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Continue reading →: Farewell Seattle, My New Office Has Wheels
As we come to the close of our broadcast day This is my farewell transmission Signing off… Mr. and Mrs. America, and all the ships at sea Anyone within the sound of my voice Have you ever wondered what would happen if you told your boss you’ll be taking those 9AM status meetings from a rest stop on Route 128? I have and I am going to do it. My new office has wheels and I’m leaving Seattle to circumnavigate the country. I’m going on the road not to get away but to get somewhere. Maybe it’s the American Dream…
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Continue reading →: Incremental Migration: First Things First
Is a total rewrite always a bad idea? I don’t think so. I use the pilot system often in new projects and that pilot is designed to be thrown away. What I get out of it is a proof of concept and knowledge about how the interlocking pieces of the system work. I plan to rewrite the pilot. Joel Spolsky has this to say about rewriting code: It’s important to remember that when you start from scratch there is absolutely no reason to believe that you are going to do a better job than you did the first time. First…
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Continue reading →: Intellectual property is not real property
Intellectual property is a term that bears some resemblance to real property but the two are very different. IP represents the product of knowledge workers time and resources. Real property represents physical objects. Sometimes a knowledge worker produces an idea that makes its way into the physical world. But that is another discussion. Walk down the street and count the number of Craftsman style homes you see. Nobody holds the patent on the architectural design. The Craftsman style home represents mixed-use live/work space and creative expression. It’s like asking a builder to design the ideal home for his family to…
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Continue reading →: Root Cause Analysis Chart
At Sologic I worked with an excellent team to design their new RCA charting application UI. The process began with an existing product which was outdated and failing to deliver on customer expectations. After becoming familiar with the legacy application and its user experience I spent time interviewing existing customers who were dissatisfied. I drew some sketches of what I thought would improve current users’ experience and got buy-in from the product team. I built a prototype in HTML and CSS. After a few iterations we decided on a UX theme and got to work. Milestone Context: Sologic, LLC |…
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Continue reading →: Javascript modules and maintainable code
In Javascript app development maintainability is often exchanged for rapid production and delivery. Using Javascript code modules is not a new concept to software developers who write single-page JS apps but the distinction between using namespaces with a singleton-style static object and writing modules is important. I keep hearing that modules improve executing speed and reduce memory footprint but none of that matters right now. I was once told by a senior developer that “Shipping is the most important feature.” For web developers that is most often the case. We don’t have time to test and retest algorithms for performance…
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Continue reading →: House Democrats’ Health Plan Flowchart
This chart illustrates a Republican Congressman’s view of the Democratic House proposals for a healthcare reform. Looks complicated. The part I’m interested in here is how Americans will find the information they need to navigate the system. There’s a line in here which connects Health and & Human Services Dept to the states’ regulators and health care agencies labeled “Federal Mandates for Website Design.” I’d like to know if anything has been published about these mandates. House Democrats’ Health Plan Flow Chart infographic http://visual.ly/embeder/embed.js
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Continue reading →: Spring cleaning like a software architect
Everyone knows how to clean. Throw out trash, move dust and dirt around until you can’t see it anymore. Wash, rinse, repeat. I’m developing a system for living with the clutter through my spring cleaning process. Specify clear goals (Are they feasible?) Make a plan (Can it be delegated?) Commit to a timeline (When will you be done?) Measure your success (Is it maintainable?) Goals The requirements of my cleaning project are designed to tell me when I can stop. The feasibility is high for work items like organizing my desk, throwing out old documents, and hanging art in my…
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Continue reading →: LinkedIn Endorsements Are Useful… Only to LinkedIn
LinkedIn.com is in the business of selling ads (classified and otherwise). Much like other social networks they use many tactics to drive traffic back to their site and prompt as many page loads as possible to increase exposure to money-making features like job listings and recruiter contacts. There has been much discussion about whether endorsements are useful to you, the user. Most commenters seem to distrust the endorsements of strangers or the unqualified. Some bloggers who have weighed in on the subject cite the thumbs-up rating approach as a cheapening of the data. It seems to me this feature is…
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Continue reading →: Migrating to Feedly
R.I.P Google Reader. A few interesting, and unexpected, alternatives have cropped up but Feedly is the one I’m going with. 5 Reasons Why: It’s free! Easily imports all my Google Reader feeds and categories iOS and Android apps Everyone else is switching to Feedly It’s better than Google Reader I say it’s better because of the way I skim headlines. Google Reader’s UI looked very much like GMail and showed my news in brief headlines. Feedly presents my news in a nicely designed layout that feels less cramped and more like a blog.
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Continue reading →: Failure is not a permanent condition
“Leaving a high-flying job in consulting, Angela Lee Duckworth took a job teaching math to seventh graders in a New York public school. She quickly realized that IQ wasn’t the only thing separating the successful students from those who struggled. Here, she explains her theory of “grit” as a predictor of success.”
Hello,
I’m Aaron
Engineering Manager in Seattle
