Developer, are you dangerous enough to your neighbours?

[persilj]

Media is almost always talking about "big issues" only (think "cyber espionage networks", for example), even when there would be seemingly "smaller, but important" stories to tell related to security. As a "solo developer" I often have to face the problem that some people try to disturb my thinking and hurt me emotionally - by trying to make lasting associations between irritating things in my surroundings (or nearby) and something that I think, touch or handle while developing. I guess they have their reasons, but they can't be honest.

My favorite development enviroment, Eclipse had started showing "java.lang.OutOfMemoryError: PermGen space" errors. I felt sure that I had "-XX:MaxPermSize" set to defaults, but for some reason it wasn't. It was lower. Now, the PermGen itself is "permanent generation of objects in the VM (Class names, internalized strings, objects that will never get garbage-collected". Notice the part "will never get garbage-collected".

Now, at the very same time I realized that something had changed in the file eclipse.ini I also realized that something had changed in my surroundings: somebody had kicked the trash can, which is normally attached to its place on the other side of the street (partially visible from my window). It was now laying on the asphalt. Somebody had also thrown a beer can on top of the bus stop shelter.

So, basically I had to choose between "make my own hands dirty" because of the trash (container and a single piece of trash) or "wait for somebody else to take care of the issue". The trash can itself was recently taken away by city's Environment services department and it seems that it didn't even have any real use - or then (normal) people just carry their empty water bottles etc. themselves.