Personal
-
We arrived in Bozeman from Toronto (having changed in Denver) fairly late on Thursday night. After picking up the rental car – and eating a quick pizza in Belgrade – we zoomed over to West Yellowstone, the town closest to the western-most entrance of Yellowstone National Park. The kids really only had a few hours of sleep in a Days Inn before we bundled them into the car and headed across to try to snag a spot at a first-come-first-serve campsite (the only way to get a place in Yellowstone at this time of year, at late notice). We waited…
-
For the last year and a half I've been reporting into an Autodesk Research team based mainly in Toronto, so it made sense to include that city in the itinerary of our round-the-world tour. This did mean, however, that almost inevitably my wife and kids would be left alone for the majority of our time in the city, while I spent time with colleagues. I'm part of the Complex Systems Research group, run by Azam Khan. It's an impressive group – many have PhDs, a few of us do not – so it's always an education for me to spend…
-
Several people have looked at our trip's itinerary and have reacted in a similar way: Washington DC New York West Hartford Toronto … "Wait a minute… why on earth are you going to West Hartford?" It boils down to this: one of my closest friends lives there. Duncan and I met during our first week or so at University – we played field hockey together – and ended up becoming very good friends: we lived in a shared house during our 2nd year at Uni, for instance. We've stayed in touch ever since, visiting each other in the US, Switzerland…
-
So far our big trip has gone well: the trip out via the UK went smoothly – we had a 5-hour layover at Heathrow Terminal 5, as we had to collect and re-check our bags (our ticket from Geneva was separate from the main round-the-world itinerary, it seems) – but time passes quickly in a pub when you're eating fish and chips and sipping Guinness. Arrivals in DC were also a breeze: I'd forgotten about having to take mobile lounges at Dulles, but immigration was quick and easy. We booked an UberXL (we're 5 people with lots of bags) which…
-
It's now less than a week before my family and I get on a plane and start our big trip: visiting 13 countries on 5 continents (not including the one we're starting from) over the course of 6 months. We leave on July 2nd, 2017, and – if our plans don't change – will return home on January 5th, 2018. Here's a map of where we're going… be sure to zoom into different locations and click on the place-markers to bring up additional information. It's been a deliberate choice, over the years, not to talk much about my family on…
-
As always, the annual football tournament – this time in Barcelona – was a complete blast. The Neuchatel team was as strong as it's ever been, in my opinion, and played really well. We were in a tough group (yes, the proverbial "group of death"), but managed to qualify for the knock-out stage with 3 wins, 2 draws and a loss. The weather was scorching… a beautiful early summer's day. We had a few great games in the knock-out phase, eventually losing (again) in the quarter final on penalties to the UK team (who went on to win the whole…
-
Autodesk has maintained a health dashboard for its cloud products for quite some time. The good news for Forge developers is that – just in time for next week's Accelerator in Barcelona – Forge has been added as a line item: Given the internal response to the technical issues we experienced during the last Accelerator I attended in Munich, I'm pretty sure we'll be green through the week in Barcelona. Let's hope so, anyway! One great feature of the dashboard is the ability to subscribe to notifications: once you've signed in you'll have the option to do so via the…
-
Most of my team has been 100% focused on an event taking place in Toronto, this week, the Symposium on Simulation for Architecture and Urban Design (or SimAUD). This is a really interesting conference for people working in our space: I'm looking forward to attending myself, at some point. As the only non-Toronto based member of the team, it made sense for me to skip it (and given the fact I'm about to embark on a 6-month trip – including some time in Toronto – I didn't even suggest that I attend). This meant that I ended up spending the…
-
I'm writing this on a train to Geneva airport from where I'll hop across to the UK for a week. This afternoon I have a meeting in London at the British Library, after which I'll be checking into the Hilton London Metropole where Autodesk is holding its 9th (at least I think that's right, if the first was – as I seem to recall – in 2009) annual Technical Summit. This is the internal meeting where technical staff from around the world get together to share information and learn from each other. Every year the percentage of presentation proposals selected…
-
This one almost passed me by, but I did remember just in time. Have a great Start Wars Day, everyone! photo credit: saoulsliberty Just few days Chewie ! via photopin (license)