The Company man, part 24

Jonah determined that the president of Privex had suddenly decided to leave the country and head to Columbia for a summit meeting with his angel investors. “Bad move,” Jonah commented to Henry as they drank coffee. “They’re not going to be too happy that he spent so much of their money now have nothing to show for it. He thinks his skills are so valuable that they’ll give him a different job in their outfit, but that kind of money lost is unforgiveable. He’s gonna die a very painful death.”

Henry put down his coffee. He didn’t like that kind of imagery Jonah was putting in his head. “Did you ever find Jonathan?” he asked, trying to change the subject.

“Just his car,” Jonah conceded. “I’m starting to think that guy really is a ghost, just like you said. He’s very good at disappearing.”

With the the discovery of the clones, Privex was declared lost. Its assets were sold and the money used to setup identities for the clones determined to have not actually committed any crimes. They were moved to different cities and states, with restraining orders to not contact one another. The original Henry was permitted to keep his apartment, though he had to give up his car, and now took the bus. Jonah got him a job in the accounting department of the local FBI office. They were having lunch in the cafeteria on the second floor.

“Henry?” Jonah asked. “What did you think of those guys in inventory that got killed?”

Henry didn’t like to talk about it, but he trusted Jonah. “I never especially liked them,” Henry confessed, but then added, “But I never hated them! I still respected them. Why?”

Jonah stared up at the ceiling. “I was reading through Jonathan’s notes,” he explained. “He makes mention of a monoculture. It’s an environment where everyone has the same or view similar views on things, with no differing opinions. In that kind of situation, soft opinions get reinforced, making them stronger. Over time, they become strong opinions, even fanatical ones, except that members of the monoculture don’t see it as such because everyone agrees with them. I’m guessing you had at least some infatuation with that weather girl too?”

“She is very pretty,” Henry smiled.

“And that got reinforced into a dangerous obsession among the clones. There are subtler examples of this in companies where the president is very controlling. All of the people that report to him just agree all the time, giving the president a perception that he can do no wrong, and ultimately drives the company into the ground. In a sense, the experiment Privex performed demonstrated why cloning for labor is not a good idea.”

“Cloning for labor?”

“The drug cartels wanted a cheap source of labor,” Jonah explained, “Which in progressive economy’s is increasingly hard to find. Places like China are on the upswing. With labor prices and job opportunities increasing, it’s hard to find people to process drugs for little to nothing in compensation. Columbia has less of a problem, but they can see which way the wind is blowing. It makes sense that they would invest in a program like this. What’s sad is that they found an American company willing to do the dirty work. I don’t know what the board was thinking.”

“Maybe they had one of those mono-culturey things,” Henry suggested. “If that were the case, they wouldn’t be able to see the problems posed.”

Jonah smiled. “You’re smarter than you think you are Henry,” he stated, then switched topics suddenly. “Found any new hobbies?”

“I found a group near my apartment that does a lot of stuff with RC planes and helicopters. I bought  a kit and have started building my own. The girl working at the hobby store is really cute, and has helped me out a lot.”

Jonah smiled. His next report on Henry would be a good one.

THE END

The Company Man, part 23

#2 heard the shots and cautiously peered around the corner. He saw #62 laying on the ground as the police officer pulled his injured partner back through the door. He was yelling into his radio. “Shots fired!” he cried. “Shots fired! I’ve got one man down and need backup. I need full armor backup!”

#2 could not take his eyes off the corpse of #62. With one death, his confidence evaporated and fear raced in to fill the void. “My God!” he exclaimed softly. “They’re going to kill us all!”

#2 turned around to face his crowd of brothers. All of them stood, motionless, with the same  horrific look of terror. The scene was sickening. No variety, they truly were all the same. #2 knew they were all thinking the same thing.

“Start looking for other ways out,” #2 ordered with a voice that crackled with fear, but none of them moved.

“We should give ourselves up,” one of them suggested.

“Maybe they’ll listen if we explain,” another offered.

#2 felt his power slipping away. In the short time he’d grown used to the power, and could bear to give it up. “We just shot a police officer,” he argued. “They’re not going to stop and listen.”

“We didn’t shoot a police officer,” one of them argued. “That one did, and he’s dead now.”

“We could blame him for the other killings,” #12 suggested. “That he held the rest of us hostage.”

But #2’s nerves had already yielded to fear. He drew his gun and pointed at the others. “I said,” he growled. “Look for another way out.” The others did not move. He fired once, killing #33. The others still remained frozen in fear. He fired again, killing #78. It sickened him that no matter how many he killed, there would still be more of them with that expression of horror. #2 started to shake.

#24 drew his gun and shot #2, killing him. He then walked over to the couch and turned on the TV to the weather channel, but the weather girl was not scheduled to come on for another six hours. The rest filed out of the dorms and surrendered to the SWAT team that had just breached the building.

The Company Man, part 22

#62 could not stop sweating. He’d managed to take down the security guard who held the key to the weapons locker, but not before he seriously injured several others. The police were demanding entrance and it did not look like they’d be able to keep them out much longer.

#2 instructed them go and get guns, which they’d done, but now it was unclear who should carry one. There were not enough to go around, and none of them had any experience carrying a gun. It looked pretty easy in the movies, but in practice there are a lot of steps to remember. Actually loading the gun, clearing the chamber, turning off the safety, and all of this while not accidentally pulling the trigger and shooting oneself.

#62 kept a gun. He felt it appropriate given that he’d been the open to get the weapon’s locker open. He wanted to feel safe, and did not care as much about the others. #2 demanded a gun. He had a certain authority given that he’d been around the longest that the others respected. The others were a bit nervous giving him a gun, though. Still, it was passed up to him.

The one who had committed the murder, #24, was also given a gun. #62 did not see who else got one. He kept his hidden. Still, the excitement and adrenaline made him dizzy. All of the clones were milling about in the common room, which was too small to contain them all. He moved clear of the crowd and went over to the door to sit down.

But as he did so, the door burst open and a police officer stepped in. #62 panicked, drew his gun, and pulled the trigger.

For a moment, everything was quiet. He could not tell if the shot had silenced the crowd behind him, or if he’d simply gone deaf from the pounding of his own heart resounding in his ears. He did not have time to dwell upon it. A second office drew his gun and fired three times, hitting him twice in the heart and once in the head. #62 fell to the ground, dead.

The Company Man, part 21

#99 woke up to a nightmare. He’d only been awake for a few hours when the trouble began. One of the clones, he wasn’t sure which one, had come racing into the common room with blood on his hands and shirt yelling, “It’s done! It’s done!” A great cheer went up. When #99 asked what had happened, someone explained that they had just rid the company of those horrible beasts  from inventory. #99 wasn’t quite sure what had happened, but was at least proud to have been there and part of the group.

Excitement, however, turned to fear half an hour later when Jonathan burst through the door, demanding to know who had done it. The clone who committed the deed had washed and changed, and now blended in with all the rest.

“The one who did this must be punished!” yelled Jonathan. “If you don’t give him up, you’ll all be punished.”

#2 spoke up. He sat on a makeshift throne of easy chairs piled up next to the television. “I don’t think you can do that,” he chided. “We’re worth far too much to the company for you to punish us, or kill us. How much did you say it cost to make each of us? $8 million or so? It would be foolish to throw away an investment like that.”

Jonathan glowered. “This goes beyond my control,” he argued. “People are dead. The police have to get involved now.”

“Let them arrest Henry,” #2 suggested. “You’ve got the information you need from him to keep making more of us. With him gone, we can start taking turns going out into the real world and living a real life, rather than being cooped up in here.”

“Yeah!” chimed in #37. “We might even be able to meet that lovely weathergirl… and have some fun.”

Jonathan maintained a steady gaze. He’d gotten reports of lewd phone calls to the local tv station directed at the woman who reported the weather. They’d come from a variety of phones throughout the building. He’d not realized how badly the obsession had grown. He glanced up at #2, who sneered as he looked down at his ‘supervisor.’ Admittedly, he had a point, Henry was expendable at this point, and it would make the entire case more open and shut. “Alright,” he conceded. “Alright, I’ll take care of Henry and the police. for now, you all had better stay hidden and real quiet. But understand, nothing like this can ever happen again!”

Jonathan stormed out. #2 waited until he was gone before laughing out loud. “Jonathan can’t order us around anymore!” he laughed. “We’re too important. They’ll protect us no matter what we do. We’re too crucial to the company. As long as we remain united, they can’t single any one of us out!”

#99 watched the others murmur in agreement. He smiled. It felt good to feel so secure and among friends. And it would be nice to meet that weathergirl.

Going paperless, yet another important lesson learned

Don’t eliminate documents you might need during a time that you will not be able to access your machine or the internet. For example, the manual to help you diagnose why your generator isn’t starting during the power outage. All those documents stored on the computer that you can’t turn on are pretty useless during that time. *Sigh* Another lesson learned.

Android app success!

As much as I’ve complained about Java and the stupidity of the emulator (it’s also dog slow), I’ve gotten to the same level of functionality in much less time than it took me with Windows Phone. I’ve got features I want to add to both, so it remains to be seen which works better in the long run, but I will tip my hat to Android on this round.

But not to java. Java still sucks.

*shakes fist at Java*

It’s still just as temperamental as it’s always been. I copied code directly from the Android developer’s website, keeping the formatting, and it did not work. It gave me an error that no one has reported through google. I purged that project, created a new one, copied the code again, and this time it’s not giving me the error. It’s still refusing to launch the emulator, something about @foo, which is not very clear, but I might be making progress.

Eclipse is like a less polished version of Visual Studio. Admittedly, it’s more general purpose, and less honed to design mobile apps for android, and the wizards for creating new projects and viewing your layout on different screen sizes are pretty nice. It’s just a shame that you have to write the code in Java.

*Update* I finally got the emulator running. Turns out that the default path the files get installed to has a space in the folder name, and the emulator can’t handle spaces in the folder name. They’ve only been doing that since 1995, so I guess it’s understandable.

