Welcome to the End of the Information Age

I remember having some discussions about 15 years ago about the Internet and what it was useful for. At the time I was still in University, and the Internet was primarily used to link together educational institutions and government agencies.

We didn't have the Windows operating systems that are so common (rampant?) today, so most of the applications we had were text/character based. Applications like "gopher" and "telnet" were used to navigate the various libraries and information sites on the 'net, and programs like "Pine" and "Elm" were popular for checking email from our Unix accounts.

For the most part, if you were in college or university and you needed to do research on some topic, the Internet was likely to provide you some limited access to information databases online. (Real libraries provided the really useful information though.. no shortcuts.) Other than that, email was very useful for trying to get a hold of authors and researchers anywhere in the world. (Cool!) That was it though. If you weren't into Newsgroups, then you probably had a life and never gave the Internet a second thought.

By the early 1990's the Mozilla web browser appeared on the scene (running on the X-Windows interface on our Unix accounts) and changed the way we viewed information forever. The gopher sites were slowly replaced by more flexible and visually-appealing web sites. By the mid-90's, commercial businesses were jumping on the HTML-bandwagon and starting to make use of the Internet to appeal to a slightly different market - the technologically-savvy! Email accounts were gaining in popularity, as graduating students started to expect these accounts as a standard part of their professional lives too.

Sometime before anyone really started to worry about the "Year 2000" (Y2K) problem, the Internet was already becoming the "Information Superhighway" and the World Wide Web was becoming the standard interface to that information.

With any advancement in Communication we usually have Progress. When information travels faster, we can work with it sooner. Just think about what the Telegraph, Telephone, Radio and Television did for the world. Now we have the Internet, and the world is a smaller place once more. We can watch News as it happens from anywhere in the world. We can research the latest papers, articles, journals, and theories. We can shop and start a business within a global market. We can be entertained, post our thoughts, send messages instantly to others, and more! The Internet is truly a rich, multi-media opportunity to express our ideas and share information with everyone on the planet.

There's just one problem. There's a lot of crap out there too. I don't just mean the obscene material that some people of little intelligence or low moral standards think we should know about... I'm talking about the poorly-researched, incomplete, often-misleading, assumption-driven, over-hyped, or just plain incorrect information that is passed off as "fact". If you don't know how to tell the good information from bad, then just remember this simple rule:

ALWAYS IDENTIFY THE REFERENCES AND CHECK THE SOURCES!

"Houston, we have a problem!"

So, now we find ourselves floundering in a sea of information, and we can't always tell the useful from the useless. Welcome to the end of the Information Age.

Just knowing the facts (true or otherwise) isn't going to help you. You have to know what to do with that information. You have to know what the assumptions were that the information was based upon. You have to know when the information you are reading is incomplete. You have to know how to separate the useful from the useless. You have to know how to act upon receiving the correct information. In essence, you have to know how to process the information into useful action.

Welcome to the beginning of the Knowledge Age.

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Some incomplete thoughts...

There are a series of related ideas that I want to discuss, but I don't think I'll have the time to properly describe them here. I'll make a quick attempt to put some of my unpolished ideas down in upcoming blogs, but I'll have to save the clarity and completeness factors for a later date and/or forum.

As with all ideas, discussion helps me bring out the best arguments. If you have any ideas or comments to share, please do so with the functionality available through this blog mechanism.

Thanks. Cheers!

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Use your BRAIN!

I bumped into an old colleague last week and found out that he's expecting his first child in a few months. He asked me if I had any advice for the delivery "experience".

I had to think about it for a minute, but then I recalled a lesson I learned before my first child was born.. useful advice that worked for me at the time, and advice that I continue to apply in other areas as well today.

Since you don't really know what will happen, you kind of need advice that will prepare you for just about any situation that might arise. In that case, use your BRAIN.

BRAIN is an acronym - a mnemonic for some heuristic advice. Here's what it stands for:

B = Be aware - of everything going on around you.
R = Know the Risks (Don't know them? Ask!)
A = What are the Alternatives?
I = What do your instincts tell you?
N = What if you say "No"?

There are times when you will find yourself alone in a situation where an important decision needs to be made. Don't forget to use your BRAIN.

