ASP.NET, Events, Meet the Team, Programming

Events: Spring 2013 Career Fairs

February 4, 2013 elisek

Coming to a college near you. We’re Looking for swashbuckling, creative college grads with object-oriented programming under the belts, a penchant for amassing new skills, and who don’t mind a few board games and BBQs. Think you’ve got the coding chops to work in this dynamic office environment? Then we want to meet you.

We’re big on hands-on learning and career development. In years past we’ve had interns work on product demos, pick up a new programming language, and share their expertise on our blog. Have a question? Ask it. Have an opinion? State it. Have an idea? Run with it.

Got you curious? Let our Technical Services team give you an inside look at this eclectic group and the types of projects you could be working on in this video.

Who we are: SoftArtisans is a leading developer of Microsoft Office reporting software. As a key Microsoft partner, SoftArtisans delivers award-winning products to over 20,000 clients in over 70 countries. We’re a company founded on brains not gimmicks and we aim to keep it that way.

Find out more about internship and career opportunities at SoftArtisans and how to join the SA Crew (and get in on those BBQs) by interacting with us on all of the usual social media hotspots or visiting one of the career fairs below. Looking forward to seeing you then!

Spring Career Fairs

Olin College

Wednesday, February 13, 2013, 11 a.m. – 2 p.m. Continue reading Events: Spring 2013 Career Fairs →

Truth in Tech, Uncategorized

This Week in Tech News

February 1, 2013 elisek

This week in tech news: Harvard medical school rakes in a cool $1 million to study NFL injuries and Foodspotting app is acquired for $10 million. But nothing beats the priceless price of putting your head on a PEZ dispenser.

Boston: Harvard Medical School Awarded 100mil by NFL Players Association to Study football injuries. The program’s goal is to “improve the health and well-being of NFL players, while further elucidating the risks of participation in American football.” – the research to improve players’ health will include studying concussions, treatment for ACL injuries, and heart function.

Continue reading This Week in Tech News →

Big Data, Programming

Best Practices for Performance Testing

February 1, 2013 sethm

This week I set out to add performance testing to a project I’ve been working on. Why performance test? The main benefit is that we can hone in on when one of the changes we’ve made to a project has affected performance dramatically (such as memory usage, run-time, etc.). It gives us the ability to review performance historically and subsequently identify areas of improvement.

The catch with performance testing is that run-time can vary between runs, making it tricky to test. There are a couple ways to tackle this problem:

The first of which is to run each performance test multiple times and average the results; then compare it to the previous run. This is the most accurate way to go about it, but not necessarily the most cost effective way to spend your time. For instance, if your performance tests take 30 minutes to complete and you need 10 runs to get a good average, that’s a 5 hour test.
Alternatively, we can compare the results of a single test to previous runs and simply identify whether or not the test falls within a desired percent of our distribution. This doesn’t have quite the accuracy of the first approach, but if you don’t expect extreme performance changes it can be a viable option. The biggest downside to this approach is that you won’t necessarily detect deviations immediately.

Right now we don’t have the time to run each test multiple times, so we will be implementing our tests using the second method. For testing the run-time I created a simple function that takes a lambda expression as an argument, so usage would be something like this:

1	TimeExecution( () =>
2	{

3	DoWhatever();
4	};

The implementation ends up looking like this:

01	TimeExecution(Action action)
02	{

03	Stopwatch perfTimer = new Stopwatch();
04

05	perfTimer.Start();
06

07	action();
08

09	perfTimer.Stop();
10

11	_runtime = perfTimer.ElapsedMilliseconds;
12

13	// Store the time and assert failure
14	}

Continue reading Best Practices for Performance Testing →

Featured, Truth in Tech

Stuff Tech Blogs Do That Bother Me

January 29, 2013 Richard 1 Comment

[cross posted from Riparian Data]

Credit: Business Insider Some people thought Gourmet’s demise was a nail in good journalism’s coffin. Others said no, it’s just another sign that the web is the future of journalism, good and bad. Today, the consensus seems to be that the latter group was right. And, happily, there is quite a bit of good journalism on the web. Short form, long form, data-based, image-based, crowd-sourced… all can be found, relished, and easily shared.

Unhappily, there is also quite a bit of drecky journalism on the web. I can’t tell you if technology really does take up a lion’s share of drecky journalism in general, or just a lion’s share of the drecky journalism I read. Regardless, there’s an awful lot of it, fueled by both the traffic-winner-takes-all maxim and tech companies’ willingness to stroke the egos of tech reporters in exchange for headlines. The following 12 tics are the icing on my insufferable cake. If you have any of your own, or just want to tell me to shove it and stop reading these sites if I despise them so much, feel free to let me know in the comments!

