James left me...

So James has been and will be gone all week on vacation. Thanks buddy...

So, I've been working on a dashboard for this software project we're working on. Other than that, nothing too exciting going on really...



Still doing the healthy (er) thing. I've discovered these delicious chicken caesar wraps...D-Lish...


Truck on fire...

Day Whatever...

So I'm not going to be posting about what happens every day. It's too much work and I don't really think anyone really cares anyway...

I've been going to a lot of meetings lately. It's amazing how much time is spent talking about a project and planning the next meeting. Let's just get this stuff done! But, we do have to work with different people in different departments, so, that's just how it goes...

I've also been doing a lot of intern stuff, which includes more factory tours, financial planning stuff, get togethers, etc. We're all starting to kind of get to know each other. Even though they all kind of work near or with each other, and I am not really near them at all...

So I'm still working on the server project and the software projects. That's about it. Just making progress. Oh, this will be cool... In a week or two we'll be working with an outside firm to help us generate concepts on some of the stuff we're working on. They plan on coming to our office and brainstorming with us. That will be cool to not only get an outside perspective, but also to meet new people and make new relationships. It will be interesting to see how a consultancy works with such a large corporation like HP.



GGOOOAAALLLL!!!!! Real productive here guys...

You can seriously hear the Vuvuzelas from down the hall...

Days 21-23

James was on vacation this Monday and Tuesday. Belgie was out Monday as well. I was kind of bored without them here.

I finally got an EZ Tag for the toll road. Man this thing saves a lot of time and frustration. The lines can get pretty long waiting for change at 5:30 on a Friday. Plus, the toll is a little cheaper.





Met with James. We went over my progress on the many different projects I'm working on. We're going to have a weekly update session to keep things moving along.

Went on a tour of some more of the facilities here with some fellow interns.
It was pretty awesome. We got to see the Factory Express Facilities where they assemble and package servers and racks built to custom order. It's somewhat of an assembly line. Each person assembles the server from all the different parts. Then, it moves to testing stations. Once passed, it is either shipped out, or sent next door to be placed in racks with other servers. It's a 24-7 process. There are also alot of young workers there. At first, I thought a bunch of high school kids were on a field trip or something, but no, they were workers.



We also took a look at what they call PODs. It's basically a portable data center inside boxes the size of shipping containers (and, sometimes they are actually made from them). These things are pretty awesome. You can just leave them sitting on the trailer and move them whenever you need.



A fun little graphic I threw together real quick...

Days 16 - 20

Man, I've been slacking. Sorry...I've actually been pretty busy...it's nice...

So James and I started development on an iPhone app. It's pretty cool stuff. I'll get to learn how to code apps for the iPhone and hopefully have a kickass app for my portfolio. I found an e-book online (for free) that gets you started on coding. It'll take me a little while to make the transition, but I'll get there. I'm used to coding websites in XTML, CSS, and Javascript. That's actually what the first round of prototypes are going to be made in. Since James and I are both very farmiliar with web coding, we can put together ideas really quickly. I'd love to show you what we're working on, but I'm affraid I can't here. If you really want to see, e-mail me or see me in person and we can talk about it...



So, that's pretty much what we've been working on all week. Also, we ditched the cubicles pretty much all week and went down to the "Dungeon" or "Lair" as we call are calling it...It's a lot easier to collaborate and get stuff done down there. Plus, we can listen to music and be ourselves...




Took a tour with some other interns of some of the factories here on campus. It was pretty awesome. We got to see their rapid prototyping labs, as well as their testing labs. Here, they make mockups or change current designs, then test them in different areas. They have a kickass sound proof room. When you walk in and they close the door, it's completely silent and you actually feel off balance. Your ears are mostly responsible for your balance, and since there is virtually no pressure coming from outside sources, your body doesn't know what to do.

Anyway, they have all kinds of sweet machines that test altitude, temperature, humidity, sound, vibrations, gravity, dropping force, etc. So, we got to see how all that works behind the scenes.

I tried to snap a few photos wihtout getting caught. Wasn't sure if I was supposed to or not, but did anyway...








Went to lunch at BJ's again (by myself...I know, but I'm cool with it). Like I said before...it's ta die foruh!

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Had an Intern Scavenger Hunt on Friday. It was ok. Got to get out of the cubicle for a few hours. Most of the interns are either engineers or marketing or something like that. And, most of them are SUPER nerdy...So, we don't really have much in common. They're also pretty socially awkward, but I try to converse anyway...Oh yeah, we also got free food, so, that's a plus...