Oh noes! Java!

After more investigation, I’ve gotten eclipse installed and look to be more on my way to creating an android app. I have, however, discovered a disturbing fact. Andoid apps are written in Java.

Java is one of the reasons I stopped writing code.

Back in the days of yore, when I was in college, java was the new and exciting language everyone needed to learn, because it was not platform specific. Theoretically, code you wrote in java could then be compiled to work on anything and everything.

The problem is that as soon as it was released, that stopped being true. Special libraries had to be written for each platform, and those got so interwoven into the basic fabric of java, that writing a program for one platform meant writing a program for one platform. Hell, Apple has maintained a separate implementation of java for years, meaning that web code written in java often does not work on macs. They’ve only recently abandoned that with Lion. So, maybe this aspect is better. Time will tell. They also simplified debugging. Any error, no matter what it was, generated a null pointer exception. I hate null pointer exceptions.

It doesn’t matter if you’re missing a semi-colon at the end of a line, or did not correctly declare a variable, or a loop is not terminating correctly, everything generates a null pointer exception. It also never told me where I was getting a null pointer exception, which meant I had to go through the code with a fine tooth comb to track down errors. Java is the reason I had to demonstrate an ability to go three days without sleeping. Did I mention I don’t care for Java?

But times have changed, and so have I. Perhaps this will work out. Perhaps things will be better the second time around. Perhaps eclipse is more capable of finding bugs and the errors have gotten more descriptive. I do  know that this time I intend to get more sleep!

In the meantime, I’ve asked my wife to tell me if I mumble '”javac!” in my sleep. (Programming joke, not even a funny one).

The Company Man, part 20

“You probably don’t realize this,” Jonah explained to Henry as they drove, “But cloning people is technically illegal in the United States. Ethics and morals are ambiguous enough when you’re doing it with animals, but with people it gets that much harder. The very act that you agreed to serve as a DNA host makes you an accomplice.”

Henry’s face drained of blood. “An accomplice to murder?” he asked weakly. “Would I go to jail for that?” he wondered. He didn’t know for sure. Now he wished he’d watched those judge shows, so at least he’d have a clue about the law.

“Hard to say,” Jonah answered. “There’s no precedent for this. One could argue that as you’re all exactly the same, you’re all just as culpable.”

“But we’re not the same!” Henry protested. “I could never murder anyone!”

“From a forensics perspective,” Jonah continued, “It would be impossible to distinguish you all. Did they tag the clones with some kind of ID? Like a tattoo or marker to tell each other apart?”

“I don’t think so,” Henry confessed. He began to imagine what life would be like in prison.

Jonah reached onto the dash and pulled out a small recorder. He flipped it on. “Tell me everything Henry,” he commanded.

Henry told Jonah about the day he signed the papers, the lab tests, meeting #2, and then going through all of the different jobs day after day. Jonah nodded periodically, but did not interrupt with questions until Henry finished.

“…And then Jonathan drove me to the motel where you found me,” Henry finished. “By the way, how did you find me? Jonathan drove pretty crazy to make sure no one was following him.”

“I know,” Jonah sighed. “We put a tracking device on his car months ago when we realized how much of a mover and a shaker he was within the company. I kept about a mile back and waited whenever he did one of his crazy maneuvers. It was more annoying than anything else.”

“It was nice of him to hide me while he figured out who really did this and keep me out of trouble,” Henry confessed with a smile.

Jonah turned with that same eerie stare. “Is that what he told you?” Jonah asked. Henry nodded.

Jonah shook his head. “Henry,” Jonah clarified. “Jonathan set you up.”

“But,” Henry protested. “He wouldn’t do that-“

“Think about it Henry,” Jonah explained. “He’s got a couple dozen contraband clones concealed in the back building and needs to buy time to keep the police from discovering them, especially as one of them is a killer. What he needs is for the police to find the fugitive hiding out in a small motel on the edge of the county. It’ll look like a hate crime where the person acted alone in a fit of fury and then ran and hid.”

“But why would he drive me all the way out there?” Henry asked.

“It would look pretty strange for the killer to walk into work just after committing a murder as if nothing had happened,” Jonah mused. “It would be enough to question the person’s sanity, causing them to probe deeper and investigate claims of cloning more thoroughly. Finding you hiding out in a seedy motel wrecks your credibility as it’s the action a sane person would do after committing murder. Claims of cloning would be dismissed as panicked excuses to try and place blame on anyone else but yourself.”

Henry rubbed his head. He hated how complicated his life had become. He wanted it to be simple again.

Jonah slowed down and pulled into the Privex parking lot. “Let me do the talking,” Jonah started, but did not finish the thought. Instead of several police cars, there was now a SWAT truck and several men suiting up in full body armor. One of them waived Jonah over, who drove up and rolled down his window.

“What’s going on?” Jonah asked.

“Shots fired as a uniform tried to enter the restricted second building. Took a hit to the shoulder. They pulled back and evacuated  the first building, called us.”

“How’s our man doing?” Jonah asked seriously.

“Not great, but not bad either,” the armored man replied.  “He lost a lot of blood but the bullet didn’t do much damage. I think he’ll be alright in a month or so.”

His radio crackled to life. “Get ready!” the order came. The armored man leaned down to look at Jonah and his passenger. “You all better hang back,” he stated dryly. “This could get real ugly real quick.”

Visio is fun!

I’d never used the program before, but in less than an hour I’ve got a great flowchart going to help me plan everything out. This thing is fantastic. I’d tried freemind, but it’s more of an outline tool, so you can’t link back to an earlier statement. There’s only one parent for any given possibility. Hooray for Visio!

Mobile app developments

A victory! worked through the remaining bugs on the WP7 app in fairly short order. I have a program now! It’s lacking content, and is pretty ugly, but it works. Now to add functionality, content, and make it look nice. How hard can that be?

App writing, Getting started

I’ve downloaded the free tools from Microsoft and Google for their respective sdk’s and worked on getting both running. I’ve given windows phone the most soak time, so I’ll start with that one.

In all, the toolset provided by visual studio is pretty impressive. I’m used to writing code in notepad and compiling from a command line, so things like intellisense are pretty handy. Good coding practice is to give variable names things that make sense, like “PointertoHandleExceptionsDuringRuntime.” I never liked names like that because they took so long to type, so I settled for variable names that were much shorter to type, like “bob and “noon”. I’ve written a great deal of bob++ in my day. Intellisense makes it possible to start typing a variable name, and it guesses what you’re writing and helps you complete it, so I only have to type as many letters as bob, and get a more descriptive name like the one mentioned above. See? I don’t even want to copy paste it, it’s so long!

There’s also a pretty fantastic set of videos I found on www.learnvisualstudio.net by Bob Tabor called Windows Phone 7 for absolute beginners. It uses the free tools, and is intended for people who don’t know how to program. I used to know how to program, so it’s a bit slow for me, but each video shows a trick with the tool that is handy to know, and I’m learning some of the nuances of C# and XAML, the code used to write WP7 apps.

Laying out the program took less than a day (it’s a very simple program). The content will likely take me a couple of months to write, I’m hoping to be able to format it in such a way that I can reuse it. The code…. well…. the code is getting there.

I found some sample code that does something similar to what I’m trying to achieve to use as a baseline and hack into what I want to accomplish. The code was written with the beta version of the SDK, so there are some things done that don’t work. That’s disappointing, but I was able to quickly find and correct those issues, and the sample program runs fine. My real gripe comes from the fact that lines of code that I’m taking from that program are not working in the new program.  Simple things that should work, like resource declarations.

At the beginning of a program, you declare what resources from the phone your program is going to need to run. One line, “using Microsoft.Xna.Framework;” works fine in the sample program, but not in mine! It boggles my mind that such a simple thing isn’t working. I suspect is has something to do with the original program template that I used, but it seems strange that you would be denied resources based solely on the template.  All that being said, I think I can overcome these hurdles.

Whenever I want to feel better about my progress on the WP7 app, I switch over to Android development.

It sucks.

Out of the box, fresh from installation, I tried to create a VM, and it refuses to launch. The error that pops up tells me to type something in a command window that does not exist. Google, while being a great search engine to find content, does little to add to that content through their own documentation of how to use their tools.

I’m sure I’m missing some subtle detail, but the difference so far is that with the microsoft tools I was able to get into writing the program before I started hitting snags and errors. With Android, I can’t even get into the tool!

The Company Man, part 19

Jonah did not look his usual, kempt self. He wore a t-shirt, jeans, and the butt of a cigarette dangled from his lips. “When did you start smoking?” Henry asked, surprised that of all questions, he would ask that one. “Was it because you got laid off?”

Jonah cracked a smile. “I always did like you Henry,” he mumbled. “Come with me. We have some serious problems to resolve.”

Henry hesitated. “Jonathan told me to stay here,” he said. “I could lose my job if I don’t listen to him.”

Jonah stared at Henry with eyes he’d not seen before. “This goes beyond your job Henry,” Jonah explained. “I don’t know what Jonathan has told you, but people are dead.”

“I heard about that,” Henry said, protesting. “It was one of the clones! Jonathan moved me here to keep me safe.”

Jonah continued to stare with those strange eyes in silence for several moments. He then reached into his back pocket and pulled something out. It was a badge that read, FBI. “Henry,” Jonah commanded. “Get in the car.”

Henry did as he was told. It was a black charger. Henry recognized it as one of the unmarked police cars that often sat in speed traps. Jonah put out the cigarette before getting into the car, then sat down and began to drive.

“When did you get a job with the FBI?” Henry asked.

“About twelve years ago,” Jonah answered. He held up his hand to stop Henry’s line of questioning. “Let me explain. Henry, I’ve been working undercover for the past year at Privex. We’ve known for some time that they were up to something, and what you just told me was the final piece of the puzzle.”