1. Slideshows. Especially slideshows that are one image/page. If gddamn Buzzfeed doesn’t use them, you don’t have to.

Capital Offender: Business Insider

2. Attributions listed below the post. This is shady and shoddy journalism, for it at best de-emphasizes and worse obfuscates the source. (1)

Capital Offender: Engadget

3. Headlines that are two sentences of keywords, strung together with a minimum of prepositions.

Capital Offender: TechCrunch

4. Headlines that follow this formula: [adjective] data startup [startup name] lands/gets $[number] Million in Series A/B/C to disrupt [noble cause like social network for cats] market.

Capital Offender: Pando Daily

5. Headlines that follow this formula: “I’m quitting/Why I quit [currently cusping or widely-used technology]”

Capital Offender: TechCrunch

Continue reading Stuff Tech Blogs Do That Bother Me →

Featured

Office 365 Launches Today

January 29, 2013 elisek

Microsoft launched the newest version of Office today (January, 29, 2013). Designed in the Cloud and with people on-the-go in mind, Office 365 Home Premium was aimed at helping businesses and families organize their increasingly busy schedules. See what all the buzz is about with these pictures, tweets, and videos from the launch.

http://storify.com/softartisans/office365-launches-today

Office Life

How to Use Trello to Stay on Top of Your Hiring Process

January 17, 2013 paulam

Sample - Recruitment Dashboard - Trello What three letter acronym will send the most tech savvy recruiter running? You guessed it! ATS, the applicant tracking system, or most affectionately known as: the last place I want to spend my time when I need to recruit amazing candidates and get my positions filled!

No names. For those of you looking for the latest pros and cons article on what system worked well and which one not-so-well, this is not that post. If you would like to try something that only measures the metrics that matter and gives you and the hiring manager a dashboard view of “Got Talent or Not,” then hang on for a quick tour of my new best friend and management tool, Trello, and why it works for us.

My recommendation to step out of the box and try something completely different is based on a few assumptions of why ATS tools ever came into existence in the first place. There is a need, and still is, for a tool that makes the job easier for recruiters “to recruit” and for companies to understand the value of where the recruiting dollars are being spent now and where to spend in the future. Before my team starting using Trello as our Recruitment Dashboard, we took into consideration 3 things:

1) Candidate Pipeline: For us, this is the active candidate pipeline. Candidates that are being screened either by me or one of the hiring managers. Our preference is to have all of that information on one screen, dashboard style.

2) Time to Hire: Self-explanatory. The candidate starts the process and things are competitive, so let’s keep it moving. If you don’t act with a sense of urgency, game over.

3) Source Tracking: So many places to go when looking for candidates but where do we get the most value for time spent networking and reaching out to the best talent?

I took that wish-list and presented my recommendations on which ATS might best serve our needs. Those of you that know me and my passion for all things recruiting, I get pretty jazzed about the latest tools and toys in my industry. But just like finding the right candidate for the job, I wasn’t finding the perfect match for our needs. Enter Trello.

Our development team adopted Trello in early 2012 for managing their work on Gander. (You can check out their Trello Made Awesome Blog Series on taking your boards to the next level.) Personally, I was thrilled to delay my search for the perfect ATS and jumped in (hesitantly, at first) to my new Trello board. For the first day, I made a few cards and moved them around the screen. Honestly, I was skeptical if this would work or just be another drain on my time! Continue reading How to Use Trello to Stay on Top of Your Hiring Process →

OfficeWriter, Programming

Enhancing your Word Document with Images Using OfficeWriter

January 14, 2013 Chad Evans

One of the questions that comes up frequently when talking with customers is how can they get their images into their Word document with OfficeWriter? Depending on how you are using OfficeWriter and making your Word documents, there are a few ways to do this. The following outline several of these methods and cases in which to use them.

1. Design your document in Word with images

This is the easiest way to get images into your document. Since OfficeWriter can use the Word file you have already created and allow you to enhance it with data from a database, you can get all of the design functionality of Word with the enhanced capabilities of OfficeWriter. This method is commonly used when designing a document that uses your company logo, for example.

2. Dynamically insert images into a document

Another option is to design your document in Word, but leave a place holder for a dynamically loaded image. (A quick overview on how to do this can be found here.) This method is great when the document is structured the same each time it is run and you want to keep your company logo static, but use different department logos.

