And back to Miami

Thursday night, I went to the house of my brother Antoine. We were six: Antoine, his wife Marie-Hélène, his sons Adam and Cantor and his daughter Orlane. They were living in Seattle in 2000-2002, and I have not seen the children often since then. Orlane, the youngest, was polite and told me that she was remembering me. The two boys, Adam in first year at university of medicine and Cantor in equivalent of grade 11, being older, were remembering me very well.

Antoine was the sixth of my siblings that I saw during this trip. Sixth out of nine is not too bad. My mother was not in Versailles this week, so I did not have the opportunity to see her again.


Yesterday, Friday, I flied back to Miami, a ten hour direct flight. In the plane that was full, there was a group of around twenty teenagers. So, I expected the flight to be noisy. I said so to the woman on the next seat, and she told me that they were a group of high school students from Fort Myers, Florida. They were studying theater and/or French and they were coming back from Great Britain and France, where they had visited the Globe theater in London and la Comédie-Française in Paris. She was the theater teacher. She assured me that they will behave, and she was absolutely right. Later, one of the flight attendants commented to her that indeed her group of teenagers were exceptionally quiet.


I arrived at home at 16:45 and at 18:45 I was crashing, so I went to bed, after checking that there were no work emergency. I had a relatively good night. Of course, I was awake several times, starting at 2 AM, but I was able to sleep more than 8 hours in total. When we were living in Vancouver, it would take me more than a week to recover from the 9 hour difference. Here in Miami, with only 6 hour difference, I expect to recover in two to three days. Much better.

Diners with my brother and with old friends

Tuesday night, I had diner with my 52 years old brother Grégoire. He is a priest. He is currently working on a PhD in philosophy at the Sorbonne university. I don't see him very often, so we had a good exchange about what is happening currently in our respective lives.

And yesterday, Wednesday night, I went to diner to the home of Bruno, one of my comrades from École Navale, the French Naval Academy. We shared a dormitory for two years in 1968-1970. We were seven at the diner party: Philippe and Dominique, two of our comrades and their spouses were also invited. They are both retired admirals that I have rarely seen in the last forty years. We reminisce about our lives in the French Navy around the world. We also spoke about two subjects that are usually taboo in ships'wardrooms: politics and religion. It was a very enjoyable dinner party, so we left rather late, 20 minutes before 1 AM.

Today is my last day at the Paris office. Tonight, I will go to my brother Antoine's house in Châtillon and have dinner with him and his wife Marie-Hélène.

And tomorrow morning I'll will fly back to Miami. I should be at the apartment before Daisy returns from work at 5 PM.

Back to Paris

I flew back to Paris Sunday afternoon and was at the hotel around 5 PM. This is hotel Le Péra, an hotel I have never been before. I did not sleep very well on the first two nights, because there was a humming noise. Fortunately, tonight I will be in another room that seems less noisy.

I am working in the Paris office until this Thursday. Unfortunately, this is a period of school vacations in the Parisian region, and some of the engineers I wanted to see this week are not here. I will have to contact them by e-mail.

Yesterday, Monday, I went to have diner in Versailles at my sister Nicole's, and my brother Benoit and his wife Jeanne-Marie came specially from Dreux to see me. Benoit is the one of my siblings who never finished high school when he was young, became a successful farmer and is the richest of all of us.

Tonight, I'll have diner with my brother Grégoire, who is a priest, in a restaurant near by.

Wednesday, I'll have dinner with 3 of my comrades at the French Naval Academy (in 1968-1971).

And Thursday night, I'll visit my brother Antoine and his wife Marie-Hélène for diner.

During the days, I am working at the office and starts to know two newly hired engineers that were not there yet two weeks ago.

Back in Budapest

I could not read my mail on Thursday, too many things happened.

First, at 9AM, Daisy's aunt visited. Then at 11:30 we left to have lunch at Daisy's high school friend Vilma's house. A very good Hungarian meal. Then, we walked with Vilma to the Zsolnay ceramics exhibition where we met with the rest of the family. There were dozens of exquisite ceramics items from the period 1880-1920, that were collected by an Hungarian born American and sold to the city of Pecs.

Then, Daisy and myself went to the railway station to buy our tickets to go back to Budapest on Friday, before going back to Daisy's parents house. The rest of the family joined us later.

On Friday, I was able to read my mail for two hours (9 to 11AM). I had more than 800 e-mails (not SPAM), but for most of them I did not need to read more than the title and 2 or 3 lines. We had a last family lunch, then all the visitors left for Budapest: Daisy's children in their rented car, Daisy and myself by train.