Henry tried to think about what he’d said, then realized he’d mentioned the clones. “Oh no!” he moaned. “Now I know I’m going to lose my job.”

“That’s going to happen regardless,” Jonah observed tersely. Privex has broken enough laws that there is no way that company can hope to stay together. Henry you recall about six months ago the patents for Privex’s main money-makers ended?”

“Sure,” Henry answered soberly. He could not imagine having to find another job.

Jonah continued. “They have a few things in the pipeline, but nothing that’ll get approved by the FDA for another few years. Even if they do get approved, they won’t be the big money that the company enjoyed in the past. A lot of analysts had given them up for dead. The stock price has been devalued three times in the last quarter alone. That’s a pretty bad sign of a company going under. They needed something new, but even a magical breakthrough drug would require FDA approval, and there was no guarantee that the company would be able to remain liquid long enough for that happen. You follow me so far?”

Henry nodded, and this time he actually did. Numbers were the one thing he did understand.

Jonah continued. “So imagine our surprise when suddenly the company finds the money to build a whole new top secret research facility adjoining the existing building. Something like that does not come cheap, and they were not financing it through sale of stock, because the stock didn’t have the necessary value. Private investment is not unheard of, but the names disclosed were from agencies with known ties to triads and Columbian cartels. These groups have had some bitter rivalries in the past, so imagine our surprise that both were willing to put money into a failing drug company. We assumed that Privex was being hired to make the next marijuana or heroin. They sent me into accounting to try and figure out from the expenses what kind of drug they were working on, but the expenditures didn’t make sense. They were building dorms and buying full body CAT scan machines, as well as DNA sequencers. This is not the kind of stuff you use to develop a better meth.”

The car pulled onto the highway and Henry felt himself sink into the chair as Jonah accelerated. He did not drive fast and hard like Jonathan, but certainly had no problem going quickly. He flipped a switch and the flashing lights came on, but no siren. Jonah picked up a radio broadcaster and made an announcement. “This is Jonah,” he stated. “I have the suspect in custody, and we’re enroute back to the crime scene.”

“What?” Henry asked. “But, Jonah, you must know I didn’t do this thing.”

“I do,” Jonah replied. “And if you want to get out of this without much or any jail time, you’d better do exactly as I say.”

App writing, a journal of the experience

I’ve opted to try my hand at creating a simple app for mobile devices. The idea is to create a program that is free, but with content one pays for, and then produce a steady stream of content as a a revenue generator. I’d like to produce the app for the iPhone, Android, and Windows Phone 7. Given that I don’t have a mac, I’ll start by developing for the latter two initially. I’ve not written code in many years, so it’ll be a pretty steep learning curve, and will post thoughts and opinions about developing with the different tools as I go.

I may also just give up at some point, in which case you may never hear of this ever again.

The Company Man, part 18

As Henry walked toward the front entrance, he saw a car sidle up next to him. It was Jonathan.

“Get in,” he ordered softly.

“What’s going on?” Henry asked.

“Get in,” Jonathan ordered again.

Henry paused, then did as he was told. Jonathan did a  tight u-turn and drove out of the parking lot. He said nothing until the got out onto the highway and the wind made it hard to hear.

“Someone killed Hassan and Osam from inventory last night,” Jonathan stated soberly.

Henry’s eyes widened and his jaw dropped. “Do they know who did it?” he asked.

“Yes,” Jonathan answered. “It was all caught on tape. They have a clear picture of the killer’s face.” Jonathan paused for a moment to take a turn sharply. “It was you,” added as they straightened out.

Henry was still in shock from the fact that two men had been killed. It did not fully register what else Jonathan had said, so Jonathan continued. “Obviously, one of the clones has lost his mind. The problem is that we don’t know which one. We don’t have a good way to tell them apart as it is. They could’ve traded cards easily. I suspected some have been doing it for a while. They’re trading identities as part of a small gambling ring one of them organized. It has something to do with the weathergirl. I don’t know much beyond that.”

“What are you going to do?” Henry asked, finally finding his voice again. The fear in his voice came through clearly, even with the wind howling past the car.

“Find the one responsible, and turn him over to the police. They’ll be arrested as you.” Jonathan turned to Henry. “Sorry, but it looks like you’ll have to stop being you.”

Henry blinked, unable to discern what that really meant. Jonathan continued to drive in silence. They left the city limits and drove into the suburbs. Periodically, Jonathan would take a turn sharply, and then watch the rearview mirror to see if anyone was following them. After nearly an hour, they approached a small, run down motel.  “Wait here,” Jonathan instructed. He ran in, grabbed keys off the desk, and came back outside.

“Don’t you need to check in?” Henry inquired.

Jonathan rolled his eyes. “I’ve got an agreement with the owner. I give him a call. He puts a key out, goes to lunch, and can say that he never really knows who’s using that room around the corner.” Jonathan puled the car around to one of three rooms that could not be seen easily from the road. He did not shut off the engine. “Yours is the first. Get in there, don’t call anyone, and wait for me to come back and get you when this is done.” Henry dutifully obliged. Jonathan did not wait to see that he got in, but instead sped away as soon as Henry was clear of the car.

Henry felt nervous inside the motel room. It was clean enough. He’d imagined a bug infested hell-hole that stank of mold and rotten food, but it was well-lit, with a made bed and no signs of infestation. The TV worked, but the phone did not. Henry would not be making any calls anyway.

As he sat down he realized he had no change of clothes, no food, only about $20 in cash in his wallet, and a bunch of credit cards he could no longer use because he had to hide from the police until they caught clone that committed the murder.

Henry turned on the TV and changed it to the weather channel, but they had driven far enough to be a different region, and tall, heavyset man was forecasting rain. Henry flipped through a few different channels, then turned the TV off with a frown. He didn’t enjoy hiding, especially because he had no reason to hide!

There came a knock at the door. Henry assumed Jonathan had forgotten something, perhaps he’d brought him lunch. As he opened the door, he found himself face to face with Jonah.

The Company Man, part 17

Henry did not know who he was anymore. He still got up at the same time, watched the weather channel, ate his breakfast, and went to work. But that work changed from day to day. Jonathan rotated him through two dozen different positions. In some, he’d done quite well, such as janitorial duty. In others. like answering the phones at the front desk, he’d not done so well. They seemed to be testing him to see what things he could do. After a day or two, they’d move him somewhere else and replace him with a clone. A lot of employees had already been let go from Privex. He could tell based on how fewer cars were in the parking lot after just a month or so.

A phone message from Jonah at home revealed to him that the entire accounting department had been let go. Henry felt awful. He went to bed early but found he could not sleep, so he tossed and turned and imagined his coworkers out of  a job, and Jonah standing by the side of the road with a cardboard sign reading, “Will work for food.”

He’d tried calling Jonah back, but the caller ID did not reveal the number, and it saddened Henry to realize that he could not remember Jonah’s last name to look him up in the phone book.

Every time Jonathan appeared, Henry now cringed, as it meant some new change.

The paychecks were still coming in strong, but Henry did not care much about the money anymore. When he finally did build up the courage to tell Jonathan that he did not want to do this anymore, Jonathan reminded him of a document he’d signed with Lenny the lawyer, committing himself to remain with the project. Otherwise, he’d have to give up the money he’d made since the project began, and likely face a lawsuit from the company for breach of contract. That made him so nervous, he threw up shortly thereafter. Fortunately, he was working as a janitor at the time, and so was able to quickly clean it up.

People in the company no longer looked at him. They knew that if they saw him coming, it meant he was coming to take their job. He was ostracized by everyone outside of the R&D lab, and those inside did not seem to care enough about him to show any compassion.

Not even his mother could cheer him up.

Henry tried different restaurants, even really expensive ones, but the food had gone bland. He’d had no idea how much he missed the few friends he had until they were gone. Jonathan did not care about him. Jonah did. When he’d been out sick months back, Jonah arranged for a card to be passed around the office, and took the time to mail it to him. He’d even invited him out to lunch a few times. Now Henry just wanted things to go back to the way they were, back when he worked in accounting, making his meager 4% merit raises, but it was far too late for that.

At three months, Henry found himself having a hard time getting out of bed. He thrived on consistency, but had none of that for quite some time. As such, he overslept and ended up coming to work late. When he arrived, there were several police cars at the front entrance.

The Company Man, part 16

#43 did not care for his lot in life. He did not enjoy the dorms. He did not enjoy the fact that there was never a good spot at the TV during the news to watch the weathergirl. He did not enjoy the fact that he had to work as a janitor when others had wonderful jobs like the accounting department.

At least, he admitted, he wasn’t forced to work in Inventory with those… things. He didn’t even want to call them people. He wondered who let them into the country to begin with.

A hierarchy of those that came first did not seem appropriate. Wouldn’t it be better to rotate those newly created into the established positions? That seemed more fair to him. But he did not speak up about it. #37 raised a fuss and was taken away for observation. That was a week ago and he’d not come back.

#43 wondered what Jonah was up to. Had he found a new job? Was he happy there? There were not a lot of people that the original considered a friend, but Jonah was one of them.

He also wanted to call the original’s mother. #18 had done this. He skipped his lunch break to call her. After that, they locked down the phones. #43 did not like it. He did not like it one bit.

The Company Man, part 15

#12 was celebrated by his peers. With his joining of the team, they were able to replace the entire accounting department. They were sad to lose Jonah, but confident a guy like that would land on his feet. Now #3 could get out of the inventory room with those wretched men. #8 no longer had to work as a tech in the lab, which is good as he was not  very good at it. They actually had #11 doing janitorial work. The very idea!

When they arrived to the department, everyone instinctively walked to the original’s desk. #2 made a beeline for it and jealously guarded his cubicle. The supervisor tried to negotiate a compromise, but was not willing to buy more of the same chair for everyone. In the end, the chair was setup on a rotation so that each day a new person would get it. #2 was not at all happy, but agreed because the boss told him to, and he did not want to get reported.