We did a lot of running around the campus, but we got to see some parts of the compound we probably wouldn't have seen anyway, so that was cool.



Go RED TEAM! (We lost...like last place lost...oh well...)Like seriously though, some of these kids are so hard-core about some of this stuff...it's not even funny...

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They're always out of the peanut M&M's :( I guess it's a good thing, because that's really all I want out of there anyway...

Daym 13 + 14 + 15

Sorry to my readers (all 4 of you) for slacking...

I don't even remember anymore what went on last week. I'll try to remember...

We had an Intern Retreat. It was kind of lame. Farther North on 249 to a park. Los Cucos catered. James met me there later. Not too many people came. Everyone just kind of sat around and listened to Nickleback...Great...

Some prizes, but we left before they gave those out.

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So James and Belgie decide it was a good idea to bring me out Thursday night. Bad. Bad idea...Long story short...It was a crazzzy night. We kind of had a little too much to drink. Had to be at work the next day. Last time I do THAT on a school night work night...

I was pretty hungover that next day. Had lunch with Dad at BJ's. You have GOT to get the Parmesean Crusted Chicken. Seriously...


So, I don't even remember what I was working at work...I still have to catch you up on LAST week since I've been slacking...

Day 12

Went to "Intern Welcome Day" : an hour and a half long presentation and ice breaking event to meet all the new interns.



Got some free HP branded swag, including a flash drive, coffee mug, some pens, clock, and more...It was kind of boring, but it was nice to meet some other people my age and in my position. There's also a kickoff event this Friday at a local park with food and games. I also get to leave early, so that's a plus!

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I'm definitely the only design intern and the only intern close to design for that matter. Most everyone else is either an engineer, HR, or marketing :(

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After the intern thing, James and I went down to our "Pseudo-Studio" and talked about one of the software projects we are working on...

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James and I also took an early lunch today. His computer is loaded with viruses for some reason, so he had no computer while it was being fixed. What did we do before computers?? So, we went to a Mexican place over on 1960, then went to the Intern Thingy...

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I'm no longer a "Sweet Ass Design"...I've been demoted to just "Sweet Designer"...

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Yes, this is trash...

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Hopefully I'll find someone to play...

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They like to keep crap in the hallways...every single one of them!

Day 11

Today was the first day back from the long Memorial Day Weekend. It was kind of rough getting back into things after the (much needed) time off. The good thing is, however, that my week is only 4 days this week!

Not too much going on today.


Decided to do the whole "Eating Healthy" thing again...

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I sat down with James today to bring him up to speed on where I was at with the server project I'm working on. It was good to finally get some feedback on what I have been working on. We talked about the User Interface and what value I see this device bringing to the user.

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One thing I forgot to mention last week was that I often will go sit with Belgie as he photographs some of the Enterprise Products. Since he has a camera, knows what he's doing, and has done it before, they keep coming back to him to take pictures. This isn't really in his job description, but, being the super nice guy he is, he says yes. It's cool to be able to talk photography with him. He's also into music production and recording, something I used to be very much into...



Speaking of Cameras...She will be mine, oh yes, she will be mine...

Days 8 + 9 + 10

I've been neglecting this blog for the past few days. Sorry about that. Not much has really happened however.




James had been in a conference the whole week and for the whole day, every day. It's for a big software project we've got going on. I didn't really see him all week, except for about an hour where I sat in on the meeting. I got to see the end of the conference where they were going over the findings and where they will be going next. But even then, people still had ideas and wanted to voice their opinions. It's hard to get things done with so many people on a team and from so many different departments. I feel like they really didn't get much accomplished, other than naming the project...



Decided to get out of the office, so I went to Juan and Lefty's for some lunch (alone). They have some pretty awesome chicken enchiladas!



Had a short discussion with a guy in the break room. I explained to him that I was the design intern for the summer, and we talked about Industrial Design. He seemed to not only be very interested in it, but also well versed in what it means to be an industrial designer. While talking with him, I noticed he was making some hot chocolate. There was a big box of the powdered substance right next to the coffee maker with hot water. Since it was free, I decided why not. It's only 94 degrees outside. Hot cocoa + Famous Amos chocolate chip cookies = delicious! Try dipping the cookies in the hot chocolate! Seriously...

I was pretty bored this whole past week. I didn't really see James at all, and I've been needing to bounce some ideas off him, but couldn't. It also didn't help that he decided to work from home Thursday and Friday. If we didn't get to go home at noon on Friday for the long weekend, I think I would have gone crazy!



