Categories
Geek Toronto (a.k.a. Accordion City)

Web Site Integrator Postion in Toronto

Here’s the job that my friend Jay Goldman is offering. Tell ’em you heard about it from the “Accordion Guy” blog.


Job Code: DEV02

Location: Toronto

Type: Full Time

Description

Radiant Core has an immediate opening for a full-time Integrator. You

will be responsible for implementing client sites based on Architecture

and Design Documents, including HTML/CSS, images, and integration with

Radiant Core’s Foundation Website Management Platform. You feel at home

in a self-directed team environment and love producing work that

pleases both you and your clients. You are comfortable building HTML in

a text editor, fixing cross-browser/platform rendering issues, and have

some amount of programming experience in either JSP, PHP, or ASP. You

understand the importance of web standards and are often heard

muttering about validation and cross-browser compliance testing.


Responsibilities

You will work very closely with our Architects, Developers, and

Designers as a member of our Professional Services Team, reporting

directly to our Vice President, Professional Services. You will be

responsible for implementing client websites based on Architecture and

Design Documents, as well as ongoing work to improve our processes and

client services.

Required Skills/Education

  • One or more years experience designing and building

    standards-compliant websites (XHTML 1.0 Strict, CSS2.0) without the use

    of WYSIWYG editors as we hand-code our sites. We are not, at this time,

    hiring implementers who are not fluent in CSS2. Please do not apply for

    this position if you use tables to lay out your websites as your

    application will not be considered.

  • Experience in a client-service environment and an understanding of the politics of client work
  • Experience in design software and web tools (e.g.: Photoshop, Illustrator)
  • Knowledge of cross-browser and cross-platform issues and workarounds
  • Ability to work quickly and efficiently in a self-directed environment and a willingness to learn new things
  • Bachelor degree or equivalent from a related program
  • Knowledge of web programming in one or more of JSP/PHP/ASP
  • Experience with JavaScript

Bonus Points!

  • Experience with JSP specifically (rather than PHP/ASP)
  • Experience building dynamic websites based on Content Management Systems
  • Working knowledge of Macromedia Flash and ActionScript
  • Familiarity with team development environments including CVS, etc.

Compensation

Compensation will be commensurate with your level of experience. Our

employees enjoy competitive pay, flexible hours, a prime downtown

location, and potential ownership opportunities. We are in the process

of finalizing our benefits package and stock plan.

How to Apply

Please send your resume, in an electronic format (e.g.: Microsoft Word,

PDF), along with a link to your portfolio site, to “careers at radiantcore dot com”. Please reference job code DEV02 in your

subject line.

Categories
It Happened to Me

My Housemate Went to Poland and all I Got Was This "Osama and Friends" Nesting Doll Set

Last weekend, my friend and former housemate Paul gave me a very eastern European gift — a set of matreshka (Russian nesting dolls) that he picked up during his summer visit to Poland and the Czech Republic. This was an unusual set — rather than the whey-faced women and girls typically depicted on such dolls, these had the Middle East’s most notorious characters:

  • Osama Bin Laden
  • Mullah Omar
  • Saddam Hussein
  • Yasser Arafat
  • Ayatollah Khomeini


Click the image to see a photo album of shots of this matreshka.

He wisely chose not to give them to me at my wedding, which took place in the United States. If American airport security found this in your carry-on luggage, I’d bet that your next stop would be the body cavity search room.

I took a few shots of the matreshka and put them in a photo album. You can view this album in album format or as a slideshow.

Categories
Uncategorized

Archie Goes Goth

Excerpt from the 'Archie' comic 'She's Goth to Have It'.

The last panel will shock you!

It’s a little-known fact that your subculture is over the minute it becomes a plot point in an Archie Comic. In She’s Goth to Have It, Betty gets tired of being ignored by her friends and tries a new look to get their attention:

Categories
In the News

R.I.P., Porkins

Star Trek may have led to the term “red shirts”, but the expendable characters in Star Wars were more memorable. Most memorable of them all was Porkins (a.k.a. “Red Six”), played by William Hootkins, who passed away last weekend. Hootkins also played the crooked police lieutentant Echkardt in Tim Burton’s Batman and Frobisher in the Blackadder II episode “Beer”.

Photo: Porkins in the cockpit of his X-wing fighter.

Categories
Uncategorized

What Would Jesus Bet?

Next poker game with AKMA, I’m bringing Faith Chips!

A ten-pack is going for ten bucks right now! Click the image to learn more about Faith Chips.

Categories
Uncategorized

The Case of the 500-Mile Email

[Cross-posted to The Farm.]

The story’s a couple of years old, but it’s been making the rounds

lately, so I thought I’d point to it: The Case of the 500-Mile Email.

Here’s the introduction:

I was working in a job running the

campus email system some years ago when I got a call from the chairman

of the statistics department.

“We’re having a problem sending email out of the department.”

“What’s the problem?” I asked.

“We can’t send mail more than 500 miles,” the chairman explained.

I choked on my latte. “Come again?”

“We

can’t send mail farther than 500 miles from here,” he repeated. “A

little bit more, actually. Call it 520 miles. But no farther.”

“Um…

Email really doesn’t work that way, generally,” I said, trying to keep

panic out of my voice. One doesn’t display panic when speaking to a

department chairman, even of a relatively impoverished department like

statistics. “What makes you think you can’t send mail more than 500

miles?”

“It’s not what I *think*,” the chairman replied testily. “You see, when we first noticed this happening, a few days ago–“

“You waited a few DAYS?” I interrupted, a tremor tinging my voice. “And you couldn’t send email this whole time?”

“We could send email. Just not more than–“

“–500 miles, yes,” I finished for him, “I got that. But why didn’t you call earlier?”

“Well,

we hadn’t collected enough data to be sure of what was going on until

just now.” Right. This is the chairman of *statistics*. “Anyway, I

asked one of the geostatisticians to look into it–“

“Geostatisticians…”

“–yes,

and she’s produced a map showing the radius within which we can send

email to be slightly more than 500 miles. There are a number of destinations

within that radius that we can’t reach, either, or reach sporadically,

but we can never email farther than this radius.”

Read the rest to see what the culprit turned out to be.

Categories
It Happened to Me

38th Birthday Party Soon

I’m working on the details. Stay tuned…

Photo: Joey deVilla at his birthday/engagement party, November 2004.

Me at last year’s bash.