The single most important subject in the realm of software development is, sadly, often ignored entirely in computer science education. That subject is workflow. I've seen altogether too many well-implemented, relatively bug-free software packages that are nonetheless miserable failures because they fail to adequately consider what the end user really needs to do and how those users go about accomplishing their work.
I'd even go so far as to say that I believe that the first "Intro to Computer Science" course ideally should involve little or no programming at all. Rather, it should focus on requirements engineering. Students should learn how to work with real end users to understand their workflows. They should learn how to write good requirements documents in prose that adequately describe the workflows they have observed so that someone could conceivably build a satisfactory software system from the requirements documentation.
"User and Task Analysis for Interface Design" by Hackos & Redish is an excellent resource that focuses specifically on this topic. "Software Engineering" by Ian Sommerville addresses the issue to some extent while providing a broad overview of software development processes.
You're just failing to envision what the real killer app is for the segway. The whole point of the thing is that it can go pretty much anywhere you can go by walking (with the exception of climbing steps and other rough terrain) but it goes there much faster than a human can walk for sustained periods of time. The killer app is door-to-door delivery. Think U.S. Postal Service. Who knows? Maybe the newspaper delivery kid could actually get the newspaper onto the porch instead of throwing it onto the front lawn.
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....sparks fly when the score is love, love.
The single most important subject in the realm of software development is, sadly, often ignored entirely in computer science education. That subject is workflow. I've seen altogether too many well-implemented, relatively bug-free software packages that are nonetheless miserable failures because they fail to adequately consider what the end user really needs to do and how those users go about accomplishing their work.
I'd even go so far as to say that I believe that the first "Intro to Computer Science" course ideally should involve little or no programming at all. Rather, it should focus on requirements engineering. Students should learn how to work with real end users to understand their workflows. They should learn how to write good requirements documents in prose that adequately describe the workflows they have observed so that someone could conceivably build a satisfactory software system from the requirements documentation.
"User and Task Analysis for Interface Design" by Hackos & Redish is an excellent resource that focuses specifically on this topic. "Software Engineering" by Ian Sommerville addresses the issue to some extent while providing a broad overview of software development processes.
Ah......another nice subsidy for high tech industry, funded by the generosity of American taxpayers.
You're just failing to envision what the real killer app is for the segway. The whole point of the thing is that it can go pretty much anywhere you can go by walking (with the exception of climbing steps and other rough terrain) but it goes there much faster than a human can walk for sustained periods of time. The killer app is door-to-door delivery. Think U.S. Postal Service. Who knows? Maybe the newspaper delivery kid could actually get the newspaper onto the porch instead of throwing it onto the front lawn.