Well I have been very quite here for sometime. Hadn't quite meant to let things slip, but I've been so busy doing other things.
Best news for me this week has to be finally getting a job. MessageLabs got back to me yesterday and made a firm offer, which I've accepted. I'm now due to start next Tuesday. This had been a great weight off my mind, as I was beginning to wonder whether I actually get anything Perl related. I even had a Java interview a couple of weeks ago.
My plans to rewrite the Intranet system I was working on at QIIS have slowed. Partly due to me contracting with the company that has come out of the ashes of QIIS, I2Q, but also there is a legal issue with me creating something that I previously created at QIIS. I still have plans to finish it, and possibly sell it, but I think that that will be a long time down the line now. This time around I want to design it properly, with full Technical Specs and everything, and code it with the benefit of hindsight. I2Q have already stated interest if I finish it, which would be good as they can do the selling and leave me to tinker in my spare time.
DanDan and Nicole have taken up some of my time too, which has been fun. Though I think DanDan is going to get withdrawal symptoms once I start work again. Still at least I'll be home earlier than when I was working in Brum. Gloucester is only about 35-45 minutes drive, whereas catching a bus back from Brum could take anything up to 2 hours.
I should mention that our Technical Meeting for Birmingham.pm, went down very well last month, with thanks to Dave and Mark for coming up to Birmingham to give us 4 talks between them. Some felt that the talks were a bit too heavily weighted towards the experienced programmer, so from now on I'm going to try and keep a balance. At the next Technical Meeting (proposed 30th April) I am planning a beginners guide to Regular Expressions tutorial, and possibly a further look at screen-scraping via my Perl Auctioneer talk. Time permitting of course.
MessageLabs got back to me yesterday and made a firm offer, which I've accepted.
Excellent news. Have fun, and the best of luck in making spammers CFT-enabled
