person / partner / dad / sre@mozilla
If you’re mailing in your iPhone for a trade-in, I highly recommend taking a quick video of the device, highlighting its condition and serial number before packing it up and handing it to the UPS worker. It saved me this time, and has helped others I know in the past
Some days I think I know almost all there is to know about Apple software/hardware. Other times, especially being new to the CI/CD world professionally, I feel like I know very little.
A week ago a friend sent me an image they had taken at a bar over iMessage. Because he was traveling, I wondered if the location data was attached. To my surprise, it was.
Another friend working in Apple Retail confirmed this was expected behavior. If you wish to not share that data, there is a workaround but you do have to apply it on a case by case basis.
When sharing an image from the Share Sheet, you will see an Options menu that will allow you disable location data from being shared.
This approach seems problematic in many ways. One scenario that could be quite common is the influx of individuals using dating apps. Sharing images via those channels more than likely strips this information (hopefully), but surely its puts those at risk who share photos with people over iMessage that they are just getting to know.
I decided to file my first Apple Security bug and receive confirmation that this is expected behavior. I’d like to see Apple implement a setting to disable sharing this information by default.
Most days I’m grateful for where I’m at in my career. I’ve had the privilege of working remotely since 2016.
You usually hear about the typical benefits. Dressing comfortably, flipping the laundry in between calls, showering when you want.
Yesterday I had to drive to an appointment 30 minutes away in the midst of out of service traffic lights and rush hour traffic.
All I could think about is how little time I’d see my two young children during the week if I added a 1-2 hour commute to my life. Thoughts like this make me both grateful and motivated to do my best work.
Today marks six months at Mozilla.
As the title suggests, a recent curiosity of mine has been paywall circumvention. I found two approaches so far worth sharing.
Good:
Disable Javascript add-on for Firefox allows you to block javascript per domain. This approach can have some drawbacks but overall it seems to work.
Better:
Bypass Paywalls Clean supports bypassing a number of paywalled sites. It is available for Chrome and Firefox.
It has been a while since my last post. An incredible year filled with ups and downs, but mostly ups.
Amazon ended up not being the dream employer I had imagined. I found the work challenging and engaging, but massive layoff rounds combined with threats to return to a physical office which would require relocation really made it hard to square with their mantra of “World’s Greatest Employer®”.
During the chaos a new opportunity arose at Mozilla. I took a position as a Senior Site Reliability Engineer overseeing the Apple infrastructure used for Firefox CI and performance testing.
I was somewhat reluctant to get back into the MacAdmin space but I soon discovered it would be unlike any role I had previously. I am enjoying seeing how the software “sausage” is made and am proud of my contributions to the team thus far.
On a personal note, my wife and I brought our second daughter into the world in February. It’s no exaggeration when I say that I feel as if I am the most blessed person on the planet.
Today was my first day at AWS. I can honestly say I am equal parts excited and terrified. I am on a great team and my leadership has a vision for my upward career trajectory.
I figure by the time I start getting comfortable baby number two will have arrived. I continue to feel incredibly blessed.
It was a solid seven weeks at Amazon Care. Landed what seemed to be my dream job, fell in love with my team and the leadership…but alas, Amazon Care will be no more at the end of the year.
The good news is that there seems to be a high amount of internal opportunities open and teams at Amazon are actively helping re-place us.
I am confident something will work out but the next few months will no doubt be chaotic as the interviewing process ramps up again.
This week marks my fourth week at Amazon Care. I am on an incredibly great team of Systems Engineers. I try to keep my enthusiasm measured when around them but it’s so nice not being a one person show.
I’ve also found most of the onboarding training to be deeply thoughtful and not as “canned” as I’m used to. Might be the new job feel but I can’t help but feeling this was the right move.
I’ve also been highly enjoying Jeff Sutherland’s book Scrum: The Art of Doing Twice the Work in Half the Time. As someone fairly new (~1 year) to Scrum, I welcome the iterative nature of improvement and constant/consistent accountability.