dinner with appetizers, SirloinSteak (see pic below), several side
385 dishes and... Even a PinotNoir!
387 http://www.fairburysteaks.com/images/bci-sirloin-round-bone.gif
389 There were also Mauro -- Federico's colleague at Ximian -- and Irena's
390 friend who's a physics professor from Providence and could speak perfect
391 French and, surprisingly, even Italian!
393 What can I say? I think I got a pound or two that night, but it was
401 There's a cinema in building 26 @ EmAiTee, and it's cheap.
406 If you're curious, my room rent is $500 per month. Utilities,
407 forniture and DSL Internet access are included.
409 It's not cheap, but it's also not too expensive for Boston.
410 They told me that only Manhattan is more expensive here on
413 ==== CurriculumVitae ====
415 ...is almost ready. A friend told me that I'd better have
416 also a synthetic resume of 1-2 pages for the impatient.
419 Well, I said I'd be finished by last Monday, but then I
420 managed to slip past my own deadline visiting NewYorkCity,
421 moving in my current room and in other frivolous ways.
423 Now I have no excuses: the time has come. Next Monday I
424 ''will'' write my proposal. Seriously.
428 ==== Exchange Rates ====
430 Looks like I'd better convert all my money to dollars *now*:
432 http://www.x-rates.com/d/USD/EUR/graph30.html
434 What do you think about it?
436 Babbo:penso che $ continuerà a svalutare. Perderai soldi.
438 ==== StataCenter ====
440 I forgot to tell you about the kewlest building in EmAiTee:
442 http://www.eecs.mit.edu/images/big-stata12.jpg
444 See also: http://www.eecs.mit.edu/stata-link.html
448 After a long time, I finally get to (ab)use MIT's wi-fi and
449 barf my short-term brain buffer into my BrainDump.
451 Tonight we went to an Irish pub next to Kendall, where I got
452 to know a few more Ximian employees. I got rumors that
453 the famous kernel hacker RobertLove would be there, so after
454 a while I turned to the guy next to me and asked: "Is
455 RobertLove really going to come?". And he replied: "Speaking."
457 Another guy told me: "Hi, I'm BAHB". "Pardon?". "BAHB!".
458 "What???". Federico promptly helped me out: "Ha detto che si
461 The beer was good. I discovered that a BlueMoon is the
462 nearest approximation of a WeisseBeer I can find here,
463 and I'm not at all displeased by its taste.
467 My landlord has recently switched DSL provider and Internet
468 doesn't work any more: the sync light on the modem flashes.
469 It seems that crappy ISPs are a common disease in the States
472 Yesterday, he called for service and, finally, they told him
473 they would send a tech today from 8AM to 18PM. They refused
474 to be more specific. And so I've agreed to wait here to let
475 the guy in... I care about it for myself too!
479 By the way, today I'm exactly 150 pounds (use GoogleCalculator
480 to get it to SI units).
482 150 pounds = 68.0388555 kilograms
488 They told me Roxbury is quite an infamous suburb of Boston.
489 And my first impression confirms that: shops are uglier,
490 parks and streets are somewhat dirtier (but not as much as
491 in NewYorkCity!) and, most importantly, some of the neighbors
492 look creepy. Especially in the night, streets are crowded by
493 people with criminal faces and many homeless.
495 You know I'm not the type who's easily scared off by a bunch
496 of zombies, but I'll feel much better when I'll drive a car.
500 I've finally settled in my room. There's no need to describe the house
501 in detail, as it's the most typical colonial design: two floors plus
502 basement, front and back yards, sliding windows, wooden floors
503 everywhere. You've come to know them very well from the movies.
505 Today I went to the mall to gather the essentials: a blankets,
506 a pillow case and some bath towels. The bed is comfortable and
507 I was quite tired already, therefore I fell asleep early in the
508 evening and kept on until 8 AM.
