Category Archives: Thought

Site “Birds of Kazakhstan” has moved

One of my favorite sites – “Birds of Kazakhstan” (btw – site I support, to the best of my ability) has migrated again… The new Url is: https://kz.birding.day/

So, please welcome new “Birds of Kazakhstan” site.

Meantime, at the moment, the site hosted 100+ members, who created 2400+ blog posts, uploaded 250K pictures of 500 photographed species out of 524 registered in Kazakhstan.

The original “Birds of Kazakhstan” url: https://birds.kz/ is still in place, but it hosts “Birds of Kazakhstan Best Pictures” now.

Why we study foreign languages

I know that my country – the country where I was born and grew up, the country where my parents gave me everything – from first sip of milk to education and cultural upbringing, the country where I got my friends – this country is the best country in the world. But wait… Did you say “the world”? What is the world? Is it something where other people live? Do those people live their own ways and speak their own languages? Do they love their countries and their culture?

Of course, we know that there are other countries (we use internet-connected computers and smartphones). We probably heard/use words like Gastarbeiter, automobile, opera. But did you know they all came from different other languages to our language. Now what are the other languages and why do we learn foreign languages? I would say there are two main reasons.

The first one is just a practical reason that came from the past – knowing a foreign language helps you make more money. International trade is an essential part of the world economy and impossible without communication. So the ability to communicate in different languages simply gives you an advantage – an ability to do thing not everybody can do – and an opportunity to earn more.

The second reason lies more in the cultural or cognitive field. Simple example: How do I know that The Hamburgeris is tasty? Only because I tried other food and I can compare. The same with languages. “Wer fremde Sprachen nicht kennt, weiß nichts von seiner eigenen” – which means “Those who do not know foreign languages do not know anything about their own” stated the famous German poet and scientist Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.

And that is so true. I just started understanding it because I just started studying foreign language. And the more I learn it – the more I like it. The world is diverse. And that’s the beauty of it. And that diversity is expressed via languages. Each language is unique and beautiful as it absorbs all historical and cultural legacy of a nation.

So, knowing other languages not only benefits us with more opportunities and perspectives, but makes us more tolerant, open-minded, intelligent and creative.

Essay: My future profession

Change is live.  Static is death. Everything and everybody must change for live. The moment you stop developing – you are out. That’s true for everything starting from plants and animals. For human being that’s also true, but a little different. We are not competing for food any more. As a social creatures we want to be a part of the society, we need to be respected, recognized, useful. And that is done via job, via profession we choose.

In average we spent 8 hours a day at work. Some people might think that work time is distracted from our live because only after work you can have fun spending money hard earned during the work time when you have to do something unpleasant just to be able to do what you really want to do after work. Miserable and pitiful people they are. Eight hours a day is a decent part of our life. I do not want to waste that time. I want to enjoy that time. How do I enjoy that time? Choosing a profession that I love. 

In a modern world one of the biggest problem mankind facing is a human health. And that is where I want to work. I know, that’s not easy. In order to be successful in the healthcare field, I need to pose certain skills and abilities. One of the essential skills is an ability to love people. I must be able to treat and respect my clients in order to maintain their trust and support. As well as readiness and acceptance. I have to be precise and confident in my actions. I have to be able to accept the consequences if something goes wrong. There may be times when an emergency occurs and the environment gets chaotic. But, on the other hand, what could be better, what could be more demanded and rewarding then help people live healthier lives? 