Sometimes your heart tells you one thing and your head tells you something else. This handy little mnemonic should help you find a reasonable compromise between the two. It's worked for me.

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New Tester's Hardware Research Tool -- eBay

Ever come across a piece of hardware in a lab (like a modem or network hub) and you don't know which power supply goes with it? If you can't find the spec sheet for it, you might be out of luck. Or are you?

I picked up an inkjet printer out of a junk pile last week. It looked like it was in good shape but it had no power supply. I checked the manufacturer's web site for some technical spec sheets and I found them, but they were useless when it came to telling me the exact specs of the power supply.

So I googled the web and I found a few hits on eBay. Why not? It's worth the look. Turns out it was my lucky day! Not only did I find the exact power supply for sale on eBay, but some really thorough sellers include close-up photographs of the power supplies too. Spankin! =)

I printed up a copy of the photographs and rummaged through a bunch of boxes of miscellaneous mice, power supplies, cables and other small parts. Bingo! I found the matching power supply. I brought it home, plugged it in and, presto, my kids now have a new inkjet printer all their own. (Of course, there's the added cost of the overly expensive inkjet cartridges, but considering the printer was free, I'll overlook that for now.)

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Marketing Research - How to make your meetings work better

I got a phone call yesterday. I was contacted by a Marketing Research group that periodically holds Focus Groups on particular subjects in my town. I signed up with them a few years ago and I get a call from them maybe a few times a year, so it's not really a bother. (I like to contribute to research and data whenever I can.)

There are usually the pre-screen questions though to make sure that you are a part of their target group. Turns out that I didn't fit the profile they were looking for this time around (I'm a Generation-X, and they're looking for a Gen-Y), but I asked them the details of the Focus Group anyway. It was to be a 2-hour discussion forum on some topic and it pays $50.00.

Wow. That's cool. $50.00 for sitting around in a meeting room and talking for a few hours? I can do that. (Too bad I didn't qualify this time.. better luck next time.)

Hey, wait a minute!

How come when I sit in a Project status meeting for 2 hours at work I don't get $50 spending cash?!

How much more efficient do you think these status meetings would run if the Meeting Chairperson had to dole out cash for each attendee for each hour? I'm pretty sure that these meetings would run a lot quicker and be far more productive! ;-)

Maybe there's a lesson in there somewhere.

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Interlude

I haven't forgotten about this blog.. I've just been crazy busy at work for the last month. We had a major software release at the end of March, followed shortly afterwards by a planned "hotfix" release to patch the last remaining things that we couldn't finish in time for the deadline. So between long work hours and spending my remaining waking hours with family, I've let this chill for a while.

That reminds me.. I think some of my friends called about 4 weeks ago.. I should probably get back to them.. maybe get out, go see a movie. I need some air.

I've got lots to write about here, so I'll probably be adding several entries over the next few weeks. One thing that I should mention is that one of my hard drives has also failed on my home computer. Just happens to be the one that has all my email on it. (That kinda sucks.) I'll be [carefully] taking the computer apart this weekend to see if I can recover the data before I replace the drive.

I actually unplugged the drive several weeks ago, so if I can go almost a month without retrieving my email, I think I can wait a few more days before I start writing entries. ;-)

Cheers! Write soon.

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The Paradoxes of Software Development

When you've been working in Software Development for a while, you eventually wise up to the three important factors that drive any project: Time, Money, and Scope. (Sometimes people replace that third option with "Quality", but I think that the three of them together make up the three sides of a "Quality" triangle.)

They are certainly the three things that drive any Project Manager, although you sometimes hear them talk about it using different words:

1. Schedules, Milestones and Deadlines
2. Budgets, Resources, People, Equipment, Tools, Training, etc.
3. Features, Requirements, Work Breakdown Structure

When you start any project, you always desire lots of each of these. In reality, you are constrained in each. You can't have all the time in the world. You can't have all the people, tools, training, or equipment that you'd like. And someone is always trying to sneak in more features, but there are limits to what you can put into any software release if you ever want to get it out the door and make some money from it.

