Working Up

by Dwayne Phillips

Great ideas have a different and necessary perspective when I look at another person and say the words aloud.

The man with 30 years experience and accolades as an expert in his field sat across the table from me. He looked me in the eye and, before he opened his mouth, had that expression saying, “I can’t believe I thought this was a good idea.”

He paused, grinned a little, and told me that the idea didn’t seem so good now, but he told me what it was. His expression was correct. It was an awful idea, but he didn’t realize it until that key moment sitting across the table.

(1) I write it on a napkin. I write it in my journal. I write it on the white board. I polish it in a word processor.

(2) I look another person in the eye, open my mouth, and say the words aloud.

Actions (1) and (2) are different—vastly different. I must do (2) before I take it seriously. I should do (2) before I spend large amounts of resources on the idea. That is prudent. Step (2) is essential.

All the great thoughts appear differently when we look at another person and say the words aloud.

by Dwayne Phillips

AI, as we have it today, is a software tool. Like all software tools, it should aid persons in their jobs, not replace persons.

We have all these artificial intelligence programs everywhere. At least some persons claim such. What we have are software tools. The software can find some images that maybe have a rose in them or steer a car down a well-defined and lighted roadway. Artificially intelligent? I don’t think so.

Regardless of definitions, AI is replacing persons and taking their jobs. Any manager that replaces a person with a piece of software is taking huge risks. I strongly advise against such.

Despite all the excitement, our AI software today is merely a tool. Tools aid persons in jobs. Open a million jpg files and copy the one hundred that might have a rose to a directory for a person to examine. That is helpful. That doesn’t replace the person.

Open a million social media posts and copy the one hundred that might be hate speech to a place for a person to read. That is helpful. That doesn’t replace the person.

Depend on the software to do the job start to finish without a person. That is foolish and takes on unacceptable risk. Now your CEO is sitting before Congress with two dozen lawyers charging $1,000 an hour to keep the CEO out of jail.

What we have done is replace the analyst with two dozen lawyers. The AI software didn’t save anything.

by Dwayne Phillips

Want to know what computer software is doing? Go to the source of knowledge regarding it.

I run a bash script daily to put my Internet viewing log online. (See here.) This script runs through a series of folders, us old guys still call them directories as in the Unix days, copies files, runs a (secure) File Transfer Protocol, another old-guy thing, and puts it all online.

I don’t remember the details of all this. If I want to refresh my memory, I look at the text of the script, a.k.a., the source code. It lists each individual, tedious step that I have the computer do for me everyday. That is why I have written a computer program of sorts—this is repetitive, tedious, and error prone.

At my current job, I find things in the software that don’t quite make sense. One of the programmers will often tell me, “Let’s look at the source code to see what we are actually doing.” Such readings of the source code often bring surprises. “This is what we are doing,” he’ll tell me. “Is that what we are supposed to be doing?” he then asks.

And now we have the title of this post. The source code, as we programmers have called it for many years now, bears that name for a reason:

the source code is the source of all knowledge regarding a computer program

If there is any question about what a computer program is doing, go to the source. Read the source code and learn. Forget the documents, forget the conversations, forget all else. The source code is the definitive answer, i.e., it is the actual definition of the software.

It is fortunate that we have the source code.

It is unfortunate (in my humble opinion) that in many other parts of life, there is no source code. There is no actual definition, or we don’t want to reread the definition. See, for example, marriage vows.

by Dwayne Phillips

We make mistakes. We make mistakes at a given rate of X mistakes per unit of work. Look at all the work, find all the mistakes, learn, and change direction.

We make mistakes.

We make X mistakes per page.

The more pages the more mistakes.

In a bad situation? Sit and read and read and read everything. There are mistakes in the pages. Read it all. Find the mistakes, learn, and change direction.

by Dwayne Phillips

The most difficult thing about the agile and similar approaches is the zero-th step.

“I’m aren’t sure about this.” Let’s take small steps and learn as we go. Let’s not reach too far and make too costly a mistake.
This is the agile manifesto stated another way. There is nothing new here; we all always knew this.

The trouble is, we have to start with the zero-th step. That step is when I stand in front of everyone at every level of the organization and say, “I’m not sure about this.”

And sometimes some of us cannot say that in some situations. It is an admission of imperfection and inadequate knowledge. Some organizations live in some fairly tale land where such are not allowed. If you work in on of those fairy tale land places, if at all possible, L E A V E.

by Dwayne Phillips

There are several places I can always find an interesting person for an interesting and educational conversation. One is outside any neighborhood elementary school.

My grandfather on my mother’s side outlived his wife by 20 years or so. That was and still is unusual. After a year alone, he needed a reason to wake in the morning.

He found a job at a school crossing. For about 20 years, he woke in the morning, had breakfast, shaved, dressed, put on a “uniform,” and went to an elementary school. When children came to the street crossing, he pressed the button on the traffic light pole. When the lights changed and the safe-to-walk signal lit, he walked out into the street so the children could cross.

After morning duty, he went home, ate lunch, took a nap, and went back to the school for the afternoon session. He did this everyday for about 20 years without missing a single day to illness or doctor’s appointment or anything. A generation of children needed him, and he needed them.

And he always had time to speak with the children and with any adult who wanted to learn about life and raising children (he had raised six children in poverty—never knew there was a depression at the time).