The train takes a little less than 3 hours. We arrived around 6 PM and Daisy's friend Erica (that I had already met in August 2010) was waiting for us. We went to an excellent Hungarian restaurant, then to her place 25 kms east of Budapest, where we spent the night.

Saturday morning, we visited Erica's daughter who lives nearby, then went to Gödöllö where Daisy has lived for twelve years. Gödöllö cannot be transliterated in English; in French it is pronounced "Gueudeuleu".

In Gödöllö, we visited another of Daisy's friend who lives in the same street where Daisy had her house.

Then we went back to Budapest to have lunch with one of my nephew and his girlfriend who recently moved from Paris to Budapest. He is the son of one of my first cousin, from my father's side. He is an artist (drawing, sculpture, ceramics, but no painting) who lives from his art. We had lunch in a nearby café.

We left our suitcases at their apartment, then took the metro to meet with another of Daisy's friend Edit. The Budapest metro was the second one built in the world, after the London Underground. It was inaugurated in 1896 for the celebration of the millennium of the arrival of the Magyar people in what is now Hungary.

We met with Edit in a wonderful Tea Room called Gerbeault that is world renown. After tea and cakes, and walking around, we went back to get our suitcases and Daisy's sister Ili took us to another wonderful café in Budapest, located in a bookstore, where you can also buy wine. We met there with the rest of the family, including Ili's three children.

Then, we said our good byes to Daisy's and Ili's children and went to Ili's apartment to spend the night.

This morning, at 6:30 AM, Ili drove Daisy to the airport. She is flying back to Miami. Ili will drive me to the airport at 11 AM, to go back to Paris. I will work again this week at the Paris office and go back to Miami this Friday.

As you can see, I was very busy these last three days, and I expect to have a lot of e-mails to read on Monday morning! But spending this week in Hungary, meeting with Daisy's family and seeing many new things in Daisy's country was wonderful. Her family welcomed me with open arms.

We don't know when we will be back in Hungary, probably not this year.

Celebration of Daisy's father 80th birthday

Yesterday night, the celebration of Daisy's father 80th birthday took place in the restaurant "Tettye Vendéglő", on the heights of Pécs.

We were nineteen at the dinner, the two parents, the three daughters, their SOs, the seven grandchildren, two of their SOs and two parents of two of those SOs.

This was a very good and very enjoyable dinner and everybody looked very happy to be together, which does not happen often as Daisy and her children live in Canada, Scotland and now the United States.

Before the dinner, many pictures were taken in the parents' house, including one that attempted to reproduce one taken exactly twenty years before of the grand parents and the grandchildren.

As the best rating in the Michelin restaurant guide: "vaut le voyage" (this is worth a trip).

A piano concert in Pécs

I was able to work for two an a half hours this morning. Daisy's brother in law, who lives 300 meters from Daisy's parents, let me use his Internet in his house.

This evening, we went to listen to a piano concert with two young pianists, still studying in Budapest, one of them being Daisy's nephew, Adam. They played piano pieces by Scarlatti, Bartok, Scriabin, Rachmaninoff and Liszt. The concert took place in the amphitheater of the art high school where the two pianists were students.

There were around thirty people in the amphitheater, including twelve from Adam's family. It was quite an enjoyable event.

Geocaching in Pécs, Hungary

Yesterday, I decided to look for some geocaches here in Pécs. And I discover that there was one less than 100 meters from Daisy's parents house. So, we went there yesterday afternoon with Daisy and her father. Daisy found the cache very easily. And I took a picture of Daisy with the cache in hand with her father.

Later, I went to get another cache within walking distance of the house. I found on the map the streets I needed to follow to get there. These were narrow streets, called in Hungarian "dülö". But I had not realized that it was very steep: the slope was announced to be 30%! In fact, it was forbidden to climb, but not to descend this particular dülö.

In any case, I got this second cache, and I did my exercise at the same time.

Hungary is the fourth country where I have found geocaches, after Canada, France and the United States.

Driving a Trabant in the hills near Pecs

This afternoon, Daisy's brother in law, Beci, drove us to visit his his parents in their week-end house in the hills near Pecs, the city in Hungary where we are staying in Daisy's parents house.

There we ate "palacsintak", similar to "crêpes" in French (thin pancakes).

Then, Beci's father let me drive for 15 minutes his Trabant, a car that became famous in the western world after the end of the Iron Curtain. We went to a village called Szabolcs and back, in very bad and muddy roads. Driving the Trabant was not unlike driving Citroen "2 chevaux" in the 70's.