Consultants use these three factors (Time, Cost, and Scope) during contract negotiations. The experienced consultant will be able to take any two fixed factors and give you a practical estimate for the third.

So what are the paradoxes? These three factors are, but not for the reasons listed above so far.

Time

You never have enough time. Never. Live with it.

It's more than that though. When you are at work, your time is always interrupted. This is unfortunately unavoidable. It is the nature of Software Development that we miraculously create a complex masterpiece through a process of continuous interruption.

Interruptions come in different forms. Everybody expects to take bathroom and mealtime breaks. But what about the interruptions by email? What about when someone calls you on the telephone or shows up at your desk? Bam! There goes your train of thought!

Of course, it's not polite to yell at people to go away and leave you alone. (Although it may be very tempting with some people.) The reality is that, as a complex human activity, software development requires that a lot of people get the information they need to do their part of the project. Everybody has a part in creating information, so everyone has a responsibility to make sure that the information they know is passed onto the people who need it.

You could be on the verge of solving a complex problem that has eluded you for days, when all of a sudden a Project Manager shows up at your desk to ask you your opinion on the risks involved in making a change somewhere. Or it could be an impromptu meeting. Or a technical writer asking you to review some documentation that you have some familiarity with.

I knew a programmer once who said that he was far more productive when he worked at home for two reasons: (1) he didn't have to get up and leave the building whenever he needed to smoke (he could just smoke at his desk at home), and (2) no interruptions.

The problem of course is that when he does get back into the office, he will eventually be inundated with questions about the work that he did -- in order to pass that information onto the next person who needs it. He also eventually needed to collaborate with other programmers to understand the integration of his work with theirs.

Try as you might, you cannot make software in isolation forever. You may need to get away from others for a while to help you focus on a problem or goal, but you cannot stay away for long. You just can't.

Money

This is a funny one. Not everyone is immediately aware of the importance of the money available for a project until they try to get something and realise they can't. For example, it would be really cool if we could get this "super analyzer metrics-reporting database-query problem-solving automatic-tester all-in-one XML-friendly scriptable-API user-friendly reliable coffee-making appointment-remembering time-saving dry-cleaning fully-customizable easy-to-use tool" ... until they see the price tag.

Or worse, you realise that you can get some of the tools you need cheaply, but you don't have the time to spend figuring out how it can be integrated into your project or environment. Is there any way that we can hire a contract person (e.g. a high school or university student) to figure it out for us so that we can reap the benefits of the tool without actually spending any of that time figuring it out for ourselves?

What? No money in the budget for extra hires? But how can we meet the deadlines if we don't have the help/tools/equipment/training/whatever that we (think we) need?!

Start-up companies generally have a harder time with budgets and available finances than larger, more established, global organisations, but big companies have their share of money problems too.

The funny thing about needing money is that often you get it - but at a price! You will end up "owing" someone, in one way or another. Nothing comes free, and money is at the top of the list.

Many years ago, I had a terrible experience working for one company when we had a person leave our test team. I approached the Director of Development about when I could start hiring her replacement, but then he started giving me the run-around, talking about the "return on the value" of our test team, and that perhaps the funds allocated to the test team salary budget could be better reallocated to hire another programmer instead. After all, we would certainly be more productive with another programmer and one less tester, wouldn't we?

I quit a few months later. I have been extremely happy with my decision and never regretted it. That company no longer exists since it lost all of its customers a short time after I left.

Money is a tricky thing. It should never be placed in the hands of fools, because they will always do foolish things with it.

It's about more than just the Economics of the business though. "Time to Market" can have a BIG impact on the price of the Shares in your company (if it is a Publicly traded organisation). You don't meet the release deadline for a particular Quarter >> share prices drop >> No bonuses this year! In fact.. there might even be "restructuring" in the near future.

To do a great job, you may need more people, tools, training or equipment, but those things all cost money. You may or may not have money "in the budget" for these things. Getting those things may come at the expense of a lower salary or absence of financial bonuses. Not having those things may mean that you will miss the important deadline and cause your business to miss its Sales goals... which in turn mean lower salaries, no financial bonuses, or even layoffs.

Money. How do you want it?

Scope

It all starts innocently enough with the customer. This "customer" may take different forms depending on the industry you are working in.

