(혼자) 흰머리뽑기 도사되는듯

이젠 쪽집게도 필요없다....

지난 2중안 회사에선 보였는데 집에만 가면 안보였던 흰머리 한가닥을 방금 그냥 회사에서 화장실 거울 보고, 손으로 뽑았다.

이젠 반대쪽에 있는거 나중에 발견하면 또 뽑아야지...

회사에 쪽집게 하나 갖다두든지 해야지 원;;

US ranks #13 in Smartphone Penetration

What an interesting research/stat, but UAE is #1 and S. Korea is #2.

US is ranked at #13 for smartphone penetration.

Smartphone Penetration is basically the rate (or percentage) of the supply of smartphones to the number of population (unsure if it's total population or if it's wireless population).

So... I ended up spending money on Surface Pro

I decided to go with Surface Pro over Helix for a few reasons -

- Smaller screen (10.1" vs. 11.6")
- Helix's docking station is way too heavy
- Cheaper
- $100 discount ends on 8/30
- Surface Pro has external memory slot (but Helix has a huge storage available anyway)
- Less body volume
- Fits my travelling needs better

Helix has much better/stronger specs without any doubt, but spending $1,800 was not part of my plan, and Lenovo specifies Helix as an 'ultrabook' rather than a tablet PC.

There is a post from someone who owns both devices and voted for Surface Pro, which made me to go with Surface Pro as well

Microsoft Surface Pro vs. Lenovo Helix

A couple months ago, I was really interested in looking into a tablet PC - that is in tablet form factor but is powerful as a laptop/PC.

Well, to tell the truth, I wanted to play FM on the road.... and looking at some of the options, a full Windows 8 tablet PC.

Looking at some of the options, the two that caught my eyes were:

MS Surface Pro and Lenovo Helix

If I had the cash, then there'd be no doubt that I was going to buy Helix, but the reality is that I'm poor OTL;

I'll have to see if I can hold off onto this 지름신!!!

Original Article: http://www.babson.edu/news-events/babson-magazine/summer-2013/Pages/behind-the-wheel.aspx

Ian So ’08 (left) and Jaemin Lee ’08  Photo: Tom Kates

With their hip status, food trucks seem like a fun, cool way to make a buck. And they are, say those in the business, but these seemingly simple meals-on-wheels can take even the savviest entrepreneur for a bumpy ride.

On a slightly overcast morning, Ian So ’08, co-founder of The Chicken & Rice Guys, drives his bright-yellow food truck down a street near the Prudential Center in downtown Boston. He pulls a U-turn, then heads to where he’s supposed to park for the day’s lunch service. A car, however, is parked in his spot, which has been designated for the truck by the city. “That happens,” says So, who takes it in stride but acknowledges it occurs more often than he would like. “We can call a tow truck, but it takes forever.” Two other food trucks, one selling Middle Eastern fare and the other Vietnamese, already are lined up for lunch. As such, So pulls in front of them and sets up in a no-parking zone. “The police won’t bother us,” he says. “They’re not really sure what the rules are.”

Many cities are still figuring out how to deal with the growing popularity of food trucks. By no means a new idea, the business of selling street food dates all the way to ancient times. But in 2008, gourmet trucks such as Kogi in Los Angeles, which sells Korean BBQ, brought an unexpected flair—and, thus, popularity—to the cuisine. Seeing that success, more trucks have tried to capitalize on the increased interest in foodie street fare. How far have food trucks come since their roach-coach days of selling prepackaged sandwiches at construction sites? An industry report pegged the mobile food business at $1.5 billion in 2012. Even restaurant-guide Zagat now rates food trucks in certain cities.

“Serving food to people is a calling of the highest order, and I don’t say that with any sense of irony at all,” says Andrew Zimmern, entrepreneur in residence at Babson. Zimmern, a multifaceted entrepreneur perhaps best known as the creator, host, and producer of The Travel Channel’s Bizarre Foods, began his career as a chef in the ’80s. Wanting to get back to his cooking roots, he started a food truck called AZ Canteen in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area at the end of last summer.

Zimmern offers the following advice to those interested in the food truck business. “Be prepared. It’s life changing,” he says. “Everyone eats. Everyone thinks they’ve figured it out more than anyone else. Nobody turns to a family member at the dinner table and says, ‘You know what? I’m going to open my own accounting practice.’ Everyone says, ‘Honey, you make the best pork chops in the world. We’re going to open a pork chop shop.’ I think it’s because of our special relationship with food. But you have to be very dedicated. It’s not easy.”

