Spotlight: Interns to Staff Members - The Metamorphosis

STACIA CHOE

"Honestly, I just needed money for college and I applied - and Jeanie Treichel hired me. I didn't know anything about engineering or Sun Microsystems, except that it was a reputable company making I-don't-know- what. But I got much more than I expected - I thought I would be at the beck and call of some supervisor doing routine filing and answering phones, but I was encouraged to be creative, to learn, to talk to people about their work, and Jeanie encouraged me to sit in on talks, just to get a feel for what kind of research was happening in industry. It was the best job that any high-school student could have had."

"I don't have a `most' memorable experience," she continued, "I think the whole experience was memorable. I really enjoyed how Jeanie, my manager, encouraged us to seek out our own interests - at the time, I really enjoyed making graphics and signs, so she encouraged me to do that, to decorate the bulletin boards. In addition, I was allowed to maintain a website, and that was really exciting considering that the Internet was a new idea back then. But I also remember the social events, the Friday parties, the trip to Angel Island on the ferry, and just the fun and friendship I had with my fellow high school interns."

While referring to Sun's cultural environment, Stacia especially enjoyed how sociable people were - and how people around her were so willing to help and answer her questions, and went "out of their way to demonstrate something to me. I think I felt awkward there because I was only in high school and I was surrounded by PhD's and brains and some really famous people even, but I felt really welcomed and felt instantly comfortable in the friendly environment."

"I know that Sun Labs is also more of a relaxed atmosphere than other parts of Sun, now that I've gotten the chance to work here professionally, but I think Sun in general is known for their employee- first attitude and that definitely made an impact in my choice to work here."

Stacia was "pretty much born and raised here." But she loves California because of the good weather and the diversity of people here. Also, being an engineer in Silicon Valley," she beamed, "there are many opportunities for work."

GRZEGORZ CZAJKOWSKI

Grzegorz Czajkowski, Senior Staff Engineer, received his PhD from Cornell University.

Grzegorz was inspired to come to Sun because of the Java technology and what Sun Labs was doing with it around '97-98. At the time, his most interesting project was Persistent Java - "I was porting it to Windows and started to play with a port to JavaOS."

His most memorable internship experience occurred "when Mario Wolczko took me and Doug Simon on an airplane trip (Mario was the pilot!) Life at Sun was very open, very collaborative. It was an overall very positive experience, and that's why I decided to join Sun. "...but also the opportunity to work with Mick Jordan and Mario Wolczko had a huge impact" on my decision. Learning real software engineering in industrial research labs settings was a bit hard initially -- but then it paid thousand-fold. I knew my way around the company and the Labs, so I was able to hit the ground running."

Something he's proud of since becoming a staff member: "Creating what I think is quite a successful project (Barcelona) and developing with my teammates several really exciting technologies."

"Greg's" most unforgettable conference is the one he couldn't attend and for which he and Laurent Daynes received the Best Paper award -- the IEEE International Conference on Data Engineering (ICDE) held April 2-6, 2001 in Heidelberg, Germany.

In California, Greg enjoys being close to a a great variety of nature, and national parks, and remembers a special Christmas Party in the San Francisco Planetarium/Aquarium.

Churning out more than fifteen conference papers, Greg has also published several technical reports, and has eight patents granted, with more in the pipeline!

NILS GURA

Nils Gura, Member Technical Staff, received his BS in Computer Science from the University of Hamburg, Germany, and his MS in Computer Science from the University of Ulm, Germany.

Nils inquired about an internship at Sun in Germany, where he studied. Since he was mostly interested in research or development - which Sun didn't have in Germany at that time - he was lucky to be put in contact with researchers at Sun Labs in California. That's how he ended up spending eight months as an intern at Sun. What he loved about living in California was the diversity of landscapes, people, weather, and cultures -- especially the friendliness and openness of Sun's employees.

In recalling his most memorable intern experience, Nils said it was "... a rather humorous welcome speech by Sun's CEO Scott McNealy. Scott mentioned his internship experience at a company that made dog food, where his duties included tasting the dog food. He added that even if we didn't like our internship experience, it wasn't necessarily going to hurt our careers!"

Traditional events had an impact on his deciding to stay at Sun: "The Bashes (social gatherings on Friday night), the Intellectual Desserts (a talk series on Tuesday), and events from Sun's intern program. They were (and are!) a great way to meet people and learn about other projects at Sun."

Since becoming a staff member, one of his achievements was "... having the honor to be part of the project that built Sizzle, the world's smallest secure web server. We had a great team, lots of fun, and were able to demonstrate a working prototype and write a conference paper that received a best paper award."

Nils' output has been prolific. To the question, have you written technical reports and filed patent applications, Nils replied: "Many. I have to thank my supervisor at Sun Labs for teaching me how to write technical documents. Since I joined Sun we have written numerous patent applications, papers, and technical reports together."

Continue to Page 3: Dean Long, Tarik Ono, & Krzysztof Palacz >>

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