The workday progressed very efficiently. No one had anything to talk about, no funny emails to forward, no interesting stories from the night before to share. The accounting department had always been pretty efficient, but they swiftly burned through the tasks for the day. The boss was very proud. #12 was proud to have been the one to enable the team to make it all happen, and wished that the boss would point this out. Instead he simply said, “Great job today everybody! See you all tomorrow.” #2 stood next to him, as though he were somehow in charge as well, which #12 did not care for. After all, they were all on the same team.

That night, everyone rushed through dinner and hurried over to the television to watch the weathergirl. Beyond that, a few played cards and most went to bed. #12 wondered if he had the same dreams as the original.

Musings on fatherhood

Or, everything you know is wrong.
Alex has a speech delay. This is something we can say with clarity. By age 2.5 he should be forming simple sentences and at least able to communicate simple desires like the fact that he’s hungry or thirsty. Not only is he not improving his skills, they appear to have been regressing a bit.
In terms of physical capability, he’s top notch. The other night he was able to descend the stairs while balancing a bowl on his head. What prompted him to attempt to do this, I cannot say, but he has managed to exceed my own physical capacity for coordination at an age that is a full order of magnitude less than my own. After telling him how very impressed I was, I promptly sent him to bed, somewhat envious of his bowl balancing skills.
But when it comes to the speaking (and I guess writing but that’d be cheating) skills, I’ve still got a leg up. More of one than I’d care to have, frankly. I’d much rather have to occasionally disappoint him by denying him something he wants, than to consistently disappoint him by not knowing what it is that he wants.
By itself a speech delay is something that can be handled with more concerted training, which we’ve started doing. But there are a few other odd things. An obsession with spinning things, an strong sensitivity to loud noises and fluorescent lights, a near refusal to make eye contact. All of these symptoms point to the dreaded ‘A’ word. That’s Autism, for those who might be thinking ants, or anteaters, or Applebees. Does Alex have Autism? We don’t know. There is a means of testing him, but the waiting list is months long, so to know for certain will be a bit of a wait. In the meantime, we’re leveraging the state’s early intervention program to get assistance from a speech therapist, and with only a few visits under our belt, and the tips she has shared with us, Alex is already showing improvement.
In the grand scheme of things, there is a whole lot of stuff that’s worse than Autism. A friend and former co-worker’s youngest son has been battling leukemia for several years. Our former pastor’s grandson had a tumor in the brain that caused him to go blind. Worst case, autism is something you can learn to live with.
There are also various degrees of autism. Autism does not necessarily mean Rain Man. Which means I’m not planning a trip to Vegas with my son any time soon. There are plenty of people with autistic tendencies that you would never know they had a problem. A lot of that is because it was caught early and the parents got assistance quickly. I will say right now that I’m happy there’s an early intervention program offered in the state that I live. If other places don’t have one, they should get one.
Saccharine disclaimer: Alex continues to be a gem in my life. No question of that. I’ll never regret becoming a father. And while I’m the first to argue that life is never fair, and people only complain about unfairness when the unfairness is not in their favor, there is that undeniable twinge of anger from wondering why my son has to have a harder time than some of the other kids. Maybe it will help him to build the character he needs to overcome some great difficulty he would not otherwise be able to handle at some point in the future. Maybe it’s giving me the skills to better handle other relationships. Who knows?
Time will tell. Who knows, maybe by them time he’s grown up and contemplating fatherhood, there will be an app for that.

The plight of the tragic hero

I have a problem with the idea of the tragic hero. From the perspective of writing, the tragic hero provides incredible opportunity for deep drama, moving moments, and a compelling story. The opportunity is so great, that I sometimes wonder if writers rely on it as a sort of crutch.

I’m an optimist, and I like happy endings. That doesn’t mean I like for things to be sappy, but I do like the entire concept of sometime getting an opportunity to relish the end results of their turmoil. I can admit, in real life this does not always happen. But the practice of the tragic hero in stories is  too commonplace.

I think it is harder to write a story with the level of drama and turmoil one gets with a tragic hero and not have a tragic hero. This is where I tip my hat to J.K. Rowling. (*Alert, spoiler if you’ve not read the last book or seen the last movie and have somehow avoided discussion of it) Opinions can vary regarding the originality of the universe, the movies, but the woman can craft a story. Before the last book came out, a lot of people believed that the only way the story could be brought to an end was to kill Harry Potter. I, myself, believed that she probably would not do that, but at least one of the three main characters would die. But she managed to create a compelling story that did not kill any of them, which gave it a very satisfying conclusion for me.

I’m not going to point out lots of books that emphasize the use of the tragic hero, because ultimately that’s not where the problem lies. I worry that the  mentality of the tragic hero has been overly embraced in our culture. It’s a simple and successful storytelling crutch because readers/viewers too readily identify with the protagonist.

A few years ago I went hiking with a guy who had not packed enough water, yet refused offers of water from others who had extra, preferring instead to soldier on without it.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m a strong advocate of self sacrifice. I think one gains a tremendous amount from the experience self sacrifice. It can make us quite strong, but to  deny gifts of grace denies you a taste of love and compassion that is unique and cannot be gained through self sacrifice. Do not turn something down for the sake of turning something down. Do not create, in your own head, a narrative of the tragic hero. Remember, at the end of the story, the hero usually dies.

The worst part about such a narrative is that the protagonist will often make choices that could have spared them the fate they suffered, and still succeeded. At that point, they stop being a tragic hero and just become a really bad decision maker.  Those are the stories you read about in the papers and see on the news. We see them as bad decision makers, but they saw themselves as tragic heroes. I use past-tense, because they’re usually dead by the time we hear about the story.

Do not romanticize the tragic hero. Celebrate those who sacrificed themselves for the greater good by enjoying the goodness they enabled us to enjoy. Anyone who aspires to martyrdom sells short what they can hope to accomplish by living.

*I’m adding this bit a few weeks after drafting this originally. After feedback from Julie and thinking about it for a few weeks, it’s probably worth qualifying that I am in no way immune to the issues I describe above. Julie caught me doing the tragic hero bit just the other day at lunch. The things we hate most about others are often the things we dislike most about ourselves, no?"*

The Company Man, part 14

#3 did  not like working in the inventory room. The two middle-eastern guys seemed so cold to him. He suspected there were racial motivations, but could not really tell. They didn’t speak a foreign language when he was around, but he suspected they might be talking in code. Isopropanol might just be a euphemism for that Henry guy we don’t like. He wished he could trade places with #2 on occasion. He wanted to sit in the nice chair and hang out with Jonah, who was always really nice.

As it was, he spent his evenings in the dorm, under observation. At least they let him watch the news. He really like the weathergirl, and wished he could meet her.

He also wanted to call his mother. Well, not  his mother, the original’s mother, but he’d still like  to talk to her. She always had a way of making him feel better. He wondered, if something were to happen to her, would the company let them all go to the funeral? After all, they all had just as close of a bond to her as the original.

#2 made him nervous. He seemed a bit edgier than the rest, a bit more agitated. Even though he loved to tell him how wonderful it is working in the accounting department, he never seemed quite as content as he could be. #3 assumed it was because he was the first, and that there might have been issues with the first clone. Issues that they seemed to have fixed with him.

The Company Man, part 13

#2 did not like his title. #2 is a euphemism for someone taking a dump. He did not like the association. He was still a person. But he was far more that. He was a triumph of science and engineering.

He wasn’t even number two. He was number one. He was the first clone! The original didn’t count. He was just born. An old practice that had happened billions of times before. Nothing special.

But #2 was special. True, they’d already made another clone within just a few weeks, but he was the first. He’d be celebrated as the original triumph. He’d managed to pick up the job that Henry had worked for years, interact with his friends, and they were none the wiser. He had worked the magic that only he could do. He was special.

He had the original’s chair, but he wanted more.

For now he had to live in the dorms they’d built behind the research lab. They’d distract the original and after he parked and went into R&D, he’d come out and go into the accounting department. He saw the original’s new car and wanted to drive it, but he had to spend his evenings in the dorms for observation. He was more than the original now. He could see greater aspirations than a nice chair or car. The company needed him. And he would comply… for now.

The Company Man, part 12

Henry did not relax during his mandatory vacation. He did not know what to do with himself. Daytime television was not a welcome distraction, and he did not like going to the movies by himself. He could not think of other things to do. A few times he went for a drive, but found that he was too nervous to drive his car the way that Jonathan did. He lacked the experience and confidence to pull it off. When driving it cautiously, it was just another car, and no more fun than the one he had before.

The clone bothered him. It was shocking enough to find that there were now two of him in the world, but that smile at the very end continued to bother him. He called his mother, but didn’t dare talk about anything. Instead, he said that he was thinking of coming a few days  early for Christmas this year. She was thrilled, but wanted more than anything for him to come with a girlfriend. Henry got frustrated, and quickly ended the conversation.

His vacation could not come to an end quickly enough. Monday morning he arrived early enough that only a few cars were already in the parking lot. His card, thankfully, worked to let him into the front door, but he could not get into the inventory section. For a moment, he lost his patience and rapped sharply on the door. To his surprise, it opened, and he found himself facing himself.

“You!” he gasped.

“Me?” the one who opened the door replied.

“I thought you were working in accounting,” Henry explained.

“That’s #2,” the other explained. “I’m #3. I get to take over your inventory job.” His face soured and became sarcastic. “Thanks a lot for that. The guys here are jerks.”

Henry was dumbfounded. Then #3 suddenly remembered himself. “Hey,” he said quickly. “You’ve got to get out of here. No one is allowed to see us together. Get  over to R&D.”

Henry turned and angrily marched to the R&D lab, only to find it deserted. He’d come to early, and no one was in yet. Henry sat down in a conference room and stewed.