The long weekend was nice. Got to hang out with the family and go to Beaumont. Went to Lake Livingston and played in the water. It's always nice to get out of town for a while. And, what's even nicer about having Monday off is the four day work week!

Day Sayven

Moved cubicles today!

I'm finally sitting in the design team aisle. I felt kind of like an outcast before. I always had engineer type people walking by thinking, who the hail is this guy? Now, when I have a question or want to bounce an idea off someone, they're right across from me.


James' cubicle directly across from me.


Brooks' cubicle to the left of James. Brooks is mainly in charge of storage (i.e. hard drives, etc.). And, next to him, Belgie, who is mainly in charge of Blade Servers. Keith is on the end after Belgie. Across from him is George, the design manager. I'm not quite sure who's next to me. I don't think that person is ever there.



Had to take this stupid entrance exam today. It's required for all new employees. You have to read company polocies and then they give you scenarios at the end and you have to answer questions. It was super long, but I really didn't have much else to do today anyway, since James was in that meeting all day again.



I'll have to attend some seminar for all new hires next week. I'm sure that will be even more exciting than the online version. But, I think I get some free HP branded stuff :)

I was pretty bored today. Not having James around kind of sucks. I need some more work and I need to bounce some ideas off of him to see if I'm heading in the right direction. I find myself getting bored with the work that I have. I do a whole bunch of concepts, but I can't sit here and force stuff out all day. They need to be developed with the rest of the team.

Anyway, just another day at the office...

Day Six - A New Week

Bored out of my mind today. James has been in a meeting allll dayyy (without me). But, he hopes to include me in that tomorrow (Im sure the meeting will be boring too, but at least I'll get to know what's going on).

Worked some more on the graphics for the software project. I think it's heading in a good direction. Did some more photoshop mockups and a quick after effects sample.

Found it really hard to work today. I guess you could say I have a case of the "Mondays". I sure hope someone's not tracking my internet activity, b/c I'm pretty sure that outweighed my actual work today.



Got in a small fender bender yesterday (my first wreck). Stupid girl turned right from the left lane and I nailed her rear door. I was on my way home from a Sirtified meeting at Agora on Westheimer. I don't know what she was thinking. Didn't call the cops. Barely did anything to Charice(that's my truck's name...don't ask), so I got her info and we went our ways. There was a really cool guys who stopped to be a witness. He saw what happened and was totally on my side. I'm really glad it wasn't bad. Her door was pretty messed up, but her car still driveable. It would have been way more trouble than it was worth to do anything about it for me. Hopefully it doesn't come back to bite me...

Day Five

Pretty slow day until 2:30 when I met with James and Belgie in our room downstairs. We went over the graphical layout and structure of the management software as well as concepts for the hardware project. That lasted about an hour, and then the design team left early and went to Juan and Lefty's for Happy Hour drinks and some pretty good Mexican food. Got to chat it up a bit with the rest of the design team. Went home and relaxed. The rest of the weekend was spent with the family. Indya's graduation + party was Saturday.





Tried to eat healthier today...



Traffic was TERRRRIBLE everywhere...but it was Friday...at Five...


Nice day though for the most part...

Day Four

Man today seems like it has gone so slowwww. Yesterday seems like it flew by. Maybe it's because I seem to be watching the clock more today.

Traffic was good this morning. I was starving this morning, so I took an early lunch, around 11:30 or so.



Lunch + Paper



No meetings today. Maybe thaty's why it seems kind of slow. I actually enjoy being included on meetings and stuff. I like to know as much as I can about what's going on.

James and I went to look at a space downstairs in the Human Factors lab that we want to convert to a studio space (so we can get out of our cubicles and have a place to brainstorm/throw out awesome ideas). It's a nice room with plenty of white board to write/draw on. The only thing is that since it's a human factors research room, one wall has a two way mirror, so when we're in there doing what we do, people can walk by and stare at us and we may never know (not that we'd be doing anything questionable anyway...i hope...).


As for my work today, I've just been continuing on the UI (User Interface) for the management software we're working on. I'm making some progress. Lots of revisions. I already have plenty of ideas. I'll see if James wants to talk about them tomorrow.

I did a little work on the server project today too. Fired up Solidworks and did a little surfacing of all things! I didn't touch it yesterday. I've got this one main idea that I really like and I'm going to do a few variations on it. I hope to show you eventually. I've had all kinds of crazy off the wall ideas, but I've tried to bring them back down to Earth to a more realistic design.

That's really about it. Just stuck in my cubicle and on the computer. I did take a walk around the building to go exploring. I still don't have a feel for the building. It's huge! And, there are more buildings on the site!