in the middle…

It happened in the middle of 1990-x. I just started to work on software company in Almaty as a computer engineer. The company had a customer in the city of Kustanai. I was sent to Kustanay to solve some problem.
It was winter. Winters in the north-Kazakhstan are pretty cold. Business-trip turned-up a little longer than I expected. At the end, day of flight home came. By this time I had run-out of money and worm clothes.
A Little digress from the topic. I used to travel a lot – by plane, by train and even by ship. I used to be petty experienced traveler. What I do not like at all – is crowds and queues. But when you are travelling by plane, you have to be in queues and among the crowd. You have to stay in the row before check-in, then before security, customs, passport control etc. When boarding announces – everybody rush to the gate and stand at their feet half an hour in the row. Usually in such a situation I sit down somewhere near and wait until everybody is boarded, then, among the couple of the same calm as myself, I get on the plane.
But that time something went unusual. I had been waiting on the bench, and thinking of home. And when boarding was announced, I decided not to wait until the very end, but rushed among the others to the gate. There was no bus. All passengers had to walk across the take-off field, at night, at cold, when the wind knocked you down. Again, I was not first, but was not last one.
The plane was Yak-40, a little jet, designed for 50 seats. The entrance was at the back side of the plane. Convertible back door serves as a stairs when got back. I got on the plane, took my seat and then heard a noise from the back door. A flight attendant, strong woman, blocked access to the plane, standing in the doorway. I was heard something like “Stop, get out of plane. We have no free seats more.”
Passengers were trying to climb. There was almost a fight. A man in the uniform – a second pilot – stout man – hurried to help the flight-attendant. They managed to push people out and closed the door. The plane took off. I was sitting in my seat, in the warm cabin, on the way home, thinking of people who had stayed behind, along, in the middle of the airfield, in the cold night.

Hair Care

One I decided to grow hair… It was just for the sake of experience – I always wanted to see “what if…”. Do I have split ends? What is my hair type? How to brush? etc… Long story short – I grew hair…

I thought all that marketing tricks like “this shampoo is only for that type of hair” or “you should use conditioner after shampoo” do not make sense. Honestly, I thought all these hair care products are just an instrument to swindle money. I did not know that I need to dry my hair…

Lucki me, I have a friend who is a professional hair stylist. She’s in her business for 20+ years, and she with her husband recently moved to Minnesota and opened a beauty studio in Ridgedale center in Minnetonka. So I got some useful advices.

But what’s the best is that they have a hair care online store where you can find hair care products from top professional brands – Alterna, Aluram, BaByLiss, Global Keratin,
Hempz, JBH, Keratherapy, Keratin Complex, Matrix Biolage, Milbon, Moroccanoil, Redken, STMNT, Verb etc. I recommend.