Ian So (top left) and Jaemin Lee (top right) brought flavors from a famous food cart in New York City to the Boston area with their food trucks. Customers especially love their sauces, they say. To let people know the daily locations of their two trucks, they use their website, Twitter, and Facebook.  Photos: Tom Kates

With two trucks and a little more than one year of experience under their belts, The Chicken & Rice Guys—which include So and Jaemin Lee ’08—know how tough the food truck business can be. If the weather is decent, their trucks are out six days a week year-round. Prep starts about 9 a.m., and then the trucks are off to the first location for the 11 to 3 lunch shift. Next they’re off to another location for the 4 to 8 dinner shift. After dinner comes breakdown, with the day wrapping up around 9 or 10 p.m. That’s just the service side of the business. Cooking, shopping, accounting, promoting—all these tasks and more need taking care of as well. “I did not personally expect this much work,” says Lee. “I don’t think Ian did either.”

Business has been good, though, so So and Lee don’t complain. Just how two business-school grads became owners of a food truck operation relates back to So’s hometown roots in New York City. Wanting to start a business together, So, Lee, and So’s high-school friend, Kevin Lau, already had been meeting weekly to toss around ideas. Then one weekend while visiting his parents, So heard about a popular food cart that sells chicken and rice, so he went and tried the food. “The Halal Guys are super popular. They have lines down the block,” he says. “I saw the hype and thought we could bring the food to Boston.”

Next meeting, he proposed the idea to Lee and Lau. Says Lee, “It’s kind of funny, because MIS [management information systems] is my background, and Ian wanted to do something more fancy like IT consulting, and then all of a sudden one day he comes and says we have to do this chicken and rice cart. I was like, what? Do you really want to do street food?” But after a trip to taste the food, Lee was onboard, as was Lau. Jenny Giang, So’s girlfriend, joined soon after as the fourth partner.

With no food experience, the group faced the not-so-easy task of figuring out how to replicate The Halal Guys’ dishes, which include chicken or lamb served on a bed of rice with shredded lettuce, pita, and sauces—white (tangy garlic) and hot—for garnishing. Both So and Lau, also a New York City native, would travel home and buy meals for taste tests. “I asked my mom to taste it first,” says So, “and right off the bat she got a few of the main ingredients.” They would have friends who are fans of the cart try their dishes, and they would bring the sauces back to Boston for more deciphering by the group. “We discovered the best way to figure it out is actually to smell it,” says So. Many nights and recipes later, they came up with what they considered the winning combinations, and even expanded the sauces to include BBQ and two versions of spicy.

Initially, the group bought a cart, similar to what they had seen in New York City. But they soon discovered that the permit to operate a cart was difficult to obtain. “For carts, you can only sell on private property, so you’ve got to find somebody willing to let you sell on their property,” says So, “and most of the good spots are taken. It’s a very old industry.” Boston, however, had started a new food truck program in 2011, and with the city interested in growing the program, getting a permit was relatively easy.

Acquiring a food truck proved more interesting. After deciding to go with a used truck, So searched the Web and discovered one on eBay in Miami. The catch: They had to buy it that weekend. They called the owner, asked him questions, and talked to his mechanic. “His mechanic said everything checked out,” says So, “and we just had to go on our gut that nobody was trying to cheat us.”

So and Lau purchased two one-way tickets and arrived about noon on Saturday. They checked out the truck, which seemed fine, and headed for the bank. “We took out $19,000 and paid him in cash. That was really scary,” says So. “Driving it home was crazy. Kevin drove it first, and he was driving really slow. I was leading with the rental car, and I was like why is he all the way back there? We were driving in the wrong gear for about 20 minutes.” They drove home in 25 hours, taking turns sleeping on the floor of the truck.

With their truck in place, the group now had to find a place to prepare their food. City regulations don’t allow for preparing food at home, so a search for commercial kitchen space commenced. “That was a whole can of worms,” says So. “In the beginning, it was one of our biggest challenges.” To find a spot, they would search on Google, call people, ask for referrals, network, and then show up and try to get the space. “A lot of these kitchens, if something goes wrong, they’re liable, so their business will be impacted, too,” says So. “Some people are charging high fees. Some people won’t let you in at certain times. Our kitchen now—we share our kitchen with seven other trucks—is the most stable location we’ve been in, but we’ve had to switch kitchens about four times.”

Despite the hurdles, The Chicken & Rice Guys launched in April 2012, originally just on the weekends but quickly switching to full time, six days a week. “There was no way we could break even if we were just doing weekends,” says Lee. At this point, So and Lau quit their regular jobs to work exclusively on the business. Lee still has his job as an information systems analyst, but he works weekends, doing the shopping and helping prepare and cook food (he usually makes the sauces), and he helps out during the week when needed.

