The Agile Zombies (a Halloween special)

Despite our best attempts to keep them under control, our agile zombie teams have been able to stagger (there is no sprinting despite what you may have heard) onward while doggedly avoiding producing even the scantest shred of documentation. All attempts to manage the hoards who are  devouring product backlog flesh have failed. Initially we purchased several weapons such as the Rally meat grinder and the VersionOne chopper. These enriched the weapon manufacturers, but the problem remained and agile sausage is still something you do not want to see how it gets made. Some poor management souls who had cast their lots with the weapons manufacturers are seeking shelter in zero accountability bunkers hoping to ride things out. Noone is sure how the disease began, the most repeated story is things started with some well intentioned team lead who avoided his document innoculation and quickly spread the infection to others in the team. The short term high the teammates experienced soon turned to a insatiable craving for uninterrupted coding. Normal body functions (like planning and knowledge retention) went dormant then ceased to matter in the single mindedness of constant backlog hunger.

All hope now rest on contacting a hero who may have the key to our salvation. A legendary figure known only as the Project Manager. This hero is said to hold the power to eliminate battalions of agile zombies using a weapon of incredible power and accuracy, the "Plan".

So if you are out there PM, and somehow this message makes it to you, save us! The zombies are everywhere!

To my life partner - a thank you card

Dear Deborah,

I awoke this morning and really became bothered by how poor a job I have done at telling you how so greatly enriched my life has been by your decision to make this walk through life with me. I want to correct that situation now.

First let me say, I cannot thank you enough for being who you are and allowing me the thrill of watching you year by year become more loving and supportive to me, to our children and to everyone who is fortunate enough to get to know you.

I wish sometimes you could see yourself through my eyes. You would stop worrying about every grey hair,  every weight change and see that what makes you, you is the beautiful person I see everyday. I truly believe every change our mind and bodies go through is so we are best able to handle what life brings our way.

I have learned in our time together how my expectations from our relationship collides with my own failures to do the very things that would help meet those expectations. Sometimes I know you feel like every responsibility falls on your shoulders. But everything we accomplish or fail is what "we" have done together. As much as loving each other, balancing expectations against personal shortcomings is the glue that binds loving couples. 

I so badly want 100 years of life as your husband. I want to see you at every stage and just marvel at how wonderful you are and how truly lucky I am. 

But if i cannot have 100, I will just enjoy each day with you and watch the kids grow around us knowing that tonight when I go to bed, the woman who chose me, will be there.

I always loved the line in the movie where Jack Nicholson says "You make me want to be a better man". In a relationship,  that line means you understand what it takes to be happy. It does not mean you have all the answers, it simply means you are committed to trying. 

I know for certain I am a better man today because I met you. You made that happen just by being you. Tomorrow and every day thereafter is unpredictable, but what I feel for you will always be there. I love you so very much.

Your Husband

Make a tent card using Word and Excel

I needed to make some tent cards for my wife.  She wanted the cards to contain a number that could be seen from either side of the card (front and back).  There were 60 of them to do.

You can't do this in WORD unless you hard code the number then convert it to Word Art and flip it over.  Me do that 60 times! I don't think so.

So I decided to use the Mail Merge feature in Word and then feed in the table numbers from an Excel file.

All of this was done using Word and Excel 2010.

STEP 1 - Make an Excel file.  I made an Excel file with one column titled TABLE and then filled it the column with the numbers (auto numbering of course).

My numbers began at 29 and then went up from there.

STEP 2 - Open Word.  I opened a blank WORD document then clicked on "Mailings".

Some options will be greyed out until you click do STEP 3

STEP 3 - Point WORD at the EXCEL file. Click on "Select Receipents->Use Existing List" and then select the EXCEL file.

STEP 4 - Insert data field. When you click on the "Insert Merge Field" it will expose the name of the colums in your Excel. In my case there was only one column (entitled TABLE) but you could have more than one if your needs required it. When I select TABLE it drops it into the Word document (not to be confused with the "Table" feature in Word).

STEP 5 - Page Setup. Now set the font size for your fields, Center them if needed and then go to Page Setup and set custom margins on the page so the field prints on the bottom half of the page (card).

STEP 6 - Printing Part 1. Put the card stock in your printer then click the "Finish & Merge" button.

I had to feed my card stock into my printer manually

STEP 7 - Printing Part 2. Turn the printed cards around (and re-order them) and do the same thing over again.

BOOM! Tent cards.

How to author a strategy document

Strategy documents need to outline two key things:
the objectives of the strategy, and the goals which are necessary to achieve these objectives.

Bob Lewis explained the difference between objectives and goals to me this way:
[An] objective [is] the point of it all, described from the perspective of business benefit. So if what's being proposed is a so-called CRM system (customer relationship management) the objective might be to increase revenue and decrease the cost of sales.
["Goals" are the] changes that will occur that will result in the benefits described as the objective. For the CRM effort, the goals might include designing a new sales process, selecting, configuring and implementing software that will support the process, developing and delivering a sales training program, and so on.It's the difference between describing what will actually happen (goals) and what the business will achieve as a result (objective).To help the manager evaluate the objectives and goals, most strategy documents are structured under seven sections:Background OR Why is this important?Objectives OR How does this help the organisation?Benefits OR What will happen when we get there?Principles OR How does this fit?Strategies OR How do we make sure this works?Responsibilities OR Judging the quality of our resultsGoals OR Where are we now? And where do we want to be?NB: Objectives are sometimes referred to as the purpose of the strategy; Goals can also be known as [key] deliverables.Documents can be structured in a variety of ways, for example:1. Background2. Purpose3. Benefits4. Principles5. Strategies6. Responsibilities7. Key Deliverablesor 2. What does the organisation want?1. Why is this important?3. What will happen when we get there?4. How does this fit? Principles to follow6. Judging the quality of our results5. What will we do to get there?7. Where are we now? And what needs to happen?

Android a stolen idea

I have been reading the numerous Steve Jobs articles since his death and something really bothers me.  I am a big Android user.  My phone, my tablet and almost all of the mobile development my team does.  I like it and I like the potential of where we can take it.  However in reading the Jobs articles, he was very clear that the Android o/s was a stolen idea.  I believe what is bothering me is that even though I was not there personally, from what I have read I tend to believe the reasons behind what Jobs said.

Maybe like most technologist my age, I hang on to some idealistic view of the world and stealing something this significant is wrong even if there is never a court case that is brought forth.

Of course I know the whole "McIntosh was co-opted from PARC" story so maybe this is some type of karma payback.

But oddly I tend to give Jobs a pass but "Google as a thief" keeps lingering in my mind like some giant blue ray bit torrent movie download site.

Intranet Subsite Madness

An intranet home page needs 4 things. News, events, people and programs.  From there everything else is fluff and does not warrant the insane amount of time devoted to the creation of subsites.

Claims based auth using Live ID

This is such a cool capability it is maddening there is not one single place you can go and learn how to get this setup (and yes I have looked at every blog posting currently available). I am sure I can trial and error this till I get it to work, so I am just ranting for now.