References

Виртуальные страны

Почему бы не сделать виртуальные страны?Идея в том чтобы люди могли не сходя с места выбирать в какой стране жить.
Ситуация, когда общество расколото на две половины и каждая часть твёрдо стоит на своём и не желает идти на компромиссы напоминает мне что-то среднее между анекдотом когда два ковбоя бесплатно дерьма наелись и басней крылова “Лебедь, рак и щука”.
Я понимаю, если бы например одна партия имела перевес допустим в 80%, то она бы победила и вся страна, включая проигравшие 20% – забыли бы на 4-8 лет все обиды и вместе стали идти к светлому будущему, сообща и согласнованно строить новое лучшее общество.
Но ведь ситуация такая, что большого перевеса ни у кого нет уже долгое время. Страна разделена на две равные части и если одна выигрывает – то это не значит что другая соглашается с курсом – наоборот, другая остаётся при своих идеях, саботирует всё что только можно.
Получается чуть ли “Мы старый мир разрушим до основания а затем, мы наш мы новый мир построим. Кто был никем тот станет всем” каждые 4-8 лет.
Так почему бы каждой из этих половин не жить по тем законам, которые им нравятся? В нашем современном мире это должно быть технически осуществимо. Каждый человек раз в 4 года выбирает, по каким законам он хочет жить.
Если хочет, например, высокие налоги на бизнес, низкие налоги на зарплату, бесплатное образование, хорошую социальную защиту, ограничение на владение оружием и больше гражданский свобод – пусть живёт по законам виртуальной страны №1.
Если человек хочет запретить аборты и ЛГБТ браки, облегчить доступ к оружию, дорогую медицину и образование – пусть живёт в виртуальной стране номер два.
Тогда каждая виртуальная страна не будет тратить деньги на “разрушить старый мир и строить новый” каждые 4 года, а будет твёрдо идти в будущее своим курсом. Это же сколько денег можно сэкономить!
А конечная цель то у стран – одна – чтобы люди жили лучше. Средства достижения – разные. Вот и посмотрим, какая страна быстрее пойдёт к светлому будущему.
На возражение – “но ведь конкуренция между партиями – важная часть демократии и мы все видим к чему приводит партийные монополизм” – отвечу что а) Конкуренция не исчезает, а наоборот становится более честной, так как люди будут выбирать лидера не по голословным популистским заявлениям а по делам. Т.е. люди будут голосовать кошельком а не бумажками. иб) Монополизм (единоначалие, автократия) не всегда плохо. Плохо, когда это превращается в застой и отсутствие обратной связи на долгое время. Плохо, когда население не может “голосовать ногами”. В проектном менеджменте по-моему есть такое что демократия нужна на этапе выбора пути, а вот на этапе исполнения нужна “твёрдая рука”.
Я понимаю, что есть такие хитрецы, которые пока хорошо зарабатывают и не болеют – будут жить в одной стране, а в случае чего захотят переметнуться. Это можно сделать через “доплати”. В технологически развитой стране, где все транзакции электронные – это можно делать автоматически.
Трудности, конечно могут возникнуть например с внешней политикой или с армией. Полицейский же не должен думать – в какой виртуальной стране живёт человек прежде чем его защищать. Но вообще я думаю что все технические моменты можно решить, было бы желание.
Можно даже не две виртуальные страны сделать – а больше. Можно даже сделать мини-виртуальные страны и двойное – тройное виртуальное гражданство. Например, по отношению к внешней политике я выбираю страну В1, по здавоохранению я живу в стране Б5, и чту гражданский кодекс страны Г7.
И не обязательно в рамках одной физической…?

IT Certifications: how much do we need them?

Scott Hanselman at Ignite (session 9/23/2020) said: if you are at the beginning of your career, certification is important, but if you have experience – experience matters, not certs. In other words – certification shows what you learned, experience shows what you know.

Does certification prove what you know?
It does in some ways, but I would not rely heavily on it. The reason is below…

To get certification in IT you’d need to pass one or more exams. To pass exam you need to prepare for the exam. Just knowing the subject – even with experience – is not enough to pass exam. You need to prepare specifically for this exam (there are specific courses, materials, tools etc.). Why? It’s not a subject experts who prepare exams.

People who prepare exams – are specialists in building tests and exams. What they do to create test questions – in simplified way – they read documentation trying to find key points and convert affirmative sentence from manual to a question. Let say the documentation says “The most important aspect of securing data is encryption.” So they put it like

What is the most important aspect of securing data? Options:
– Backup
– Encryption
– Authentication and authorization
– Access Control

or like this:

What is encryption? Options:
– The process of converting information or data into a code
– A way to conceal information by altering it
– A form of data security in which information is converted to ciphertext
– The most important aspect of securing data
– One of the aspects of securing data

So, having 10 years experience in cyber security – do you think you’ll pass such exam?

So to pass exam you need to memorize the right answers. If you know the subject – it helps. Less to memorize. But if you do not – you can just memorize answers and pass exam.

I know, vendors work hard on exams, they do not want to loose reputation. Exams contain not only such questions but some really good questions, and even complex scenarios where you spend first 10 minutes just trying to wrap your head around all the details… but still…

Does certification help if you already know the subject?

Definitely yes. Knowing the subject from practice – allows you to do the job – in most cases in some specific ways. But preparing for the exam – allows you to understand the whole big picture. Combination of your experience “how it works in fact” with the theory knowledge “how it should be done” is what you need to be an expert in your area.

So, the bottom line

Id’ say just certification does prove your competency.
But it definitely adds value to experience.