But in the silence of the office, the anger turned to fear. Was he being replaced, by himself? That’s what that VP said. Train one guy to be really good at his job, and then just keep replacing him with himself. He’d lost his accounting job. He’d lost his inventory job. He’d not done anything for Privex before the inventory job. What would happen next?

A technician arrived, bleary eyed, hinting at having a bit of a hangover. “You’re here early,” he observed at Henry.

“Do you know when Jonathan’s going to get in?” he asked.

“That guy’s a ghost,” the tech muttered, rubbing his eyes. He walked back into a small kitchenette and machine that brewed single cups of coffee.

“A what?” Henry asked. The tech held his hand up, as if unable to speak. They waited in silence for the machine to finish. The tech lifted the cup to his nose and breathed in the aroma, causing his eyes to widen and focus. As he took a sip, he walked over and started pulling out the monitoring equipment.

“A ghost,” the tech explained as he handed the equipment to Henry. Henry started strapping on the monitors without thinking. “I swear I never see that guy come or go. He doesn’t have a normal schedule. He’s never around when you’re looking for him, and just when you think he’s not going to be there, he pops out of nowhere. I swear, that guy can walk through walls. A ghost.” The tech switched on the equipment and let it run though its diagnostics. he watched, then turned. “Looks like your blood pressure went down a little, but your heart rate is pretty high. You feeling alright?”

Henry nodded, though it was a lie. The tech jotted a few notes and wandered out of the room. “Wait!” called Henry. “I don’t know where I’m supposed to go!”

The tech pointed to a neatly groomed Jonathan walking out of his office. “Ask him,” he said.

“Henry!” Jonathan called out. “Great to see you. Today, we try something new.”

The Company Man, part 11

Henry shuddered as he realized that he was staring at himself. He did not notice Jonathan watching, carefully gauging his reaction. The others turned as Henry and Jonathan entered.

“Ah!” exclaimed one of the VP’s. “And this must be the original. Come over here. Let me see the two of you standing side by side. He walked the other Henry over to the first and stepped back to view the results.

“Amazing,” exclaimed the president. “You can’t tell them apart.”

“It’s more than skin deep,” Jonathan added, still not quite taking his eyes off of Henry. “They have the same talents, skill sets, memories, you name it.

“How can they have the same memories?” the second VP asked.

“Memories are formed by bundling synapses together in different configurations,” Jonathan explained. “We performed detailed scans of Henry’s brain and replicated them for #2. In the end, #2 woke up with the same memories as Henry has. Of course, the memories start to diverge once the cloning process has taken place. You can’t help that.”

“Cloning,” Henry thought about it for a moment. He was starting to understand the multiple stick figures that Jonathan had drawn on the dry erase board.

“But you realize that the implications of this are that you only have to train one person who is particularly talented, and then make a dozen or so clones,” continued the president. “Suddenly, you’ve got an entire team fully trained for the cost of just one. You don’t have to worry about people quitting, because you can replace them with themselves! How long did it take to grow this one?”

“We’ve got it down to two weeks,” Jonathan continued proudly. “We’re hoping to work it down to just a single week, but it’s hard to prevent mutations when accelerating cell division beyond fifty times its normal level.

“We can save that for the second generation of product,” one VP observed. “Two weeks is still immeasurably better than anything our competitors have managed to our knowledge. Most of them still cannot even create a clone, much less make one that efficiently.”

Henry did not say anything to anyone. He remained unnerved by the clone standing next to him, who simply smiled at everyone who was smiling at him. They did not speak to each other at all. The VP’s and Jonathan discussed business for several minutes, then the president turned to the two Henry’s. “Well now,” he said. “What happens next?”

Jonathan interceded. “#2 has already succeeded the original in handling his position in accounting,” he explained. Henry’s eyes widened, but Jonathan paid no mind. “The original Henry is helping out in inventory like he used to, but I think it’s taking a toll on his health. The techs are reporting to me that his blood pressure has been creeping up. Because of his importance, I’m going to recommend that he take a few days off to relax.

“Sounds good to me,” the president voiced. “Well gentlemen, if you’ll excuse me, I’m scheduled to have lunch with the governor. He’s rattling his saber about our tax breaks and I need to put him in his place.” The president smiled as he shook his fist, mimicking a saber in his hand. The VP’s all laughed knowingly.

Jonathan escorted the two Henry’s out. “#2,” Jonathan began. “Wait for me just a moment. Now Henry, I’m serious. Take the rest of the week off. I’m going to lock your badge so that you can’t come in, that’s how serious I am about you relaxing. You need to stay healthy.” His smile faded away. “And, of course, I needn’t remind you how utterly important it is that you do not talk to anyone about this. Now go on, get out of here. You did great just now!” Jonathan gave Henry a shove towards the elevator.

#2 spoke up for the first time. “Oh, and Henry,” he added. “Excellent choice in chairs.” He smiled. Henry did not recognize the smile. It was different than smiles he’d seen of himself from pictures taken at company parties, or holidays visiting his mother. This smile was different. It looked… malicious.

Method of improving adoption of public transportation

Public transportation is, for a great many people, a low cost method of getting from one place to another. In the US, there is a mentality of the importance of having one’s own car for the freedom to go from one place to another when needed. Many people are will to front the cost of driving, parking, mostly (I think) because of the justification that public transportation would take too long, and the time is too important to waste waiting for the bus.

This ignores the fact that you can get a lot more done sitting on a bus than you can driving a car, because driving requires your attention. In fact, I’m typing this while riding on a bus (when else would I have time to write?). But I digress….

Proposed solution:

Give public buses the same right of way that one gives to ambulances and police cars. When the bus comes, you have to pull over. You have to stop for the bus, it does not have to stop for you.

With that, buses become not only cost effective, but more efficient than driving one’s self. Rush hour need only apply to people who insist on the freedom of sitting in traffic with everyone else who insists on the freedom of sitting in traffic.

Buses could also use more comfortable seats.

And schedules that  don’t require a decoder ring to comprehend.

The Company Man, part 10

Inventory turned out to be far better organized than Henry remembered. The people working there currently resented him when he started making recommendations.

“Everything has a barcode now,” one explained.

“The system is fully digitized,” another explained.

“A MySQL database keeps track of what gets collected and automatically orders more of what’s expected to be in demand when supplies run low,” the first one finished.

The two seemed to have the job down, and did not require a third person, so Henry found himself doing jobs that were less enjoyable, such as inputting new items into the inventory database. They resented his asking questions, especially because he had such a hard time with their names. They were of middle eastern descent, and Henry had a hard time with names from that region. He kept being surprised by the fact that neither had an accent, even though one was from Ohio and the other from Georgia.

Jonathan became curiously absent again, which frustrated Henry greatly. Not only was he no longer able to do his accounting job, the temp still had his superior chair. Because his card no longer worked he could not get it out. He’d never bothered to learn any of his co-workers extensions, and Jonah never responded to any of his emails. Henry really wanted his chair back. He resented that a temp was enjoying the chair he’d spent so much money on.

For a full month this continued to go on. Henry was never able to find Jonathan, or anyone from the accounting department. The inventory boys kept him quite busy when he was not in the R&D department getting the monitors recharged and data uploaded. One technician observed that his blood pressure was creeping up. “Yours would too if you had to go through what I’ve been going through,” Henry snorted. The tech did not say anymore.

Finally, Jonathan appeared in the R&D lab. He looked over at Henry as he entered and excitedly gestured for him to come over. Henry took a deep breath. He’d been preparing a rant for over a week about all of the horrible things he’s had to put up with, but Jonathan never gave him the chance to speak.

“Henry!” Jonathan exclaimed. “Fantastic news. The project is going better than we could have ever dreamed! The company president wants to meet you!”

Henry forgot about his rant. “Really?” he squeaked. He’d seen the company president at a few all hands meetings, but aside from that had never interacted with him before. He suddenly wished he’d put on his nicest suit that day, but he’d been dressing more casual since working in inventory, for fear of staining his better clothes with some random liquid or powder. Jonathan put his arm around him and guided him from R&D to the elevator near the entrance, which they took to the fifth floor. He’d never even been to the fifth floor.

Down the hallway, past a few very nice offices for VP’s, to the end where a pair of doors opened to a palatial office for the president of Privex. Multiple giant screens were suspended over the desk with constant feeds from CNN, a large web browser he could control from his desk, and a stock ticker with real time updates on the company’s stock price. An orb on his desk glowed different colors to show if the price was doing well or poorly. Currently, the color was yellow. Several bookshelves occupied a far well, with one shelf dedicated to different laptops that the president could take on a business trip depending on the situation. Several full, luxurious chairs made of genuine leather allowed for comfortable seating.

But the chair behind the desk, that one really caught his eye. It was an ‘Executive’, just like the one he had in his accounting department. Henry reminded himself to speak with Jonathan after the meeting about getting his chair back.

Henry recognized the president right away, as well as the two VP’s. It took him several moments to recognize the man they were all talking to. It was Henry.

Tradition vs. optimization

9 to 5. That’s the concept of normalcy. People work 7 hours, from 9am to 5pm, with an hour break for lunch at noon. Bankers hours.

A lot of jobs don’t fall into this mold, and I contend that this is a good thing. Imagine if everyone, every business, was only open from 9am to 5pm. Business that rely on commerce would be limited strictly to those that do not work (admittedly, a bigger demographic right now than anyone wants it to be). People that have errands to run outside of work would be out of luck. They’d have to use their vacation days exclusively for things like grocery shopping because nothing is ever open.

Why is it that this does not make sense, and yet so many companies cling to the perception of the 9-5 job?

Proposal: you can break a 24 hour period into 3 distinct 8 hour blocks of time. Take the companies, and split them into 3 different shifts. Not just manufacturing jobs, but everything. Banks, insurance, lawyers, clinics, you name it.

