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So I’ve made the plunge and bought an iPhone. Half the joy is in using such a beautifully designed product - every aspect of the experience shows so much thought. I can only add my kudos, and continue to be frustrated at how low the standards are for so many products.
So in the physical world, there’s tremendous constraints placed on a system by existing infrastructure. It defines and limits what can be done without significant extra resources expended - which means cost, complexity, risk, etc.
In a recent issue of Wired, there’s an article about how a new city in China is being designed with what amounts to a well thought out infrastructure optimized towards energy use
It’s an interesting contrast between that approach and the agile software approach of evolving the infrastructure (and the approach to infrastructure that’s true for most cities as well). Of course, the infrastructure in software is much more malleable than the physical infrastructure of a city - yet there are still great costs and challenges with evolving software infrastructure.
Why haven’t we figured out how to make this easier?
Ok - so maybe it’s a sign of just how much a shiny-gadget-geek I am, but I love what’s possible with MacFuse (and MacFusion). For example, I have an existing website (at omnis.com) that doesn’t have a ssh account, so the only way to deploy / work on what’s there is via FTP. So when I need to work on it, I have to use FTP to push & pull code & data, but I don’t do it that often - so I’d have to right FTP client to do bulk transfer was a pain, etc. So now, turn on ftpfs via MacFuse and woila (as my 4 yr old says) - there’s the shooting match. Now, it’s an easy matter to bring it all back down locally, put in SVN (as it should have been years ago) and re-deploy to my new account at dreamhost.
No new functionality, just a greater ease of use - esp. since my muscle memory knows how to use either shell or finder interfaces to work with files.
A great audio program on experiential computing (IT Conversations: Ramesh Jain - Experimental Computing) and Ramesh’s related blog (Ramesh Jain’s Blog » Blog Archive » Events and paradigms) gives me some inspiration to on two important points:
Some ramblings on software development
A useful perspective on software devleopment is as an ‘integrated discipline’, i.e. a perspective that recognizes that software development is actually composed of three domains:
Nothing here is new, e.g. Weinberg, Catalysis, Scrum, etc. all include some notion of these domains in their models. However, what’s confusing for me is how rarely this is recognized on all the different projects I’ve been involved. I don’t think this is just a function of how I choose a project - as I hear this from others as well. Typically, the recognition of this varies depending on who I’m talking with - e.g. developers recognize technology and business, but rarely the people; product owners recognize the business and technology, but rarely the people.
Why is this important? Primariliy because problems often creep in from the unrecognized (or recognized but less important) domain.
I’ve noticed that in the many organizations I’ve talked with, I’ve never really found any job titles that consistently appear to acknowledge this perspective. Occasionally, encounter some positions can described that way (e.g. architect, senior management, CTO), but there doesn’t appear to be a ready made & well recognized title.
Perhaps it’s a result of the perceived complexity of each domain, where the approach is to ‘divide and conquer’ the work into seperate roles. Personally I believe that this is an incomplete answer. The ‘divide and conquer’ approach works well for specialists that need to become strongly fluent in the extensive details in each domain. In this case, the differences are important - i.e. the patterns of action and subjects of action are unique within that domain. However, I believe that spanning all the domains there are patterns of action that are common, and that the unique aspects of the subjects of action are less important. Put another way - there are common patterns of doing things that can be usefully applied across multiple domains.
One concrete example of where this shows up is the role of architect. In software development, this is an overloaded term. For some, an architect (e.g. a J2EE Architect) is someone fluent with the unique aspects of J2EE. For others, an architect is soomeone fluent with the common very high-level design patterns and priniciples, which can be applied to different technologies as well as to businesses.
As a personal frustration, I often encounter the two being mixed up, e.g. in conversation expecting that they need an architect that spans multiple technologies and possibly business as well - and the conversation turns to how-to questions for a language specific library.
All the different levels are important, however I believe we need to revisit how we’ve ’sliced the pie’. Specicically, I beleive we need more emphasis on the common aspects that span technologies as one ‘bundle’ of patterns; the common aspects that span technologies, business and people as another ‘bundle’, etc. The increased emphasis on these patterns willl create opportunities for greater breadth the roles (i.e. not tied to one technology)
As I interpret it, the agile versus formal debate is generally treated as an either or question. For instance, in any given software development situation there may be an assessment that it would have worked better if only an agile approach was used or for a project like this, you must use a formal approach. Only rarely does there seem to be an advocate that suggests integrating aspects of both approaches.
Inevitably, this has resulted in religious arguments about which approach is better, and religious arguments are usually from an absolutist’s perspective.
A funny thing happened on the way to resolving this issue; some folks with poor practices attempt to partake of any legitimacy that the agile approach offers by reinterpreting their practices as agile. Their approach is to elevate any poor practice they have as really being agile. Equally confused, other folks have taken genuine successes from the agile approach and reinterpreted them as luck, hacking, or some other variant of happenstance. Their approach is to reduce any agile success to at best the results of wishful thinking.
What do these two different groups of people, the elevationists and the reductionists, have in common? Both of these groups have a perspective that only allows for two levels of software development: lets call them conventional and non-conventional.
