It’s been over a month since I had my first phone interview with Google, but I’ve finally got a second one set up for Monday the 19th. It took more than a few emails to prompt the recruiter to do this, but I’m glad that it’s finally happening.
Most companies are wrapping up their intern hiring by this time, so I wanted to make sure that I had a backup plan in case Google didn’t come through. I interviewed for a few positions at IBM over break and got two job offers that sound interesting and challenging. Both want a response by this Friday. I’m not willing to let those go in order to chase a Google internship that may not happen, so I’ve let the Google recruiter know that I’m on a tight time schedule in hopes that she can find me a group within the week.
I’m not sure how the intern hiring process works at Google. The recruiter mentioned that it can take anywhere from “one week to two months” to find an appropriate match, and that matches are made based on “intern experience, skills, and interview feedback.” The emails that she sends make it sound like they want to hire me, but they’ve really let the ball drop these past few weeks. I think that they must be busy trying to hire people to fill full-time positions. I also wonder if maybe this process would have gone faster if I had applied for an internship out in California, where they have more of their workforce.
Either way, I’ve got another week until I have to make a decision. Both options have their merits. If I work at IBM, I can live at home for free and hang out with all of my friends. I would give all that up, though, to have the chance to live in New York City and meet a whole new set of people. I think I’ll be happy no matter which way it goes, but I’ll be keeping my fingers crossed anyway…
Update: The second interview went alright. There were more abstract math questions this time, more emphasis on algorithms rather than data structures, although there were a few questions about trees and lists at the beginning. Once again, the interviewer was really interested in hearing my thought process, so I tried to think out loud as I was solving the problems.
I am relatively new to TextMate, having been converted from Emacs less than a year ago. Emacs (pictured below) has extensive support for coding in VHDL. I was quite surprised, then, when I learned that there is no VHDL bundle available for TextMate. It turns out that both VHDL and Verilog (the two most popular hardware description languages) are on the bundle request list.
When I think about this more, it makes sense. The Macintosh is not the platform of choice for hardware designers, who are probably using UNIX or Linux. The VHDL simulation software that we use in school only runs on Windows, but there are some command-line simulation tools such as GHDL that have been ported to run on Mac OS X.
I’m considering writing my own bundle, which would be a good excuse to buy that new TextMate book that I’ve been wanting. Syntax highlighting and commonly used snippets/declarations would be the main priority, followed in the future by GHDL integration. Of course, I would add the bundle to the Macromates SVN repository once it was in a useful state.
If you got here from Google, what functionality would you like to see in a TextMate VHDL bundle?
The University of Rochester is trying to develop a new graphic identity, and a huge part of that is to create a new logo. They are replacing the monochromatic, somewhat outdated seal and crest that are used very inconsistently on many campus letterheads.
The five finalists for the new logo have been selected from over 100 initial ideas. The shield has been updated but still retains many of the important elements of the old logo: “Meliora,” the motto, meaning “Always Better,” the three divisions of learning, and the dandelion, which is an important school symbol. The goal for the logo is to look unique, but dignified, and to signal that UR is a “world-class research institution.”
Personally, I like the crest on the second logo, but I like the typography on the first. The name fits inside a clean rectangle, and the word “Rochester” is emphasized without having to be disproportionately larger than the first part of the name.
Which logo do you like best and why? Leave a comment here, and be sure to take the official survey so that your vote can be counted.
Recent Comments