3. Design your report with images stored in a database

You can use one of two methods to directly insert images into a Word template from an image column: the placeholder method or the the image modifier method. For example, in MS SQL Server, there is a column type “varbinary” used just for that purpose. This method is perfect for creating an employee directory containing the employee’s picture along with their contact information, or for a product catalog, showing the product alongside the product details. (For further details on how to to design your report with images stored in a database, please see our documentation on inserting an image.)

4. Design your report with images referenced by PATH in a database

This is the more complicated case of the bunch. Unlike the previous instances where you were obtaining your images directly from a database, this process involves accessing your images stored in another location, such as a network share. Continue reading Enhancing your Word Document with Images Using OfficeWriter →

Big Data, The Intern Diaries

Big Data for Dummies. Big Daddy for Geniuses.

January 10, 2013 elisek

[The following is a guest post from our partner company Riparian Data and new intern and data-ist Brennan Full. Happy to have you on board, Brennan!]

I first heard the words “big data” while listening to the radio at the gym, the host’s voice guiding me over the precipice of a “hill” on my humming elliptical. The words immediately brought me back to my “Sandler period” where Big Daddy was watched on repeat until one had reached comedic enlightenment. It wasn’t until the 3rd mention of “zettabytes” that I finally came around and realized that this conversation was concerning the mountains of data humans create every day. Disappointed, I changed the station. Months later, looking for marketing opportunities I came across an opening at Riparian Data, a company that works with “big data”. Again, the flashbacks returned; Scuba Steve, tripping people in Central Park, teaching Rob Schneider how to read… I have got to find a way to work there!

Before my interview I began researching the company, shocked to find out that I was horribly mistaken/illiterate and that Riparian Data in fact had nothing to do with the magnum opus of my childhood. I sat for hours, researching, working desperately to understand what this emerging technological field was all about. Hours passed and I was no closer to grasping NoSQL. Dejected, I turned to my worn copy of Big Daddy. As I slowly descended into a meditative state it hit me, BIG DATA AND BIG DADDY AREN’T COMPLETELY DISSIMILAR!

You see, much like shapeless masses of data, Sandler’s character lacks purpose, that is until someone comes around and gives the data/“daddy” meaning. Big data is the collection and analysis of the information we’re all constantly generating as we text, tweet, buy things, use GPS, etc. This incomprehensible mountain of information would lack significance if not for the tools brought about by big data. This, ladies and gentlemen is how my warped mind came to understand what big data is all about.

Thanks for having me on board Riparian Daddy!

NOTES: I never went through a Sandler period, I never use an elliptical, and I’m fairly certain Rob Schneider was acting like he couldn’t read.

Events, SQL Server, Uncategorized

January Boston Tech Meetups to Attend

January 8, 2013 elisek

Credit: http://www.careerencore.com/Portals/79503/images/Downtown%20Boston%20Job%20Opportunities-resized-600.jpg It’s the start of the new year, bringing with it fresh resolutions to keep, skills to learn, and meetups to attend. While we’re keeping a close watch on industry news with our new Truth in Tech series, we’ve also been keeping our ears to the ground for tech-related events happening within the community. We’ve compiled a few that caught our eye this month; so break open your planner and mark these on your calendar, because we’ve found several you don’t want to miss.

Lean Startup Circle

Thursday, January 31st

Time: 6:30pm – 9:00pm

Location: Microsoft New England R&D Center

Twitter: @LeanStartupBOS

This group meets on the last Thursday of every month at the NERD center in Cambridge to go over lean methodology. Perfect for anyone in the startup scene.

NESQL MeetUp

Thursday, January 17th

Topic: Big Data and the Cloud

Speaker: Mark Souza, General Manager of the Data Platform Group at Microsoft

New England SQL Server Users Group is a great group hosted by Adam Machanic featuring knowledgeable and entertaining speakers. Continue reading January Boston Tech Meetups to Attend →

Truth in Tech

This Week in Tech

January 4, 2013 elisek

Truth in Tech Series

Claire and I filter through a lot of news on the interwebs. While not all of the stories are pertinent to what we do here at SoftArtisans and Riparian Data (see Gander and OfficeWriter), there is still a mind-boggling amount of industry articles worth talking about. To keep them from rattling around in our subconscious and to stay up-to-date on the latest trends (and because Claire and I don’t hang out nearly enough), a new series was born. Every week we’ll bring you an unbiased perspective on the ever-changing technology landscape, covering industry topics from mobile to startups to news you may have missed. So join the conversation as we talk acquisitions, new apps worth using, and anything else that tickles our fancy.

With two videos under our belts, we’re talking Instagram, Zipcar, and Continue reading This Week in Tech →