I was expecting an original two stroke engine in the Trabant, that was famous for exhausting a lot of smoke. However, it had been replaced by a Volskwagen engine, probably because the original engine was too polluting.

As Daisy says: "You cannot have it all".

Travelling in Hungary

I left Paris this morning and arrived in Budapest, Hungary, at noon. Daisy was born in Hungary. Her family is gathering to celebrate her father's eightieth birthday.

Her sister Ili was waiting for me and drove me to her apartment. Later, she went back to the airport to get Daisy's daughter Agi and her fiance Javier, who came from Edinburgh where they live.

Around 5:30PM, Daisy's other sister Gabi arrived with her husband Beci and Daisy that arrived from Miami.

Gabi and Beci then drove us to Pecs, some 200 kilometers south of Budapest, where they live and where Daisy's parents also live.

Later, Daisy's two sons, Peter and Gabor, arrived at 9:00PM from Vancouver. They will stay for several days in Budapest, with Agi and Javier.

Everybody will be in Pecs Tuesday night and the official celebration will be on Wednesday.

I am able to connect through the Internet with my Windows laptop, but not with my Linux one. I will probably be better connected from time to time during the week I am staying in Hungary. So, not much work will be done this week.

Continuous testing

The software produced by the Company is managed and updated daily. It is also provided to the customers on a number of computing platforms. The platforms include of course the diverse versions of Microsoft Windows and several flavors of GNU/Linux, but also more exotic platforms such as VMS IA64, for example.

To check that the software is working properly, it is built every night on all these platforms and a test suite of several thousands tests is also ran every night.

Results of these tests is sent by e-mail to a number of engineers of the Company. I personally received several dozens of these messages. Most of the "regressions" are not real ones and the fix is usually to modify or to specialize the expected output of the test.

Building and testing continuously on all platforms reduce considerably the time to produce a release, although producing a release involves still a lot of work.

New hotel in Paris

In Paris, I usually stay in an hotel near the Company's office, not far from the Saint-Lazare train station.

This time, I have decided to test a new hotel, less than 200 meters from the office, in rue d'Athènes, the Villathéna (their web site www.villathena.com is entirely in Macromedia flash!!!)

For me, the two main features of an hotel are silence and darkness. I must say that the Villathéna is pretty good in this domain.

The curtains are good. I did not hear any noise from inside the hotel. In particular, the heating system is very quiet.  And there is not much traffic in the street.

For the last two nights I have spent there so far, I have been awaken at 7:30 AM by the garbage truck. This is not too bad.

The rooms are very clean and modern. I will recommend this hotel to my colleagues.

Arrived in Paris

I took a taxi to go to MIA (Miami International Airport) at 3:30PM. When I arrived at the airport at 4:00PM, I realized that I had forgotten my passport at home. So, with the same taxi, I went back home, got my passport and then back to MIA. An expensive mistake ($100).

I was at the gate at 5:15PM, for a departure at 6:10PM.

In fact, we left the gate 30 minutes late, as we needed to wait for a group of 15 years old girls from Honduras who had a late connection.

Just behind me were a French couple with a one year old girl. I was afraid that the little girl would prevent me to sleep, but she did behave most of the night. The teenage girls, being excited to go to Paris for the first time I imagine, were much more noisy!

I did not sleep very much during the flight, but I never sleep well in an airplane, so no surprise here.

Even though we were late to depart, we were at the gate at Paris CDG on time at 9:00AM. And I was at the Company's Paris office at 11:00AM.

Travelling to Paris tonight

I am going to Paris tonight. I'll arrive tomorrow Monday, February 7th, at Paris CDG.

I will work the whole week at the Paris office of the Company.

I will also visit my family, specially my mother, and some of my friends from the French Naval Academy, that I have known for more than 40 years.

Next Saturday, I will travel to Hungary, the native country of Daisy. She will travel directly from Miami the same day. Her father is going to be 80 years old and the whole family will be there, including Daisy's three children who will come from Vancouver and Edinburgh.

In Hungary, where I will stay for a week, I am not sure when I will be able to connect to the Internet.

In two weeks, I will return to Paris, work four more days at the Paris office and come back to Miami Friday, February 25th.

Mail delivery on Saturday

I recently realized that the mail was distributed here in Miami.

Canada Post stopped delivering mail on Saturdays in 1969. When I was living in Halifax, Nova Scotia, in 1979-1982, it was already the case: no mail on Saturday.

Daisy tells me that in Hungary too, there is no mail on Saturday.

Up to yesterday, I was convinced that there was no mail on Saturday in France too, but after verification, I learned that the mail was still distributed on Saturday in France. However, in France, newspapers are often distributed by mail, specially in the country. Suppressing mail on Saturday would mean: no week-end newspaper distribution.