Day Three

Had a meeting today to bring me up to speed on a user interface project I will be working on. Conference call to Austin. Pretty cool stuff. It's management software. I'll be working not only on the graphical layout, but how the user accesses the information.




Couldn't stand it. Had to bust out the Mac again. I really really hate trying to hit Apple/Command when I'm on the PC. I either hit the alt key or the windows key. Why do they even have a windows key? It makes so much sense on your hands to put the Apple/Command key right next to the spacebar. Instead, I have to reach all the way over to the ctrl. key on the PC. Even though I have CS4 on the PC, I feel like I can't work at all.




I feel like I'm in an airport every time I come in/out of work.




It's nice to get some natural light in the hallway (even though it's all fluorescents in the cubicle area)





So at 5 today, the fire alarms were going off. I didn't even notice since I had my headphones on. I looked up and the strobes were going off. Everyone started rushing out of the building. I couldn't decide if we HAD to evacuate or if it was just 5 o clock and they were trying to get the hell out oh here. So, I packed my stuff up and left with them. But, getting out of the parking garage was a nightmare!

So What is it That I'm Actually Doing at HP?

Well, I am officially in the "Enterprise User Experience" Department, which means I am working with the team on Graphic User Interfaces mainly, as well as some hardware stuff too. I am here for the summer for a three month paid internship. HP's (massive) campus is up on 249 just North of 1960. The commute is about 40 minutes from my place without traffic, but I'm going out of town when everyone is trying to come in, and vice versa, so it's not too bad.

I'm excited to be able to work on both hardware and software because I'm really interested in User Interfaces and how people access data and interact with devices. How the user interacts with products plays a very important role in the design of the product, and afterall, I am a product designer, so I'm excited to be working on the physical design of these products as well.

I think I'm am going to get a good mix of projects while here at HP and I hope to learn a lot.
So far, so good!

Day 1 + 2

So James (I guess you could call him my boss) e-mails me yesterday wondering if I would like to blog about my experience while at HP. I thought this was an excellent idea. I had thought about doing it before I started here, but got so caught up in getting started that I forgot about it.

I really enjoyed reading Wyatt's Blog while he was in New York at his internship. So, I will try to do the same.

So, this being the third day of my internship, I need to catch you up on the first two days...

Day One was great.

I got settled in with my ID badge (with awesome photo...all you can tell is that I'm a white guy) and my cubicle. Man cubicles suck. They are so boring! Plus, we are designers. Why is the design team separated into little boxes. We need to be in a studio environment where we can actually work as a team. (Ok, first rant, done).








Went to a meeting about some super cool stuff I know you want to know about, but I probably shouldn't tell you about (I'm sure there will be a lot of that).


Had lunch with James and Belgie down in the cafeteria. The food is decent. I mean, it does the job. If you're hungry, you eat it. And, it's pretty reasonably priced (which is something I wasn't expecting).


Went to another meeting. This time, staff meeting. It's for the Designers. It happens every Monday. This is where everyone catches up to speed on everything that is going on.


Back to my cubicle. Slit my rist (only kidding). I'm probably going to be making a lot of corporate world office jokes, and I may seem like I'm having a terrible time, but so far, that is not the case. I actually think I am going to like it here. I just like to comment on the guy who sits by himself at lunch looking completely miserable, thinking "God, I hate my life". I don't want to be that guy.


One super cool project they have me working on is a hardware + software project. It's kind of like a "My First Server". Say you had a small office or even wanted to have a server at your home, this would be the product for you. You could share files and backup to it, and hopefully access it from anywhere in the world. Now, I'll be talking about my thoughts on this as I go on, but already, I think corporate is going down the wrong path. They want it to be very server like, but I really see it as a consumer product. The person buying this isn't going to have any real knowledge of servers. It needs to be completely intuitive and hassle-free. Anyway, more to come on that as we go on. So, I'm super excited about this project.

Day Two...

Now, I'm not much of a writer, so bear with me. And, why is it that Windows doesn't have spell check? That's another thing. I'm totally a member/follower of the Cult of Mac, however, being that I am working for the largest computer company in the world, I'm stuck with their computers, which happen to run Windoze. I'm ok with that. However, I have my Mac and I'm not affraid to use it.

Yesterday, I whipped it out to do a bit of saladworking (Solidworks). We do have the Adobe CS4 suite on our workstations, but it's still Windows. I just feel so lost and unproductive in this OS.














Thanks to a very special lady friend of mine for giving me this sweet bottle for me to sip on cold water all day...