There is a woman who does this job at the elementary school a few blocks from my home. Everyday—morning and evening—she stands at a corner wearing her uniform and holding a stop-yield sign. She helps children and parents cross the street. She knows the name of every parent, student, and sibling that crosses at her corner everyday. She never misses for illness or anything else. I think she needs the children as much as they need her.

This past week I was in Louisiana for the holidays. I went running each morning and met a gentlemen wearing a uniform, holding a stop-yield sign, and helping parents, children, and siblings cross the street.

I stopped. We had an interesting conversation. I learned much.

Do you want to have an interesting conversation with an interesting person and learn a few things? Go to a neighborhood elementary school. There will be a crossing guard somewhere there. They will be happy to oblige.

by Dwayne Phillips

How can we communicate better? First, let’s try to communicate better.

How can I communicate better? How can I say this better?

Look for a better word

Look for a better word or two

Look for a better phrase

Look for a better arrangement of thoughts

Look for a better sentence

Look for a better title

Look for a better tone

Are we starting to notice a trend here? Try harder. Look further. Try to be better. It isn’t all that complicated.

by Dwayne Phillips

Don’t forget the fun. Adding fun to a system can expand the possibilities of delighting to user.

Systems have functional requirements. The system will…add, subtract, multiply, divide.

Systems have non-functional requirements. The system will be…(see Wikipedia for more on this). These non-functional requirements are sometimes called the -ilities (ill-i-tees). They take the form of usab-ility, reliab-ility, maintainab-ility, etc.

When listing these -ilities, add “or fun” so that the list looks something like:

. portable

. maintainable

. teachable

. usable

. or fun

Consider how the last item changes the perspective on all the others. What is your system was fun? How would that change the look, feel, usage? How would that change the attitudes of the system builders? Testers? Designers? Marketers?

Add fun. It might be fun.

by Dwayne Phillips

You can work productively all day given a few restarts or what we used to call “breaks.”

Working long hours for many days in a row isn’t a good idea. Fatigue wins—every time.

There are, however, ways to beat fatigue. We used to call these breaks, but I am sure someone has a far better noun these days.

Back during the prior millennium, I had a few technical books to read, study, and note. I had a simple formula for concentrating all day (sometimes 12, sometimes 14 hours).

At the top of the hour, I sat with the book, a pencil, and notepad at a table. I read with great concentration and took notes on every page. I did so for 50 minutes. At that moment I moved from the table to a Lazy-Boy recliner. I closed my eyes and, in a few moments, fell asleep. At the top of the hour, the clock on the wall next to me chimed. The chimes woke me. Return to the start of this paragraph and repeat.

I read with great concentration all day.

Today, some of my colleagues tell me how they worked from home as programmers. They would concentrate on programming from 7 to 9 AM. For the next hour, they did chores around the house. 10 AM to noon was concentrated programing. Noon to 2 PM was lunch and nap. 2 to 4 PM was concentrated work time. The next three hours was take a walk, prepare and eat dinner, and read a little. 7 to 9 PM was concentrated work.

They worked eight hours with high concentration. They did much of what they wanted the remainder of the day including exercise, eating, and resting. They couldn’t do that when they were in the office from 9 to 5. “Goofing off” is not permitted in the office. Taking “breaks” (those that last an hour or more) is not permitted in the office.

I guess eight hours of high-concentration work is not permitted in the office. Oh well.

Breaks and restarts allow us, even us old folks, to work productively all day. No breaks, no restarts, no productivity—only the illusion of work and all that.

You choose: illusion or reality.

by Dwayne Phillips

Success can lead to failure. Sometimes great success can lead to great failure. See, e.g., Facebook.

There must be two social media companies out there named “Facebook.” There is this social media site called Facebook that many of my friends and relatives use. They show photos of the kids and the new babies and the new-baby-is-coming reveal party and such. I have found persons who were my high school classmates. Wow, they have changed, and so have I, and they love their grandkids like crazy just like me.

That Facebook is great. They hit on something there to let us all find one another and share our lives. Good stuff.

Then there is another Facebook company I read about in the news. They rigged they last presidential election by showing, of all things, advertisements. They show “fake news.” It seems that fake news is the stuff I used to see at the checkout counter of the grocery store, you know, some famous woman had an alien baby or someone was dating Princess Di and Marylin Monroe at the same time. All that was silly and adults knew the difference back then.

And this second Facebook has really rich people running the company. The really rich people, however, always seem to be in trouble. Is it fake news that the rest of us love to read about really rich people who are always in trouble? That is why we used to watch the TV show “Dallas” way back when we used to watch TV shows on TV.

And this second Facebook has these really rich people running the company appearing before Congress and all the European Parliaments and such and saying, “Let me get back to you on that,” even though the questions were, “Is it raining outside? Do I need my umbrella?”

Is it possible that the two Facebook companies are one in the same? Is it possible that the Facebook that allows me to find they guy who played trombone next to me in the  marching band is the same Facebook where the CEO is appearing before Congress without any sweat glands?

Is it possible that Facebook succeeded so much that the persons in charge became too rich too fast and weren’t able to handle the fame and fortune at a young age and…well, we know what happens in those cases.

There must be some older, not-as-really-rich persons sitting at Facebook close to those famous, really rich Facebook executives who made too much money too fast at too young an age. If you are one of those, please, please talk to the others.

Please ask them to stay out of trouble and not cause the collapse of Facebook. I do enjoy seeing how a former trombone player from the Loranger Wolfpack Marching Band is loving his grandkids and still playing the guitar.