Suddenly, you have one third as many cars on the road during the morning commute. Suddenly, you have three times as many parking spaces available to you. Suddenly, the lunch rush isn’t as crammed. Eateries would have to stay open more, but the revenue might actually be made up for the fact that there is a more even flow of people, with fewer ones giving up to eat someplace else because a given place is always mobbed during the lunch rush.

Utilities would like it. There would no longer be as much of a surge during the day when all of those office buildings fire up their HVAC systems and computer networks.

Real estate moguls might not like it. One location could house three business instead of one, which may mean three times as much rent, but it would also mean you would only need one third as much office space. A sudden surge of available real estate would cause prices to plummet. Then again, that would lower business expenses, expenses that those businesses could pass along to the consumer.

There’s my pitch for the evening.

You don’t have to limit it hours of being open

The Company Man, part 9

No sooner had Henry found his resolve to continue on renewed did Jonathan appear back in his office. “Unexpected offsite,” he explained. “Wasn’t allowed to make or receive any calls. I trust everything is going well?”'

“Just fine,” Henry enthusiastically affirmed.

“Glad to hear it,” Jonathan mused, his head already down and peering into the computer monitor as he typed out another email. Henry waited for a few moments, to see if Jonathan had anything more to say, but Jonathan never looked up again, so Henry went back to the labs for them to download the latest vitals and attach fresh batteries.

One Monday, after four weeks, Henry began to notice a few odd things. For one, he found that his badge no longer worked to get into the accounting department in the morning. It only worked in the afternoon. Normally, Henry stopped at his desk first to drop off his lunch and say good morning to Jonah and a few other co-workers before proudly marching off to the lab for his super important work.

Then, in the afternoons, people seemed to act a bit stranger around him. They felt like he was forgetting things that they’d already told him, even when he was sure they’d never mentioned it before. Jonah seemed especially perplexed. “Here’s the documentation you asked me for earlier,” he said.

Henry looked up, perplexed. “I didn’t ask you for this,” he explained.

“Sure you did,” Jonah protested. “You asked for it earlier, and I said I’d have it for you this afternoon.”

Henry mentioned it to Jonathan when he complained about his badge not working in the morning. For once, Jonathan appeared to take an interest. "Sometimes people can start to act strangely around you when they know you’re on a secret project,” he explained with a wink.

“Ahh,” Henry nodded conspiratorially, though he still did not know what the project was about.

“Let me take care of this,” Jonathan suggested. “I think I know what we can do. As I understand from your file, you used to work in inventory?” Henry nodded. “Alright, tomorrow, report there for work.”

Henry’s jaw dropped. He was being demoted back to inventory? He’d always considered accounting a step up. “But what about my current position?” he protested.

“Oh, the temp is handling it just fine,” Jonathan explained. “Besides, I need someone with your experience back in inventory. That place has really fallen apart in your absence. You’re really the only one I trust with this.”

Henry sighed as his ego swelled. “Well,” he confessed. “I suppose I am the best person for the job.”

“Glad to hear it,” Jonathan smiled.

The Company Man, part 8

The morning in the lab turned out to be fairly uncomfortable. The technicians drew blood, ran him through a grueling set of physical tests, all while monitoring different responses, and finally made him sit still for close an hour inside an MRI. He’d had one once before, and it did not take nearly this long.

By the time it was over, he was exhausted, sweaty, and not looking forward to returning like that to his desk job. They’d not warned him to bring a change of clothes. “Is this going to happen every time?” he asked grouchily to the technicians. “Just for the next couple of days,” one answered, unsympathetically.

A couple of days became a couple of weeks. Jonathan had disappeared and was never in his office when Henry went to see him. He grew frustrated, and considered asking his supervisor to go back to his normal job.

Then his paycheck arrived. Now, every two weeks, he was making an additional $300! He gasped when he saw it. Jonah, who happened to be walking by, stopped at the noise. “Everything alright?” he asked.

Henry smiled. “Very!” he exclaimed.

“They treating you alright over in R&D?” Jonah asked. He’d been trying to get more out of Henry since he started working, but so far Henry had managed to avoid answering anything overtly. “Quite well,” Henry answered. “Like a king, in fact.”

The next week Henry arrived in his new sporty two seater. He showed up extra early but parked in his usual space so that people could see his new car. With his trade in, he could afford to lease this car, and in four years trade in for a new one. He could also start eating out on a weekly basis. He fantasized about driving the cute weather girl from the TV around in his two seater, taking her to that nice Mexican food place Jonathan had taken him.

The grueling lab tests also stopped. For the time being they made him wear a couple of straps around his wrist and arms to monitor certain vital signs.

“This,” he mumbled to himself. “This is the good life.”

The Company Man, part 7

After what seemed an eternity, the stack dwindled and finally disappeared. A much more disheveled stack sat next to Henry, and his wrist hurt from signing his name so much and so quickly. Lenny frowned at the stack, but scooped it all up and walked out of the room. As he did so, he nodded to another man that had been waiting for them to finish. He walked in and did not introduce himself.

For the next hour, the stern looking man informed Henry about the sensitive nature of the project. About the risks of corporate espionage and the need to remain ever vigilant. The company was going ‘all in’ on this project, and a single slip up could spell ruin for everyone. That was why it was so vital for him to not tell anyone about what he was doing. Henry wasn’t worried about that, he still had no idea.

The lecture lasted a full thirty minutes, though really it was a ten minute lecture told three times in three different ways. But Henry maintained an attentive vigil, and listened to the lessons over, and over again.

Finally, the man finished and walked out of the room. Jonathan entered and informed Henry that it was lunch time. “C’mon,” he invited. “I’ll buy you lunch.” No one had ever bought Henry lunch before, so he gleefully accepted. They walked out to the parking lot and got into Jonathan’s car. It was a sporty two seater convertible. Jonathan had no problem squealing the tires as they pulled out of the parking lot and onto the main strip. They went to an upscale Mexican restaurant Henry had seen, but never been to. It always seemed too expensive and not worth the trouble. “Of course,” Jonathan, “With all the money you’re gonna be making as of today, you’re gonna be the one buying lunch going forward.”

Henry laughed. “If the money’s so good,” he asked. “Why aren’t you doing it?”

“I wish,” Jonathan answered. “I’ve got a girlfriend though. They won’t let me.” He rolled his eyes as he said ‘they’. Then he looked at Henry. “Besides, I’m not you. You’re the man they want. Before I forget, remind me to ask Mona to make sure we have your badge recoded so that you can get into the labs and not just accounting.” Henry nodded.

Lunch was delicious. It was the best Henry could remember having. An hour later they found themselves back on the road to the company. Jonathan took the exit ramps faster than he could have, just for fun. “I hope you don’t mind too much,” he stated to Henry.

“Not at all!” Henry laughed. “The weathergirl did say it would be a great day to have fun outside.”

Back at the office, they discovered that Mona had already taken care of the badge issue. Jonathan turned to Henry. “Alright Henry,” he said. “Head on back to your other job for today. We’ll start things up fresh tomorrow morning. You’ll meet a couple of technicians over by lab 7.” Jonathan pointed to a particular hallway. “They’ll take care of you once you get here. See you tomorrow Henry. That’s when we start changing the world!”

Henry walked back to his cubicle in an almost daze. As he sat down, Jonah walked over. “Hey Henry,” he smiled. “People were getting worried when you didn’t come back. Everything alright?”

Henry smiled. “Better than alright,” he answered. “But that’s about all I can say on the matter.

Jonah smiled. “I see, so there’s a bit of a mystery then?” He paused to see if Henry would rise to the bait, but Henry held his ground. “Alright then, I guess I’ll have to do some sleuthing of my own.”

That night, Henry saw in his mail an offer to come back and try an online dating service again. He dropped it smugly in the trash, and sat down on his couch to watch the evening news and eat the lunch he’d brought into work.

The Company Man, part 6

“One of the problems with natural selection,” Jonathan explained. “Is that it takes too long. You require multiple generations to weed out undesirable traits. Couple that with the fact that we now prop up people with those undesirable traits, allow them to procreate, and suddenly evolution doesn’t work anymore. Do you follow me?”

Henry nodded, though he didn’t really.

Jonathan continued. “Besides, what do we need evolution for when we’re smart enough to figure out for ourselves which parts are the good parts, and which ones are the parts we need to get rid of?” Jonathan stood and moved over to a small dry erase board. “Figuring out that part is pretty easy. But to make those traits predominate within a particular generation, we need to become a little unorthodox.” On the board he drew a stick figure, two lines below it, two more stick figures, two more lines below each of them, and four more stick figures. “Average family has two kids, so you need two generations for a positive trait to go from one to four, and that’s assuming the positive trait gets passed to each kid. Nowadays, it’s anyone’s guess, and the kids will go one to have kids of their own whether they get the good genes or not. No, what we need is more of a shotgun approach to ensure wide dissemination of those genes to the general population.” He went back tot he first stick figure, drew a right arrow, and drew a dozen stick figures next to the first. Jonathan turned and started hard at Henry. “Do you follow me?” he asked.

Henry nodded, even though he didn’t.

Jonathan smiled. “I knew you were the right man for this job!” he proclaimed. He opened the door and stuck his head out. “Mona!” he yelled. “Get Lenny over here with the papers. We’ve got our man!” The frazzled woman nodded and headed deeper into the office of cubicles. Jonathan shut the door again and sat down. “Now you’ll still be able to do your regular job,” he explained, but only half time. The other half of the day you’ll have to spend with us while we run tests and diagnostics. I’ve already conversed with your boss.. Arnold? I think? Whatever- over email and he’s okay with it. We’ll get a temp in to help you out with your normal work so there’s no risk of falling behind.”

Henry smiled. He started to say something, but Jonathan interrupted him to continue. “Now I know what you’re thinking. Such an important job should have something more than prestige attached to it, am I right?” Henry nodded, though he’d not been thinking about that at all. “I’ve managed to pull a few strings, and you’re base salary will get bumped up $10K annually, effective immediately.” Henry froze. He’d never gotten a raise that big before. He’d never even imagined such raises were possible. Jonathan watched his expression for a moment. “You’re awful quiet, Henry. Are you saying $10K doesn’t sound like enough? I happen to think that’s a pretty good sum myself. I get Ph.D’s in here bargaining for a raise one-tenth that amount.”