You start with a list of features. These features are deemed to be the critical success indicators for the software if it is to be bought and used.

Software Development is a complex and iterative process whereby some really smart people take that feature list and break them down into hardware and software components from a particular technology. Suddenly that list of ten or so items, is now broken down into hundreds of smaller pieces that all need to work together in harmony to make up the features that the customers want.

Think of it this way: In Ancient Egypt, a Pharaoh once said: "Build me a Pyramid! I want a tomb of magnificent proportions that will leave a legacy for eons to come!" The Architects designed it, and then the Engineers built it.

Have you ever looked closely at a Pyramid? It's made up of thousands of stone cubes! Where did these stones come from? How did they get there? How did they put them together to make the finished product? What about the workers? How did they feed and clean up after thousands of slaves?

Thinking about some of these questions will begin to give you an idea of the orchestra at work in a software company to produce a product that the customer needs and will pay for.

But then a funny thing happens. Someone looks at the software. It might be a Product Manager, a Software Tester, or even the customer. And they discover something that isn't quite right. Sure, perhaps the big, important features are there, but the little details between them might be clunky, incomplete, or too complicated to make sense.

Uh oh. We need to make changes to the software.

And we keep "testing". And we keep discovering more "little things". And before you know it, that "critical list of ten features" that was broken down into hundreds of components is now tied together with thousands of little details!

It takes a keen mind to be able to keep all of these details in perspective of "the big picture". That is, does it make sense to make a particular change now, or should we put it off until the next release or version of the software?

I've met many testers who believe that every bug they find should be fixed right away. That's a foolish and narrow-minded perspective, in my opinion. I believe that if the problem is worth reporting, it should be worth fixing (whenever feasible), but each problem needs to be assessed for the risks involved and the priority or relevance for that particular release.

For example, I once tested a client-server application and found a bug that crashed both the client and server at the same time. (This is unusual because usually you only find bugs that affect one or the other.) In the Project Status Update meeting that week, I argued that we should NOT bother fixing the bug for that release. That is, even though it was a serious crash, I knew that no customer had ever reported the problem in the five years that the software was on the market. This led me to conclude that no one was in fact actually using that feature. So, I could only conclude that it would be a waste of time to fix a feature that no one was actually using.

Being able to keep things in perspective like this is what helps you to avoid one of the strongest Failure-factors in the business: "Scope Creep." Changing Requirements.

It's just a game sometimes. I've seen it many times. It goes something like this..

You ask the customer what they need to do their jobs. They tell you and you make the list. You come up with the requirements and double-check them with the customer to make sure it looks right. You make the software, work out the bugs, and release it to the customer for approval.

Now that the customer has the working software in front of them, the bar has been raised. "Oh well, it almost does what we need. It just needs these many more features, and then it will be perfect."

The smile falls from your face, but you go back and work to get these new features into the product. When you bring the software back to the customer, the bar has been raised again! "Well, it's almost perfect, but it still needs these features for it to actually work for us with the way we do things."

Just for the record, these are the kinds of customers that cause software companies to go out of business. More importantly, the Project Managers who don't recognise this situation and allow these scenarios to play out late in the development cycle are really the ones who cause the software companies to fail.

"Scope Creep" or "Feature Creep" simply refers to the changing of the requirements while the product is still in development. What may seem like a straightforward list of requirements at the outset may suddenly become conflicting requirements by the time you expect to release the software.

Changes may be subtle and sneak up on you in inconspicuous ways, or they may just hit you in the face like a closing door when you are looking the wrong way.

Getting a handle on Scope requires you to understand: (1) the Development Models (Life Cycles) used to provide the guidance in the way you build the software, (2) the customer and their appropriateness to help you achieve your desired results, and (3) the Requirements gathering process and the iterative nature required to truly flesh out the useful features from all the unnecessary "Bells and Whistles."

Scope. Feature list. You think you know what you need to do. You will be wrong every time. Software Development is a process whereby you usually engage on a journey with nothing more than a general sense of direction but no clear understanding of the final destination. That's the way it is.

Go to the ocean and learn to surf. Things will become clearer.

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