I still believe that suppressing mail distribution on Saturday in the United States would save money. And the United States Postal Service desperately need to save money.

Some mail order businesses, such as Amazon, do not agree with this position, saying that it would not be good for customers. But, as I said, this is what has already been the case in Canada for more than 40 years, and Amazon is doing well there.

Debugging problems remotely

Usually, when a customer finds a problem in one of the Company product, he is able to send us a small setup that reproduces the problem. We call this a "reproducer".

This allows us to reproduce the problem in-house and to find a solution.

Sometimes the customer is unable to reduce the problem in a small setup, but he is able to send us his own large setup. Then, either we construct ourself a small reproducer, or we debug the problem with the large setup.

However, there are cases when, for security reasons, the customer will not send us his setup, but will only describe the symptoms. This is when we need to debug the problem remotely.

We usually do that by asking questions by e-mail. All e-mail exchanges with the customer is logged and distributed to every developer in the Company. So, any developer may intervene in the conversation to help solving the problem.

When it is difficult to explain by e-mail, we use the phone. But we try to avoid this as phone conversations are not tracked and it is very easy to forget to summarize the conversation in an e-mail.

I recently solve a problem by remote debugging. I had to phone the customer once for fifteen minutes and exchange about 10 e-mails before I figured out what the problem was. Then, I was able to create a very small reproducer and to solve the problem.

Solving such difficult to find problems is very gratifying.

Importing a car in the United States

We had a lot of problem to solve when we imported Daisy's car, a 2009 Nissan Rogue, in the United States.

First, we were not prepared and we did not check what we needed to do to have the car legally imported. So, on November 30th, we were stuck at the border because we did not have the proper paperwork.

When importing a private car in the United States, you either need a certification by the manufacturer that the car is OK to be imported (I don't remember the details), or you need a registered importer to do the certification for you.

We were unable to get the proper paperwork from Nissan Canada, as they were already closed in Ontario when we phoned them. So, we needed a registered importer. We found one in Alberta. We had to drive back 60 km (with all our furniture in the U-Haul trailer) and we had to pay 400 dollars.

Finally, we were allowed to cross the border around 8PM. Because of this car problem, I believe that the border patrol forgot about our furniture and did not ask us any question about it.

Getting a US insurance is a prerequisite to have a Florida license plate. As the Canadian insurance expired on January 31st, Daisy did not want to get a US insurance before the end of January. In retrospect, it was a mistake as the Florida rules is that the change to a Florida license plate should be done within ten days. But nobody asked us anything. I guess they are used to see Canadian cars in Florida.

We went to two different insurance companies that either quoted outrageous prices, or asked us papers we did not have. Finally, we called Geico and the process was very smooth and the price was not too high.

To get a Florida license plate, you go to a private "Tag Agency". We first went to the closest one on a Saturday morning. After queuing for one hour, we were told to go to the DMV for the car to be inspected.

Thinking I was smart, I went on the DMV web site and I thought that we only needed a VIN verification form. Such a verification can be done by a police officer and we have a police station not far from our apartment. So, we went to the police station during lunch break, got our VIN verification form signed by a friendly police officer and went back to the TAG Agency, where there was no line on weekdays.

This was a fiasco. We were told that the form was not the right one and that we needed to go to the DMV. So, I phone the DMV and were told that indeed the car needed to be inspected by a DMV inspector. The owner did not need to be present. So, I went the next morning and the car was inspected and I got the signed form. Back to the Tag Agency at lunch time for the third time.

This time, we got our license plate. However the price of the plate is outrageous: US$320 for the default license plate. Adding the licensing fees, the county fees and the Tag Agency fees, we had to pay US$435!

Daisy says that it was the most expensive license plate she has ever bought.

How I was perceived by my children

When I started to work at home for the Company, my children were between 16 and 22 years of age.

My daughters Petunia and Elisabeth were worried by this work move. They did not understand how a business that was producing only free software could be sustainable. I had to reassure them several times that the Company was very healthy and had never lost money from its creation.

Without consciously realizing it, they had the impression that working at home on a computer was not "real" work. So, I must have a lot of free time, and as I was at home the whole day, could I do this or that for them during the day? I had to explain that I was not to be disturbed during my working hours, even though they were very flexible.

When their friends were asking them what kind of job I had, they had a hard time explaining it. At some point, Petunia told me that she was now answering that she did not know exactly what I was doing, because when she did, her friends did not believe her. Some of them had even said jokingly that I must be a spy.

No, I am not a spy. But you don't have to believe me.