[This was written on 09.08.2005]

 

I only have a few minutes to write as I am sitting in the Austin airport on the way home.

 

I am emotionally, and physically exhausted. I have nothing left... although I need to get back to my normal job, and back to my beautiful wife and daughters who I miss so much.

 

I have spent the last 7 days (and nights) working on a system that my friend, and Microsoft mentor, Jim Carroll and I conceptualized, architected, built, and now deployed. You will see some of the results of our week long 3 - 4 hour a night sleep development session called www.KatrinaSafe.com. We started it on our own time, and started coding throughout the first couple of nights without thinking about how large this would become, or how much of a deep impact it would leave on us.

 

I will not have the time to detail what happened since the first 2 nights at this time, but promise the story is coming soon in my own words. Following is a quick overview:

 

We built a system to identify the evacuees of the Katrina disaster, and match them with loved ones. This is not a bulletin board like the rest of the bunch. This application is comprised of multiple components including a web application that you can enter yourself as an evacuee, send a message to loved ones, and for people to add a missing person inquiry about a missing loved one. The system does a fuzzy match to identify and then sends a voice message (through Speech Server) and/or an email to the Inquiree and Evacuee when a match occurs. We wrote a smart client application that works on Red Cross worker laptops, detects online and offline state, and allows field representatives to add data to the database. Like I mentioned before, there is a speech component that allows people that only have a phone to look for a missing party utilizing our speech technology. It is freakin awesome to get a phone call stating: Hello, this is a message to inform you that the "Missing Person" you are looking for has been found and is at the following Evacuee site. There is a reporting component that will be delivered as well.

 

This could not have been done without the selfless acts of many very talented people who gladly gave up their holiday weekend, and go without decent sleep for many days.  I love working for Microsoft as we have such great people that work here, that really care. I am proud of them all... Jim, Dave, Phil, J, Jim K, and the rest make me so proud of how they just gave and gave regardless of the cost to our families, and our precious "work-life balance".

 

A reporter from eWeek saw J's blog about what we were doing while working on KatrinaSafe. He emailed us and asked if we could do an interview and we reluctantly agreed. It was four of us that were working late and we detailed some of the things that we were doing and why we were doing it. We were so shocked and amazed at how right he got the message. Darryl, thank you so much for telling the story. If you want to read about it, here is the info:

 

Microsoft is bringing the power of its .NET technology to the Hurricane Katrina relief effort, delivering a system to help locate people displaced or missing since the hurricane.