Our resident master of passing these things along, Denis tagged me again so I guess that I’d better fill it out.

I don’t really do New Year’s resolutions, I figure that I’m so horribly broken that I’ll never fix myself so simply. Aside from paying off debts, losing weight, making millions, etc… here are some things I plan to do this year:

Thesis: After what seems like forever, I should be finishing my masters’ degree this year. I wasn’t really feeling the idea of doing the capstone project (I have enough software projects I work on in my free time as it is, don’t really need another!). I also like writing (especially when its’ not crammed into a 7 week course) so I decided to do the thesis. The paper’s going to be on the open source ecosystem. Primarily Java. I could tell you more, but then I’d have to kill you. Or have Chrissie do it 😉

Crummy Web Page Rewrite: I want to rewrite my Crummy Web Page this year, and also move it to a new host. Hoping to redesign using ASP.net MVC, cause it is so damn fun.

Get More Familiar with JQuery: Coming from a windows background web development has always been a bit frustrating for me, but JQuery makes it much less so. I’m hoping to get much better with it. Since I’m working primarily in web development now, these last two are part of an overall effort to become a better web developer.

Silverlight & Web Services: I’ve been playing around with Silverlight, and I’m very impressed. I was always kind of interested in Flash, but didn’t feel like buying some crappy Adobe software to learn it. Now Silverlight gives me a chance to do similar things with good ol’ sea-pound. Learning Silverlight will force me to get better with webservices too.

Kick Informix to the Curb: I will probably lose my mind if this thing isn’t out of my life by the end of the year. Sorry Informix, I guess you were an upgrade from Access when they inexplicably chose to use you in 2001, but you just aren’t getting it done anymore, no matter how much hardware we give you. So I think we should see other people. Don’t cry baby. It’s not you, its’ me. You could do so much better…

I think this’ll probably keep me busy for a while. If not I’m sure I’ll think of something.

If I have to tag something, I’ve still got Mark Smith in my sights from the last time, and I think that George probably has some big plans for 2009 also.