My argument is that one significant limitation to resolving this issue is the two-level model, and that by reinterpreting the evidence using a three- (or more) level model, a path towards resolution becomes visible.
In addition, this re-interpretation can be shown to be an instance of a concept identified by Ken Wilber and named the ¿pre/trans fallacy¿. While this think piece is about software development processes, the subject area that the pre/trans fallacy originally referred to is much more universal and significant, that of human consciousness (e.g. Ken Wilber Online: Introduction to Volume 1 of The Collected Works). The pre/trans fallacy is part of a larger model called the Integral Model [need citation].
How to reconcile formal, agile & no processes in a software development environment?
Previously in conflict, considered by some as irreconcilible
Integrated using a model that accounts for development stages/levels.
Fundamental pattern: learn the form to become formless
Based on the current state of the art with modeling tools today, there are a lot of potential improvements. What follows are a set of wishes or possibilities, completely based on my own biases and experience. All of these possibilities have are based on common themes of matching the way people think about and do their work, enabling more degrees of freedom in modeling languages and proceses both of which generally support the goal of making these tools more relevant and usable in many domains.
Based on the current state of the art with modeling tools today, there are a lot of potential improvements. What follows are a set of wishes or possibilities, completely based on my own biases and experience. All of these possibilities have are based on common themes of matching the way people think about and do their work, enabling more degrees of freedom in modeling languages and proceses both of which generally support the goal of making these tools more relevant and usable in many domains.
In the field of software, system and business process modeling tools, what are some of the weaknesses and what are some of the opportunities?
Based on the current state of the art with modeling tools today, there are a lot of potential improvements. What follows are a set of wishes or possibilities, completely based on my own biases and experience. All of these possibilities have are based on common themes of matching the way people think about and do their work, enabling more degrees of freedom in modeling languages and proceses both of which generally support the goal of making these tools more relevant and usable in many domains.
To understand this weakness, it’s useful to understand the context - the creative process. During different phases of the createive process, there are different types of information processed in different ways. One key distinction is the degree of formality of the information. Current modeling tools are optimized for the formal expression of information, which makes them irrelevant for much of the creative process. As a result, users may compensate by abandoning the tools.
Incorporate Degrees of Precision or Formality of Content
Most tools do not provide for less-formal or precise content, the expectation is that the content will conform to the syntax and semantics of the ? immediately when entered. The expectation that the content will spring to life completely well-defined is unreasonable and does not match how people actually work. Realistically, content with varying degrees of precision/formality are used simeltaneously. It is only once they have been evaluated and refined that they may be conformant with the syntax and semantics. The tool must support varying degrees of precision in content, as well as their transformation as they become refined or altered.
Current tools are optimized to handle formal/conformant information and linear processes and therefore are relevant only to a subset of the creative process.
Certainly there are ways to compsenate for this, e.g.
At best, information is lost about the transformation from informal to formal, at worst information from major phases of creativity is lost.
There is no support for informal information, i.e. correct, but not conforming to a formal specification.
It is reasonable to expect that in a creative process that involves modeling, the tools would be capbable of accepting information in varying degrees of formality, i.e. to accomodate the needs of different phases of the creative process.
For the sake of discussion, consider the creative process to be composed of multiple phases (e.g. the Disney Creativity Strategy): dreamer, critic and realist. One distinction between these different phases is the degree of formality of the information during that phase:
In addition, the phases are not linear, they (re)cycle (see Wicked Problem solving).
For instance, in requirments elicitation a usability requirment may be at a very abstract level and a process description may be at a low level of abstraction. Yet, both of these pieces of information are aspects of the same model, each completing a seperate piece of the whole picture - and related to each other in some way. Without having tool , e.g. conformance and therefore no ability to navigate varying levels of abstraction.
Incorporate Multiple Modalities for the Content
Most modeling tools have a notion of providing multiple views of the same content. Unfortunately, the different views typically are composed of the same representations of the underlying content. There is the need to provide multiple representations, or modalities, of the same content. For instance when specifying classes and their relationships in a software modeling tool, the common representation modality is visual. There are many instances when it’s useful to present the same information textually, i.e. descriptions of the associations and the classes.
e.g. text & visual for modeling something
Configurable
Configurable wrt: syntax, semantics, representations per: modality (e.g. icon types, text strings, etc.); standard UML-type s.w. design is just a customization of a more general tool; allow for specification of unique model types, e.g. Ron Bennett’s own business use-case -> architectural scenario -> message interface to be represented
Progressive Customization & Specification of Language, Processes, etc.
Regardless of how unified and comprehensive a single modeling language and process intends to be, there will always be customization as well as creation of new languages and processes. As a result, modeling tools need to be configurable over the life of their use. The expectation that a language or process will spring to life completely well-defined is unreasonable. Realistically, these will be identified, used and refined over their lifetime. The tool must support varying degrees of precision in their definition, as well as their transformation as they become refined or altered.
More General Than Software & BPR
How can model driven architecture (MDA) be successful (or any approach where higher levels of abstraction are necessary) when software engineers are not yet settled in real OOD?
