GG HP

Looking back through all the work-related stories I've posted here, I notice that I've never actually mentioned where it is I work. I don't know if it's something I did because I wanted to protect the identities of any co-workers I mention, or to protect myself (from what, I don't know). It probably won't be too hard to connect those dots though because I'm sure I've accidentally left that detail as public on one of the myriad of some social networks I've joined over the years.

The reason I was looking back through all those posts was because I've found a new job, and wanted to see how my old/current job has been represented in my blog over the years.

For the record, I've been working at HP.

HP logo
These guys

My first job straight out of university, I joined HP (formerly EDS, before HP bought them) through the graduate programme as a Java developer. I pretty much stayed in that role for the next 6 to 7 years, doing Java-related work on large web-based systems and just getting good at doing that.

I used some of my spare time to work on other programmer-ish things, like this website or that perpetually-in-development Red Horizon game, and somewhere between then and now I started following the web developer/designer community. That made me change my focus from good old programming to things like graphic design, user interfaces on the web, and user-centered development. I started doing more of that, but only for my personal projects. It wasn't until late last year that I got a chance to put those things into practice when I moved teams and became a (just copy-and-pasting from my LinkedIn profile here...) "Mobile/Web Developer and User Experience Designer".

It hasn't even been a full year in that role, but I've enjoyed so much of it. I get to put so many of the things I learned from web development/design to use at work, and I get to tell my friends that I draw pictures for a living :) And there's still a good chunk of programming in there too.

It's that web development/design stuff, and that almost-year in my current role that I'll be taking with me to my new job. I don't know whether I'll continue the tradition of not naming what company it is I'll be working at. The new company has blogging / social media rules attached to their 'welcome aboard' papers which are very blog-friendly, provided I don't be a complete asshat while representing them. Although given the content of my work-related posts (I'm bored, I write unprofessional out-of-office replies, I don't know what to say about a death in a co-worker's family, or everybody around the world is pissing everybody else around the world off with the reply-to-all feature), they'll probably want to distance themselves from me too.

We'll see how it goes.

A workmate of mine said that, once I've given my resignation and set my final day for my current job, I'd start counting down the days until that last day. I dismissed it as a joke then, but now I'm very well aware that I have only 15 more working days to go with HP.

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For my non-gamer friends, gg = good game. From Urban Dictionary:

1. A polite remark uttered after the end of a round, game, or other measured interval to indicate that a match was fair and enjoyable. Usually uttered collectively by the occupants of a game server.