Nostalgia and excitement

…seems the best description of the last few days.

Friday was a big day for several reasons. We:

  • started building FF3.5beta99 (build#1)
  • aborted FF3.5beta99 (build#1) after a blocker was found, and started FF3.5beta99 (build#2)
  • pushed FF3.0.11build#2 to beta users
  • started building TB2.0.0.22
  • oh, and moved office.

The first four would have counted as a busy day. A really busy day. Add to that the contingency planning to make sure that we could still be ready whenever we finally got the “go” to start FF3.5rc1, regardless of when the physical building move really happened. Both FF3.5rc1 date and building move date changed quite a bit, so we just made plans for the worse case – doing it all on the same day. There was some last minute changes to the contingency plans when we added FF3.5beta99 to the schedule late last week.

While I dont normally like respins, in this one case, I was happy for the FF3.5beta99 respin, as it suddenly gave us ~3 hours before we would need the signing machine again. So, Aki, John Ford and myself quickly moved the mobile devices from Aki’s desk, and the signing machine keymaster out of the server room, into two cars, and drove over in careful slow convoy to the new building. Thankfully Aki thought to put all the mobile devices into a portable guitar base pedal case, which made it “easy” to carry.

(Healthy paranoia caused *me* to carry keymaster, and the signing keys, so I would deal with the consequences if it got dropped in the move. )

…although keymaster looked too unsecured in the back seat like that, so Aki sat in the back, and physically held it for the drive.

Earlier today, I went back to Building K, tracking down some loose ends. It was weird and nostalgic walking around the ghost of the empty building all by myself. Its been my home-from-home for the last two years, and it was surreal to see it all empty like this.

ps: if anyone knows who this crutch belongs to, could they let us know?

Big tip of the hat to Rhian, Chris Beard, Karen, Erica and IT for a phenomenal job on all this. I’ve done moves like this in previous companies, and there’s always a million-and-one loose details. But they seemed to have everything all calmly taken care of. Quite amazing!