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May 2013 News

May 2013 News Archive

Wed May 1 00:00:00 2013

This is the shadowcat news archive for May 2013.

YAPC NA Draws Closer

There are just 10 days left before the official start of YAPC::NA::2013::Austin which will be attended by Shadowcat's very own Mark Keating (m.keating@shadowcat.co.uk) and Matt S. Trout (mst@shadowcat.co.uk).

We have a very special privilege this year as Mark will be opening the conference with his keynote on the first twenty five years of Perl and Matt will be closing the event with the State of the Velociraptor. These two talks are part of a trilogy around the conference theme of 25 Years of Perl.

The theme has some Dickensian overtones as the organisers have termed the three talks:

Matt will also be giving a talk on Architecture Automation.

If you are attending the event we recommend that you grab Mark or Matt and say hello. It may be wise to join in with the Hallway++ initiative that will once again be running at the event.

Moving Sticks

Throughout the months of May and June Shadowcat Systems will be moving offices.

"What?" We hear you call in genuine horror, 'does this imply that you are leaving the beloved castle from whence you reign?".[1][2]

In short, no.

We will be still based in the wonderful, and historic, Barracks Building which is part of the White Cross Industrial Estate in Lancaster, we are simply moving to better offices in the same building.

So why are we moving, have we outgrown the offices?

Well, yes, and no. The current Shadowcat Offices are easily large enough to accommodate the current staff in the Lancaster region, especially since a larger number of our staff do not work from these offices. The Lancaster office has always been just the principal administrative office.

However there are some new considerations to moving that will give us some advantages.

  • We can fit a new alarm system;
  • The network and power cabling is better laid out;
  • The main road is at the front of the building and the new office at the rear so it should be quieter;
  • We can fit access control on the doorways;
  • The rooms are laid out in a more pleasing manner;
  • There is a small room we can turn into a workshop room for the rising LAMM;
  • The new office has its own small kitchenette;
  • It has its own fire escape door;
  • It is on the ground floor, has a ground floor level fire escape with no step so has disabled access;

All of these mean that we can have a better layout to the office and provide more access for guests and for local meetings such as the LAMM group who meet regularly at our offices.

We have a few pictures of the current look of the office which wil be updated and changed to reflect the work we do moving in. So keep coming back for more views.

The new internal front door

The new internal front door

The rear fire door - ground level access

The rear fire door - ground level access - the fire door is a traditional door from the time of the original Barracks. It is therefore Grade II listed and the tiny vestibule it is in also has an arrow slit - so we can still defend the office in the event of a Zombie Apocolypse

Main Room - a view

Part of the Main Room

The kitchenette and column holding up the roof

The kitchenette and column holding up the roof

The Workshop room with benches

The Workshop Room with benches

[1] Admittedly you probably will not use those exact words, or in fact anything approximating those words, but it is amusing to think you could.

[2] Addendum, as pointed out by my very fine followers this should surely be where, or if feeling foppish in a usually whimsical manner (that surely I am by the tone of the piece) it might be whither (if obtuse and directed at, thither). It should, dear readers, and I could just correct it. However, so much better I think to thank you kind readers and to note here that it is place not time, and that tiredness occasionally wearies us all.