I really don’t remember all the details of how I met Tim “XMage” Tripcony, but from early on he was always kind to me and a friend of my NotesIn9 screencast.
I remember talking to him probably via email and/or Sametime about a blog post he made on “Fancy Typeahead”. I thought it was brilliant and as like many things Tim was involved with, no one had ever done that before in XPages. I eventually pretty much stole that entire post (with his blessing) and turned it into Episode 24. http://notesin9.com/index.php/2011/02/11/notesin9-24-fancy-type-ahead-in-xpages/
I’m not sure but I THINK I first met Tim in person at the Lotusphere 2010 Opening Party. This was now my second Lotusphere. I was doing NotesIn9 by then so I started to talk to people in the community but I really didn’t know many people “in person”. Just from online chats and stuff really. The original “XPages Blog” brought a lot of people together I think.
I did meet some people in person for the first time at BALD. Declan Lynch was one of them as I was presenting with him that year. I remember bumping into someone from BALD at the Sunday night party as I wandered around aimlessly and they told me not to move as “Tim was looking for me”. Sure Tim and I had communicated by then a little bit for him to actively try and look for me was something else. Made me feel very special and included. I’ll always remember the blogger photo from Lotusphere that year where this popular genius of the community ,who was also the nicest guy you could ever hope to find, chose to stand with me.
I remember Tim pinging me on Skype one day. He said Nathan, who I never spoke to before, wanted to talk to me. I said to Tim: “Oh Crap! Nathan wants to cancel NotesIn9 because I’m doing it all wrong!”. Tim assured me that wasn’t the case.
I remember on a business trip to Atlanta arranging to meet Tim for dinner. We went to this really good BBQ place called Foxboro I think and just sat and talked for hours. It was great.
I remember thinking of him as the “Mr. Spock” of our community. Tim was completely brilliant. And where Spock would say “fascinating” Tim would say “Indeed”.
Tim was the SWAT team of the XPages world. You get stuck on something then you ask someone. If no one else knows THEN you called Tim. Tim always happily answered. Which didn’t mean you understood the solution all the time. but he tried explaining it. I remember him coming over to my room in Lotusphere one time. I was really stuck on something… I don’t remember what. Tim sat and looked at my stuff and I think gave me a couple ways to proceed. One of them I understood.
When I would describe Tim to someone I would always bring up a reference to Star Trek IV. I’d say talking to Tim is like talking Scotty. It’s like talking to someone from the future and he has the formula to Transparent Aluminum. I think Tim got a kick out of that one.
Tim was actually my best contributor to NotesIn9. He love to share. He came on for 8 shows that totaled over 3 and a half hours. I’ll put links to those shows at the end of this post. I have 2 more unpublished shows from Tim. One I knew about and another one that I just completely missed. I’d forgotten all about it. That one seems extra special to me now for some reason. I’m going to try and publish both next week. I swear on the bigger show from just a couple weeks ago he seemed “giddy” when going through the code.
I’m a better person for knowing Tim Tripcony. He was an inspiration, a personal hero, and a friend.
Tim contributed to these NotesIn9 shows: (2 more coming)
http://notesin9.com/index.php/2012/02/28/notesin9-048-applying-themes-to-form-tables/
http://notesin9.com/index.php/2012/03/29/notesin9-063-creating-an-in-view-edit-custom-control/
http://notesin9.com/index.php/2012/04/04/notesin9-064-global-custom-controls-fixed/
http://notesin9.com/index.php/2013/11/01/notesin9-130-using-xpages-type-ahead-for-navigation/
http://notesin9.com/index.php/2014/01/13/notesin9-133-using-java-in-xpages-part-2/
http://notesin9.com/index.php/2014/01/14/notesin9-134-using-java-with-xpages-part-3/
http://notesin9.com/index.php/2014/01/16/notesin9-135-using-java-in-xpages-part4/