“That amount is perfectly fine,” Henry stammered, still trying to recover from the shock of such a huge pay raise.

“Glad to hear it!” Jonathan exclaimed. The door opened and a man with a thick stack of papers came in. “Ahh Lenny! I see you’ve got everything our new prized employee needs. This is my queue to leave. Paperwork puts me to sleep. Henry, I leave you in Lenny’s capable hands.” With that, Jonathan stood and slipped past Lenny who dropped the stack of documents with a resounding thud.

“Nice to meet you Henry,” Lenny stated with a dull monotone. “Sign here please.”

Henry took the first sheet and pen and started to read it over.

“Now sign here please,” Lenny continued, passing the next page without looking up.

Henry quickly scribbled a signature on the first page and Lenny flipped through a non-disclosure to the signature page. He handed the entire package to Henry with the one page needing a signature pulled out. Henry furiously scribbled his name on the second sheet and grabbed the packet, signing his name without even glancing at the title. Lenny handed him a fourth page.

For the next twenty minutes, Henry and Lenny churned through waiver after disclaimer after contract after agreement. Whenever Henry asked a question, Lenny did not respond but handed him yet another sheet to sign. Lenny had deep bags under his eyes, suggesting he’d not slept well, or at all, in quite some time. Henry decided not to bother him with more questions after the first few failed attempts.

The Company Man, part 5

The R&D labs, much to Henry’s surprise, looked a lot like the accounting department. There were no chemistry sets with strange liquids bubbling in them. For the most part, there were lots of cubicles with people in them and computers. The walls might even have the same color paint, but it was hard to tell as a lot of the lights were turned off. Many engineers prefer the dark for some reason. All of the PC’s looked like they were running screen savers, but has Henry got closer, he saw that they were actually running simulations. They were modeling different proteins on the screen, spinning and twisting them, trying to see how they could be tweaked and changed. A woman with a very tired look and frazzled hair came over to him.

“Are you Henry?” she asked with an exasperated tone.

“Y-yes,” Henry answered. He did not expect anyone to be expecting him, even though it made sense.

“Head over to the third office on your left and have a seat,” she directed. “One of our team leads will be there in a few minutes once their meeting breaks up.”

Henry walked over to the small conference room and sat down. The chairs were not comfortable. He wished he’d brought his chair from his cubicle. He’d bought it with his own money and brought it in, because the chairs the company provided never felt very good. He’d seen an article for it in the breakroom one day. Someone had left a magazine and called it, “The Executive.” When he sat in it, it was easy to picture himself as though he were an executive. Everyone else had to settle for the normal chair, but he got The Executive.

According to the clock, Henry had to wait for a full 10 minutes for the director’s meeting to finish up. It took several more minutes for the director that wanted to speak with him to finish up another conversation that followed him out the room. Finally, he came in, sat down, and closed the door.

“Hello Henry,” the director said with a smile. “My name is Jonathan. Pleased to meet you.”

Henry wanted to say something about being made to wait, but instead smiled back. “And nice to meet you,” he returned.

Jonathan reached into his satchel and pulled out a file. To Henry’s surprise, his name was on it. “We’re starting the next phase of a project Henry,” Jonathan began. “And after extensive review of every employee in the company, have decided that we want you to be a part of it.”

Henry was shocked, and his face betrayed that surprise. Jonathan smiled. “I hope you don’t mind,” he continued. “I took the liberty of pulling your performance reviews. They’re spotless. You really are a company man!”

Henry could not help but smile.

“It says here that you aren’t married?” Jonathan asked.

“No sir,” Henry replied. “Never met that special someone.”

“Are you still looking?” Jonathan continued. He did not look up anymore, but continued to flip through the pages quickly.

“Not recently,” Henry confessed. It seemed an odd question.

“We wanted to be sure that you would be able to fully commit to this project,” Jonathan explained. “Also, and I’m going to mention this over and over again, this project is extremely confidential. One of the problems with married men, is that they have a hard time keeping secrets from their wives. It’s even harder when they’re dating.”

Henry felt his pace quicken. "A secret project!” he thought. “He was going to work on a secret project!” He shook his head. “Haven’t really looked in a while sir,” Henry reaffirmed.

Jonathan smiled more broadly. “This project is going to change the world,” he proclaimed. “We’ll go down in history as having done something no one has accomplished before. And, well, it’ll probably make us all rich!” Jonathan leaned back in his chair. He looked like he should be wearing a pinstripe suit and holding a cigar, but the effect was lost as the light struck the bald spot on his head, causing Henry to squint. “So,” he continued. “Do I have your interest?”

Henry nodded vigorously. “Please go on.”

“Good,” Jonathan smiled.

The Company Man, part 4

Finding the research and development part of the building turned out to be  quite difficult. Henry had never ventured much into the southern portion of the building. Before working in the accounting department, Henry had originally worked in inventory, which looked very different now, but he at least had a sense of where he was as he made his way past that department.

At the far end of inventory, a guard stopped him. “Should you really be back here?” he asked. Everyone’s badge at Previx listed their name, department and was striped with a color the corresponded to the department. Accounting and Sales had  yellow stripe. Inventory was green. Human Resources was blue, and R&D had a dark red stripe. Henry began to sweat a little bit from nervousness.

“W-well, I was asked to go to R&D-,” he started to explain, but the guard simply leaned back and gestured with his thumb.

“Keep moving,” the guard grunted.

Henry frowned. The guard was not a very good guard it seemed. He didn’t even try to validate his presence in the hallway. Henry hoped that the security system would be up and running again soon, and that they’d be able to get rid of the guards. He continued down a long hallway, moving deeper into the building.

It made sense to Henry that R&D be kept far from the front entrance. Technicians and Scientists did not often put their best face forward to potential customers and clients. When they came, they wanted to see a professional environment, which is something he and the others in the account department worked hard to portray. Customers did not often tour the accounting department, but when they did, Henry knew they were impressed by what they saw.

R&D, on the other hand, must look like and absolute wreck. Probably lots of people in lab coats around chemistry experiments with messy chalkboards that haven’t been cleaned in ages….

He arrived at the entrance to R&D and this time met a much more formidable guard. He actually carried a sidearm, but it was clipped to his belt. In his hand he held a  clipboard. The guard glanced at Henry’s badge.

“Should you really be back here?” he asked, same as the previous one. Henry, much to his own frustration, began to sweat nervously again. “W-well,” he stammered, “I was asked to come back here and meet with a couple of technicians.”

“What were their names?” the guard asked, without looking up from the clipboard.

Henry froze. He didn’t know. Jonah had not told him any names. His nervous mind began to race. “Had Jonah played a trick on him?” he wondered. “No. No, Jonah was too nice of a guy to do that. There probably were a couple of technicians, and they were the ones playing the trick. They’d tricked him into wandering the halls for half the morning to try and find the R&D labs, only to be stopped by a guard and shamed back to his cubicle. Everyone would have a great laugh at his expense…”

“Oh here it is!” the guard exclaimed loudly, snapping Henry out of his panic and causing him to jump a little. “Some moron wrote it on the back of the sheet. Sorry about that. Go on in.” The guard stepped to one side and pushed open the door.

Henry hesitated, still not sure if this were a prank or not, but he did not want to press his luck with the guard, and so stepped through.

The Company Man, part 3

The accounting department had peach colored walls with white square columns occasionally breaking up the straight edges made by the drywall. These cut into some of the cubicles making them a a little smaller. Henry always considered himself lucky to have not gotten one of those. The people that did never complained, but Henry secretly suspected they wished for more space.

The cubicles were about half a man’s height, so you could sit down and concentrate, but stand up and see who else was in the office. That made tracking everyone else down a lot easier. The only office belonged to Arnold, at the far end.

“Good morning Henry!” Jonah called to him. Henry nodded politely. He liked Jonah. Jonah was a young, upbeat guy who befriended everyone he met. It was hard not to like Jonah. In fact, Henry could not think of anyone in the company that had met and did not like Jonah. He had that infectious laugh and smile that made everyone feel better.

As Henry sat down and started up his computer, Jonah walked over to him.

“Hey, listen,” Jonah started. “Some techs from research were down here just a few minutes ago looking for you.”

Henry rolled his eyes. “They must be new,” he muttered. “They sometimes think that if they come talk to me, it’ll somehow speed up getting their purchase orders, when really it just slows me down.”

Jonah shook his head. “They didn’t mention any purchase orders,” he explained. “They said they needed to talk to you about some upcoming project and asked me to ask you to head over to R&D as soon as you got in.”

Henry wrinkled his nose. He’d never been to the R&D department before. He wasn’t even sure where that was. Plus, he had a lot of work to do that day already. He didn’t want to fall behind. What would his boss think? “Did they clear it with Arnold?” Henry asked.

Jonah shrugged his shoulders. “They didn’t say, and Arnold’s out this week on vacation.”

Henry’s face soured. He didn’t like the idea of R&D pulling him away from his job to help them with theirs and risk getting in trouble with his boss. “This had better be important,” Henry grumbled. With a heavy sigh, he stood and began navigating his way back to the front desk.

The Company Man, Part 2

As Henry pulled into his normal parking space, he paused long enough to look at the new construction behind the main building. It was a brand new research institution, complete with some sort of dormitory. He knew because he’d seen them building small rooms, each with a bathroom, and had helped to process the order for all of the bedding and pillows that they needed for the rooms. It was obvious they were kicking off a brand new initiative, and was confident they’d tell him during the next company meeting, which was scheduled to take place in about three weeks.

