Yesterday I was briefly interviewed by Aaron VanTuyl, one of our reporters here at The Chronicle, about the sixth game of the NBA Finals. During the interview I confessed I wasn't sure if I was related to Paul Pierce, Celtic's star and now Final's MVP. I said this jokingly, of course. I'm certain there's no relation. (Is it that obvious?)

I've been interviewed a few times since starting here at The Chronicle. I always enjoy it, even when I can't think of anything quotable to say. When writing I get a chance to think about the words I want to use and am able to put them in correct order. Verbal communication is not my strongest trait.

Note to self: Do not run for public office. Ever.

All of this reminded me of my first interview with a newspaper. In early June, 2006, I was interviewed by The News Tribune reporter Debbie Cafazzo for a Soundlife article on becoming a new father. At the time I had just finished a class on parenting that I attended with my father. The class specialized in fatherhood. I was feeling pretty good, having also finished a lamaze class with my wife a few weeks prior. I was ready for the birth and ready to change diapers.

Debbie visited us in our apartment and brought with her one of the News Tribune's photographers, Lui Kit Wong. Both were friendly enough and I tried my hardest to say something profound. I'm saddened to say that I said nothing that I would be proud of today. Regardless, Debbie was able to get some quotes from me. My father, who was also present for the interview, was able to say much more rememberable and inspirational things. I'm glad he was there.

I remember thinking these reporter-folks were awfully strange. Debbie and Lui came in, chatted, took a couple of photos, and left. "Is this how newspapers operate?" I asked myself after they left. It would be another year before I would become employed by a newspaper myself.

It is now June, 2008. The expected-dad-to-be has been replaced with a real dad. The baby who we only knew as a black and white ultrasound photo then is now the joy of my life, a smiling, beautiful girl. My wife is pregnant with our second, hopefully to arrive in the next few weeks. Two years seems like such a short time and like an eternity of change.

Reflection aside...

Standards Compliance; what you say?

The last two weeks have been filled with one thing: Programming. In the period of fourteen days I have worked with no less than eight programming languages.

I mentioned web standards to a co-worker and was delighted to find out that they knew nothing of them but were eager to hear more. I pulled out an old friend, a book that was given to me, and dusted it off. The book was written in 2003 originally, and my copy shows its age. The back cover has fallen off. The pages are wrinkled and well flipped through. It may be a bit old, but it's principals are universal. The internet is changing.

Firefox 3 was released this week, really capitalizing on the sort of language my book, Designing With Web Standards by Jeffrey Zeldman, was arguing needed to be implemented. Five years later, they are. Standards compliant websites have existed for a number of years, but the switch is finally being made to go from traditional HTML to the new standards. It's an exciting time to be a web developer!

Work has begun on a new version of Chronline.com. I've been juggling content management systems and our IT department has been busy at work playing with MySQL databases and transferring files to and from various servers to get everything working. Don't expect the change too soon: I'm shooting to have it up by 2010. Granted, that gives me an 18-month window for completion, but it's not something that our users will see in the next few weeks. Even then, no specific launch date has been set in stone. Everything right now is being kept behind closed doors of course, but my goal is to have the best newspaper website in the state, possibly in the country.

Oh yes, you just read that right.

Back to the code mines I go!

Many Congratulations

This last Saturday, The Chronicle was honored at the annual Society of Professional Journalists banquet at Meydenbauer Center when it was given 20 awards, including seven first-place wins for its coverage of the December floods and other stories from 2007.

Our entire staff was awarded a first-place win for the Wednesday, December 5 edition of the paper, "It came so fast." I remember waking up on the day of the floods to my phone ringing. Living in Olympia, I was safe. But I knew that work was going to get very hard for the next few days as others, who were in the flood zone, were not safe. I was certain our entire staff was ready and prepared.

I wasn't wrong.

I remember getting directions to take a back road into Centralia with I-5 closed. Our original plan was to have me update the paper from home, especially with the looming concern that the office could be flooded. Thankfully Centralia's downtown was all-but spared. Working from home, however, turned into an elusive dream when internet connection into and out of the county was bogged down by broken lines. The only way to get news on the web was to be at the server itself. I knew how important it was for those who still had the Internet to be able to get the latest updates. I managed to get to the office around 1:30 in the afternoon, two and a half hours past deadline.

Our editors were updating the paper's website with up-to-the-minute breaking news coverage and should be commended. I remember, after getting that day's paper online, heading over to the Buzz to find that the community was active in organizing relief effort already and letting everyone know what roads were closed and who was helping victims. For cyberspace, the whole event was quite awe inspiring.

I'm glad to see so many individuals here at The Chronicle awarded for all their hard work. So much of our younger staff was recognized for their creativity. Hopefully we'll see the hard work our dedicated web staff put into the website recognized this time next year! Congratulations, again, to everyone at The Chronicle.