510 '''WARNING: TIME WARP OCCURRED'''
514 '''WARNING: TIME WARP IMMINENT'''
518 Alberto: Attento a convertire € in $ perchè € si sta apprezzando,e quindi $ svalutando rispetto a €.
520 Belle le foto scovate da Massimo. Have a good stay in Btn.
522 Massimo: Bernie, you taught me: http://www.google.com/search?q=100+USD+in+EUR
525 Massimo: Since Bernie could not give us any picture, I had to use flickr: here they are!
527 http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=bernardo+innocenti
529 Piro: what in the heaven is RMS doing dressed like a camp tent? :D
533 ==== BankOfAmerica ====
535 I went to BankOfAmerica and opened a bank account. I went there wearing a yellow T-shirt
536 and a weary pair of jeans. In the beginning, they referred me to a young guy who quickly
537 tried to offer me a student's saving account. When I queried for interest rates, credit
538 cards, and dollar/euro conversion rates, they finally realized that I was going to move
541 When I've shown them my balance, they immediately switched me to a very polite girl who
542 took all the time to explain me everything in detail until after their closing time and
543 recommended me to open *3* different accounts to get a rate of 4.80% with no fees!
544 I totally hate when people judge you by your wealth, dressing, or other stupid status
545 symbols, but maybe a bank is the only exception where it makes sense to do so.
547 Banking appears to be far, far simpler here. I already feel like I know
548 everything while in Italy I still can't read most of the paperwork I get from
551 Batt: Or maybe american bankers are so skilled that you are happy while, in truth, they have stolen your money forever :-P
553 Massimo: Yahr yahr! He didn't realize they already got 4.80% of his balance from his pocket with a magician move! Yahr yahr! Anyway... 4-5% rate is not absurd in the US. It has always been almost like this as far as I can remember (maybe sometimes it was even 6-7%). It's useful for someone (like bernie), but tragic for someone who does not have any money and to buy a house with those mortgages it's almost impossible. Still, the US has got a very low rate in comparison with other extra-european countries.
557 ==== Good News, Everyone! ====
559 '''After a long struggling, I've finally found a room!'''
561 And I'll be moving in *today*! But I'm writing on Thursday the 3rd, actually (aren't you thinking fourth-dimentionally yet?).
563 The room is nice and comes with some forniture, including a desk. It's on the second floor
564 of a house where the landlord lives with her wife and a very friendly puppy.I like it
565 that way: all those houses shared by students I've seen so far tend to become unmaintained
566 and dirty quite quickly, while this one is a real house with a fully operational kitchen,
567 bathroom and even a clean back garden!
569 My landlord is Armenian, but have been living here in Boston for a long time. My first
570 impression is he's a very nice person, honest and easy going. I haven't met his wife yet --
571 she'll be back on Sunday.
573 I'm afraid the house is a bit far away from MIT, in southern Boston. But that won't
574 be a problem as soon as I buy a car. There may even be a chance to rent or buy the
575 car readily from my landlord's son.
577 I don't know the address yet. I should, but I forgot the sheet on the table when I went there. And I can't call my landlord either because I've stolen his cell phone by mistake also. Yeah, I reckon I mustn't a good impression, actually :-)
580 '''Camy''': the landlord lives with '''his''' wife
582 ==== Do You Speak English? ====
584 Some of you will be pissed off by this change, but I'm starting to make
585 some international friends here and none of them could read Italian.
587 Writing in English is also what I need to improve my writing skills.
588 For the few of you who barely know English, some more reading surely won't hurt!
590 [[http://translate.google.com/translate?u=http%3A%2F%2Fbender.codewiz.org%2Fwiki%2FMayBlog&langpair=en%7Cit=en Google Translator]]
593 As always, I'd very much appreciate being told about any mistake I make.
595 ''Massimo: ok, let's start with those horrible contractions my poor eyes had to read: '''Won't''' and '''I'd'''. Hey Bernie! You already went back home from NYC. Ain't gonna play with ya 'nymore!''