Reaching into his wallet, he unclipped his ID badge from the fold and clipped it to his shirt. Hitting the remote lock on his keyfob, listening to the satisfying click of the locks as well as the brief shriek of the horn, he strode confidently to the front door, and held his badge over the security RFID reader, and waited for the beep.

But it did not beep.

Henry glanced done, surprised. He looked at the badget to make sure he wasn’t using his Costco membership card again. No, it was definitely his company issued Previx badge.

For a moment he panicked. He’d been fired! They forgot to tell him and now he no longer had a job! Everyone is up on the third floor right now looking down and laughing their heads off at him for standing there like an idiot in front of the company he no longer worked for!

The receptionist caught his attention and made pushing motion with her hands. He leaned against the door, and to his surprise it opened.

“They’re updating the security system,” she explained with a heavy Boston accent. Henry cringed a bit to listen to her. “Right now nobody’s badge is working. We had to prop open most of the doors so people can still get through, and they posted security guards near all the important areas.” She gestured to the door to his right, which is the door he normally went through after entering the building. “Now go on Henry from accounting,” she said with a smile. “No time to dawdle.”

Henry was surprised that she knew his name, but then glanced down and remembered it was printed on his badge that he’d instinctively re-clipped to his shirt. Taking a deep breath to steady his nerves, he stepped into the elevator, road it to the third floor, and walked to his cubicle.

The Company Man, Part 1

Henry awoke to the sound of a babbling brook. It was his alarm clock. He bought it from a SkyMall catalog a few years ago while flying back from visiting his mother one Christmas. He never really cared for it after it arrived, but was determined to make good use of it because of how much it cost, and how much grief he’d been given when trying to return it. So, even though it made him wake up with an almost desperate need to go to the bathroom, he kept using it, waiting for the day that it might break, and he could get a different one.

Twenty minutes later, he was showered and eating breakfast. He ate  wheat flakes, because the doctors on TV said that it would lower his cholesterol. His doctor had never told him to worry about his cholesterol, which he assumed was because he ate wheat flakes. The TV was turned on to the weather channel.

“Today calls for lots of sun,” the cute weathergirl smiled cheerfully. “Be sure to break out the hat and sunscreen, and get out there and have a great time!”

Henry glanced over to make sure his hat was where he’d left it on the coat rack. He’d wear it on the drive in to work, but did not feel the need for sun screen. He’d be in the office all day. Perhaps he’d eat his lunch outside, but likely all of the picnic tables would be taken by the time he got out there, and he’d have to go back inside and eat at his desk like usual.

After breakfast, he put his dishes in the dishwasher, donned his cap, and headed out to the car. Five minutes later, he sat in bumper to bumper traffic for the forty five minute commute into work.

Work was Previx, a biotechnology firm that specialized in cell regeneration technologies. At least, that’s what Henry read in the press releases the company periodically sent out. He worked in the finance department processing purchase requests and ensuring that nobody tried to use company funds on personal needs. He’d once caught a department head trying to buy nerf guns for all of his researchers. A few emails later, the department head was informed by no one short of the VP of research that he should stick to essential supplies on his purchase requests. The VP did not thank Henry in the email, but he knew that the VP knew that he’d caught it, and was thankful deep down.

Henry was a good employee.

His review each year told him so. The accounting head was always pleased with Henry’s performance. He was always at work early, often stayed late, was willing to work weekends, even ended up losing a couple of days of vacation each year because he did not take all of his days. This earned him a solid 3-4% merit raise each and every year, even in the down times when company profits were down.  Henry could be counted on. He was trustworthy, reliable, and dependable.

Smart part numbering rant

Disclaimer: This topic is not interesting, not even to me. It’s an engineering process rant.

The problem centers around the fact that first principles, while a good place to start, are not good at resolving problems to which first principles have  been applied and repeatedly failed.

In a modern approach to design, you have a team of mechanical engineers working to design parts. You’ve also got electrical engineers incorporating electronics, industrial designers managing the form, marketing guys designing the packaging, manufacturing engineers making sure it can all be produced and assembled in a cost effective manner, and managers to try and keep things on schedule.

There are also software engineers, but this argument doesn’t entirely apply to them, for I’ll leave them out of the example for the moment.

Very early on in a process like this, it becomes evident that every part that is designed needs to have a unique identifier. Otherwise, how do you know what all you need to order and build?

The problem arises when people try to utilize that part number to describe the part itself. Lets go through the exercise of developing a smart part numbering system.

1st design consideration: At least in the US. studies have shown that when the number of digits surpass 10, the probability of a transcription error is greater than 50%. We have an average brain buffer of 10 digits. So, any part number methodology you assign, you’ll want to keep to no more than 10 numbers.

2nd design consideration: The methodology must be simple, and relatively intuitive. When new employees are brought on board, you don’t want to spend hours/days/weeks teaching them how your proprietary method works. For one that’s time that they could be doing work that will make you money. For another, given the transient nature of so many jobs, contractors and new employees are not always enthusiastic to learn a skill that will not make them more marketable to another company. If you have to write a manual on your part numbering system, you’re on the wrong track.

“Now wait a second!” you might ask. “Why not use one of the established part numbering systems already in use for a given industry?” Great idea. Go find one. I’ll wait….

Actually, I won’t. I’ve already written this by the time you’re reading it, and this isn’t a rant to go into the ramifications of reading something that’s not yet been written. What is telling is that companies with massive inventories that have to index millions of unique products have opted to use a system that does not rely in intelligent part numbering systems. Examples: Amazon.com, and McMaster-Carr. Alternately, Stockdrive parts/Sterling Instruments has what appears to be an intelligent numbering system. The numbers are twice as long, and good luck figuring out their methodology. To say nothing of the fact that the part often has multiple numbers, none of which are ever in stock (no I’m not bitter (well, okay, maybe a little bit)).

3rd design consideration: Think about all of the things different departments that I listed previously. Here’s a short list.

If you’re a mechanical engineer: weight, color, material, dimensions, general tolerances, is it an assembly?, is it a part?, is it an assembly but you buy it as a single module that you can treat as a part?, what project does it fall under?, etc.

If you’re an electrical engineer: what is the resistance?, what is the capacitance?, is it a microprocessor?, how much I/O does it have?, how does it mount to a PCB?, what is it’s thermal profile?

If you’re a manufacturing engineer: fabrication method, number of post processes, is it heat treated?, is it toxic to handle?, what is the shelf life?, is it reactive?

If you’re an industrial designer: what is the acceptance of marring, I can probably think of others, but I don’t feel like it.

Okay, lets say you’ve managed to accomplish all of the above. The system is simple, it’s running, people can use it, and learn it quickly. You’ve got 4 screws sized 1, 2, 3, and 4.

But the inevitable happens, someone comes out with a size 1.5, and your designers need to use it. 1’s not strong enough, 2 is too expensive. Prudence demands that you append a digit and create sizes 1.0, 1.5, 2.0, 3.0 and 4.0. Hopefully you designed that system to have just 9 numbers this kind of contingency. Sadly, that means you have update every number of every part, which is time consuming and expensive. You also have to pray that it won’t happen again, which it will.

Alternately, you create an exception and make size 1.5 just call it 5. You’ve broken the scheme, though, which means you have to update the documentation explaining how the rules work, with an appendix of exceptions to the rule. This can grow pretty fast, which violates the design goal of simple to learn and intuitive.

A third option, of course, is to not allow the engineers to use a 1.5 size screw because the costs associated with updating the part numbering scheme make it prohibitively expensive. Congratulations! Your numbering scheme has just reduced the profitability of your product. I’m sure that will look good on the performance review.

Smart part numbering systems are traps. They designed like wikis, where people start with a simple setup that is allowed to grow organically over time. It’s another database that’s easy to add data in. You can add more rules and complexity to maintain the original methodology, but the simplicity is lost within just a few generations of the numbering scheme, which can happen in less than a year for fast growing companies. I say it’s a trap because people believe that it’s easy to get the information back out. There’s a method to the scheme, so people can figure out the part number based upon their needs, right?

The more you add intelligence to a part numbering scheme, the more you reduce its flexibility, in terms of part reuse and cost out opportunities. The original purpose of the part number is to give each part a unique identifier. We’ve not even covered the possibility of multiple parts accidentally deriving the same number under an intelligent scheme.

This is a problem no one has ever been able to solve. First principles have been abused repeatedly in this respect. Moreover, the market has moved away from intelligent numbering systems. Consider Google and the internet. Websites are assigned a unique IP address by which to reach them. There is no intelligence related to the IP address and the content within the site. Once you have an IP address, you can put anything there you want. Rather than assigning an intelligent numbering scheme to IP addresses, it’s better to allow for random assignments, and then services like Google will trawl the content and index them for fast and easy searching.

So, when thinking about smart part numbering schemes, remember the words of Admiral Ackbar

Coming Soon, The Company Man

For a long time, I would ride the bus to South Station down I-93. Along the way, while going over one of the bridges, I would look up and see a Kaplan Career Institute, and situated behind it across the street some factory with a giant smokestack. In my mind, the two always got put together, and I started to envision a factory that stamped out middle-aged businessmen with a plain suit and briefcase, ready to walk into almost any large company in the world and start doing work.

This story came out of that.

For fun, I’ve opted to write it in small sections and post them weekly.

My contribution to mathematics

Turns out there’s a pretty simple pattern for multiplying large strings of 9’s together.

Do you see it?

Let’s say there’s 40 9’s on top, and 28 9’s on botton.

The count tells you how many 9’s and 0’s to put in and where.

From the short string, subtract one from the count and start with that many 9’s. Put in an 8. Write as man 9’s are there are more in the longer string than the short. Follow with as many zeros as you had 9’s originally, and finally a 1 at the end.

This is what math nerds do in high school when playing around with their calculator on the bus.

There are patterns for strings of other numbers, but none of them as simple as 9’s.

Doubtless this was figured out several hundred years ago by somebody else, but just in case, I wanted to plant my flag in the ground.