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Jim Fiori recently presented at Virginia Tech's Association for Computing Machinery Meeting.  My oldest son, John, blogged about Jim's GREAT 2 1/2 presentation.  Jim's slides are also here.

If I was told, "Dave, you get to pick one person on planet earth to solve the most difficult software performance problem mankind has ever seen, and if this person fails, the earth as we know it burns up in an attosecond."

I know exactly who I would pick:  Here's a hint, it would not be Bill Joy, Dave Patterson, Steve Bourne, Dennis Ritchie, Ken Thompson, Neil Groundwater, Grace Hopper or Bjarne Stroustrup.

No disprespect to those computer legends above, but I would select Jim Fiori.  Jim Fiori is a great example of  Malcom Gladwell's Outliers primary premise, which is you need to get to 10,000 hours of actual hands on experience, along with selecting the right parents, being born at the right time and finally, being in the right place at the right time - Jim Fiori meets all of these criteria.

Jim Fiori is a Principal Field Technologist at Sun Microsystems and is THE GOD IN SOFTWARE PERFORMANCE TUNING AND PROBLEM SOLVING. 

Sometimes, very rarely for me, when you are googling around, you find something that is both a surprise and makes you feel great at the same time.    I was discussing just how bogus MTBF is with my oldest son John, when I told him he needs to read Dave Trindade's GREAT book on Applied Reliability.   Many years ago, Sun had some challenges with e-cache.  e-cache is the abbreviation for external cache or cache that is not directly on the microprocessor.   I was the lead in terms of delivering the detailed message to customers.   Dr. Dave Trindade is a god in statistics and a Distinguished Engineer at Sun Microsystems.  It was Dave Trindade who did the statistical analysis and told us all at Sun the right way to think about this challenge that really made ALL OF THE DIFFERENCE with conveying the message to customers. 

In my 30 years in the computer industry and 21+ years at Sun, no one has been better at discussing Software Development than Dr. Bruce Haddon.  Bruce has the rare ability to talk to a CEO one second and the Java Real Time Developer the next.   There are countless examples of Bruce speaking to a large group of Developers and the final question is ALWAYS,  "Bruce, this is GREAT, when can you come back? "  I always went out of my way to attend any of Bruce's talks since I always learned something new and interesting.

 There is not enough storage space on http://blogs.sun.com  to list all of Bruce Haddon's many accomplishments.  I will name just two of  a very long list.   Bruce was the Father of Java Center Of Excellence (JCOE) as well as my co-author in Software Genius University (SGU).  When I was told that we only had one chance to speak to an extremely important customer about software development, my response was always the same, "call Bruce, no one is better on this planet."

Dr. Bruce Haddon is the definition of what the ultimate professional should be.

Thanks Bruce for your INCREDIBLE LEADERSHIP in Software Development at Sun Microsystems with so many customers,  Developers, Partners, University students, employees.....

 

Congratulations to my oldest son, John, who was selected to be Campus Ambassador of the Month for Sun Microsystems.  Increasing the number of Campus Ambassadors is one of Jonathan Schwartz's most brilliant strategic investments since he became CEO.  John is doing lots of very interesting Tech Talks, on topics such as Chris Melissinos discussing Gaming,  Solaris with Dr. Harry Foxwell at Virginia Tech that have been extremely well attended.  There are many other activities that John has been doing (such as the NetBeans 6 demo he did for students and faculty) and you can read more about that here at his Sun blog.

 John gave a nice interview about his activities as a Campus Ambassador at VA Tech.