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My three daughters were born in China, so this story of gross incompetence and arrogance strikes close to home:

Sandi Sheldon and her husband traveled to China to adopt their daughter Hannah. After finalizing the adoption, her husband was hospitalized, and then died of complications related to his diabetes. This is a horrible situation, to be sure, but is made even worse by the fact that the US consulate in Guangzhou is now refusing to issue her daughter an entry visa for the US. The consulate insists that she must submit new visa paperwork, and says that they cannot make any guarantees that the visa for her new daughter (which was already approved once) will actually be approved again.

More details available here.

The family is asking for assistance in the matter - a call to Sandi's representatives in the House and Senate. Many times, in situations like this, the only thing that results in any real activity to resolve the issue is pressure from an elected official. If your a US citizen, and you have the time to read up on the story, please take a few minutes more to contact Sandi's representatives and your own representatives to let them know you expect to see this issue resolved quickly.

Via the Geek Etiquette blog, I came across a link to a request for donations of "gently pre-loved technical books" to help the he local IT users group of Vanuatu build a lending library. The island nation of Vanuatu is, as the request states, "a bloody long way from anywhere", and technical books are hard to find.

Over the past few months, I've been eying my shelves, and thinking that it was time to cull the herd anyways. I usually end up taking a box or two down to the local library; in that case, one or two books may make it onto the shelves, while the rest end up occupying space until the next used-book sale fund raiser. While I don't begrudge the library my modest contribution, this time around I think I'll ship my "pre-loved" technical books off to someone who will really appreciate them.

Update: More detailed information can be found on the Technical Books For Vanuatu wiki page at Infotrope.

The Laws of Slashdot #21 - proposal of Timster's Law:

In every argument about the iPod, someone will eventually resort to bringing up a product that is not available, either because it was discontinued or hasn't been released.

I was thinking about non-technical interview questions for software developers this morning, and came up with the above. I'll freely admit that, in and of itself, it's a useless question. So someone says, "I'm a tinker!" - great. Why would you say that you're a tinker, a tailor, a soldier, or a spy? How would you map these arbitrary labels onto software development? What does your choice say about your thought processes, development persona and perceptions?

Is a tinker a one-shot, McGyver-type developer, or the mecahnic that can patch together a solution to just about any problem? Is a tailor someone who crafts elegant, personalized solutions, or someone who takes off-the-shelf components and cuts them to fit? When you think of soldier, do you think of someone doing their job and following orders, or a scout sent to search out the enemy and find a path for others to follow? Is a spy someone who examines competing products, or who researches upcoming technologies that might impact your development team?

What are you - tinker, tailor, soldier, or spy?

Are there any other interview questions of this sort that you've encountered or that you like to ask when you're on the other side of the table?