Effective communication in 7 easy steps – eMAG TechLabs article

I encourage you to check out my recent article Effective communication in software development projects – in 7 easy steps published in the eMAG TechLabs – the tech blog of the company that I work for as a Software Development hub manager.

In this article I present seven easy rules that you should take into consideration if you want to improve communication in your projects – not only IT related. It is based on my previous experience married with the culture and experience of eMAG.

This article is my next work in the series related to effective communication, after article in Smashing Magazine and presentation on WarszawQA meeting.

If you have any comments or suggestions – please don’t hesitate to contact me.

New book about Apache Thrift published

In 2011 I prepared a tutorial on Apache Thrift, which was as transcript of my exploration of this great framework. In the first half of 2015 I was approached by Packt Publishing to write a book in their “Learning” series, to serve as an introduction to Apache Thrift.

I am proud to announce, that after over half year of hard work the book was published. It is available in the paperback and ebook formats, from the publisher’s website, on Amazon and some brick-and-mortar bookstores in English-speaking world. If you would like to learn about the Apache Thrift framework I recommend my book, which is the first (and currently only) publication of this kind.

The book is available from:

If you read this book and have any questions or concerns – please don’t hesitate to contact me – I’d be happy to help.

My talk about basics of effective communication at QA event

Recently I took part in the first event called WarszawQA – organized by the community of people interested in Quality Assurance in Warsaw. I gave a talk about basics of effective communication in the IT projects.

You may find my presentation here and the summary of the meeting here (both pages in Polish). I hope, that the video of the presentation will be released soon too.

My work inspiration

I was recently approached by curators of the Workspiration website to write about tools that I use in my work and sources of my inspiration.

You can read my entry here.

Calculate exchange rates with Alfred 2 workflow

NOTE: This technical article was published long time ago. It may be not up to date. Please check for the newest versions of mentioned software. Also I am not able to provide technical support anymore. Thank you for your understanding.

Alfred 2 is awesome productivity application for Mac OS X. It allows you to quickly search files, navigate web, run applications and many more. One of the great features of Alfred are workflows – custom actions, that can be triggered (and programmed) by the user.

As a solution to my frequent need of calculating the exchange rates between currencies, I made an Alfred 2 workflow that allows to do exactly that, using Google-like syntax, for example:

rate 123 USD in EUR

will yield result:

90.44 EUR

Here’s a screenshot:

alfred-currencies screenshot

alfred-currencies screenshot

You can download the workflow here. Installation instructions are on the project’s Github page, as well as the code and issue tracker.

How to intercept e-mail messages using E-MailRelay SMTP proxy

NOTE: This technical article was published long time ago. It may be not up to date. Please check for the newest versions of mentioned software. Also I am not able to provide technical support anymore. Thank you for your understanding.

Recently I had a suspicion, that my e-mail messages weren’t delivered properly. I use Gmail as a client, however some of my messages are fetched from and sent through the third party server. I was under the impression, that not all of the messages that I send are delivered to the recipient. This problem is hard to debug, because Gmail provides no logs nor client support, and it is also troublesome to get the information from my e-mail/hosting company every time I think something’s wrong.

Continue…

How to modify and calibrate regular servo to be continuous servo

NOTE: This technical article was published long time ago. It may be not up to date. Please check for the newest versions of mentioned software. Also I am not able to provide technical support anymore. Thank you for your understanding.

Most of the servos that are available at reasonable prices are “standard” servos. That means, the output shaft of the servo can be positioned in the position from 0 to 180 degrees. It can be set by the duration of the pulse sent to the control wire (yellow, orange or white) of the servo. Other two wires are power (red) and ground (black or brown). In Arduino, there is Servo library, which serves this purpose.

Standard servo is useful when you want to control angle. However sometimes, you need continuous rotation in specified direction. It is easy to modify standard servo to become continuous servo. In such case, degree of 0 means full speed in one direction, 180 – full speed in other, while middle value means no motion (it is around 90 – more about calibration later).

This tutorial will show you, how to perform such easy modification. You will need to remove the potentiometer and replace it with two 2,2k Ohm resistors.

Continue…

Renew your CrashPlan subscription with discount exclusive for new users

NOTE: This technical article was published long time ago. It may be not up to date. Please check for the newest versions of mentioned software. Also I am not able to provide technical support anymore. Thank you for your understanding.

CrashPlan is pretty amazing backup solution – it provides multiple backup solutions for your personal data, including unlimited cloud storage, backup to friends or local devices and other. They charge $59.99 annually for unlimited plan (1 computer). Frequently (like, all the time) they offer large discounts (20% and more) for new users. However, they forget about existing users – if you want to extend your subscription, you need to pay full amount. When I asked them about that, they told me, that it is a technical difficulty to sort this out in their billing system.

I think it’s unfair for existing customers, who refer the service to their friends and families (i.e. I referred them to at least 4 or 5 paying customers). I found a way to extend your account with the discount in a couple of easy steps:

  1. Log into your CrashPlan account on their website.
  2. Find your subscription, cancel it. They will warn you, that all data will be deleted. What they won’t tell you is that they will not do it immediately – your data is still there for a couple of hours.
  3. At this moment go to the discount offer page (look at their website or facebook page), while still logged in.
  4. Buy the discounted subscription. You will receive new license key.
  5. In the CrashPlan application delete old license key and paste the new one.
  6. Enjoy your extended subscription at the discounted price 🙂

Note: this method is valid as of November 1, 2013.

Note2: I tried to use this method recently (November 1, 2015) and it doesn’t seem to be working anymore. If you were successful – please let me know!

Use multiple computers with one mouse and keyboard – Synergy

NOTE: This technical article was published long time ago. It may be not up to date. Please check for the newest versions of mentioned software. Also I am not able to provide technical support anymore. Thank you for your understanding.

Recently at my office we have set up extra machine with large screen to show project statistics, error notifications, occasional after-5pm-funny-videos, etc. (I plan to cover this subject in the future). Unfortunately, it is quite uncomfortable to work on this  machine with head upwards all the time, stuck between two desks with mouse and keyboard on your laps.

That’s why I found a tool, that is great, when one wants to control multiple computers with just one keyboard and mouse: Synergy. This solution doesn’t require to set up any remote desktop connection or any special hardware. One doesn’t have to switch between the devices – you can move the cursor (and thus, the keyboard’s focus) from one computer to another. Furthermore, it’s multiplatform, so you can use it on the Mac, Windows and Linux machine on the same time. The software is built on the server-client architecture – computer with keyboard and mouse attached (i.e. your desktop computer) is server. It runs the service and all other devices should connect to this computer. You can use the other devices’ keyboard and mouses simultaneously on the respective devices, but only the server can move the cursor between the computers.

Configuration is straightforward: you have to install the application on every device you wish to use. Then, on the designated server, you should configure the computers that are allowed to connect (by designating simple names). You have to place every computer on the matrix. Then, start the server and on the clients – connect to the given server’s IP. That’s it.

Main "Synergy" application screen.

Main “Synergy” application screen.

Client configuration matrix - "Synergy".

Client configuration matrix – “Synergy”.