The group also launched another truck in the winter of this year. Winters, as one might imagine, are tough. After one storm, So had to shovel out a space before the truck could set up for lunch. “We do OK,” he says, “but it’s about half the business.” A bad weather day, regardless of the season, affects business, but their catering business is beginning to pick up, says So, which helps. Future plans include a potential brick-and-mortar restaurant, consulting, even franchising. “I think the food truck industry is plateauing, so to really take this business further, we can’t just be a food truck,” he says.

As surprising as their leap into the food truck world may have been, So and Lee enjoy running their own business. “It’s so fun to see the business grow,” says So. “I love record sales, like how much we can sell in one day. It’s exciting.” And even though Lee doesn’t put in many hours on the truck these days, he likes working with friends and meeting people. “When people like what we do or thank us or recognize our efforts,” says Lee, “it’s worth the hard work.”

Do we really need BAs, please?

BA들이 오면 일이 줄어들 줄 알았는데... 더 많아졌다.

1) 도대체 내 to-do 리스트는 왜 신경쓰는건지... 당신 일이나 좀 잘하시지요? 오지랖도 넓어 하여튼.

2) Requirements, workflows 같은건 BA가 나한테 알려줘야하는데... 왜 회의하고 나면 BA가 나한테 물어보는거지?

3) No, I'm not giving you a full admin access to the prod instance. In prod, you can have read access to everything except for payroll & benefits info.

4) 아 제발좀... 디비 줄좀 꼬아놓지 마. 특히 금요일 오후에...

5) 디비 줄 꼬아놓고 4시에 퇴근하면 뒷통수 한대 날려주고싶다 진짜.

여담 #1. 대부님도 만나뵐겸, 슬슬 치과 가야할 것 같은데.

여담 #2-1. 요즘따라 참 8090 가요가 좋다.

여담 #2-2. 그러고보면 8090에도 티비가 있긴 있었어...

여담 #2-3. 우리 부모님도 젊으셨을 때 영화보셨다는데, 그때 극장은 좀 궁금하다. 하루는 어머니께 '대학댕길때 극장이랑 영화가 있었소?' 하고 여쭈었었던.

여담 #3. 오랫만에 술 한잔 하고싶은데... 라는 생각을 하고있었는데, 엊그제 밤에 친구랑 마셨었다.

여담 #4. 이러는거 보면 참 시간 안간다.


고민 #1. 베리죤을 계속 쓸지, 아니면 티모빌로 옮길지...
고민 #2. Surface Pro를 살까말까.. $100 디씨에 10% 쿠폰도 있는데 쩝;
고민 #3. 아니면 차라라리 돈을 좀 더 써서 Helix를 살까?

BA vs. SA, and BSA?

It seems that the title "Business Systems Analyst" is getting more popular these days.  And many people could be curious about differences between Business Analyst, Systems Analyst and Business Analyst.

And of course, what we consider as Business Analysts these days are technically IT Business Analysts, and the old traditional Business Analysts are business and finance acumen.

What are differences between BA, SA and BSA? Bottom line - it really depends on the employer.

To briefly explain, one of my past employers has three teams that were competing on the same turf: Change Management team that acted as a PMO with a few IT Business Business Analysts, Enterprise Applications team that managed business applications and systems with a few "Information Systems Analysts" which are equivalent to BSA, and Development & Integration team that had a few developers.

If you simply say Systems Analyst, the duties and responsibilities are probably more suitable for traditional systems and infrastructure (such as networking, servers, etc.).

An IT Business Analyst is supposed to be the analysis expert - gathering translating business requirements into technical details and features, or extract the data from systems and transform it in a consumable format for the business. The truth is, I never liked worked with BAs. They usually don't carry any technical or technology knowledge, although some of them are really good at researching and understanding.

So, what is a Business Systems Analyst? In short, a BSA is a systems muscle with business brain. A BSA carries the mindset of a business analyst with the skillset of a systems analyst, but specifically for business applications.

A BSA is a get-your-hand-dirty job. S/he will perform the analysis of learning a business process or operations, gathering requirements for changes in the business applications or a new features (whether custom or add-on), make such changes on her/his own or with external help, develop test plans and guide the business to test them, and then finally implement - of course, on top of day-to-day operations support & troubleshooting.

Because a typical BSA job includes micro-project management, I personally find it very difficult for a team of BA and a team of BSA to work along well.

It is not rare that a BSA will work inside VMs that SEs and SAs may set up, and manage applications that reside on servers. But in today's environment, there are a lot of "cloud" business applications. In my personal work environment, managing a VM instance is very minimal.

If you are seeking advice whether to become a BSA or not, I can tell you that I enjoy working as a BSA.