1. Have they had a job? Not necessarily a programming job but just some job. I can't abide with having to teach the basic stuff like arriving on time (and on time is up to 10:00am ino ur team), calling in when sick and dressing tidy (daily showers are a bonus). But more importantly I don't want to hire someone who has good grades because mum and dad paid all the bills so they could spend all their time studying. If they've done 20 hours a week somewhere and received good grades they I'm really interested. It's nice if they've got outside interests too, Football, Church, Charity, Travel whatever. Oh and volunteer work is a huge bonus
2.Can they fit in with my team? Do they have a personality that will fit in or are they a really smart turd?
Once they start with me us I expect it to take six months before I'm getting class work out of them. I expect them to take on some of the crap jobs to start with (another reason work experience helps) but I have a plan in place. I start them on something important but not urgent so there is time for them to do rework. I expect them to make mistakes, I expect them to fix their own problems with support of peers and I expect to spend time mentoring them. They are an apprentice and I treat them like they still need training. I do not accept other developers fixing the trainees mistakes without their involvement.
If we get it wrong we cut the relationship.
I spend a lot of time on them and expect them to work hard but we're very generous with ensureing that they become a very worthwhile team member.... then the challenge is keeping them but that is a whole other story...
I love a "The Government are Idiots" story as good as anyone but this one just doesn't make sense. Last year the Birmingham Post (http://www.birminghampost.net/news/politics-news/2009/08/04/cost-of-new-birmingham-city-council-website-spirals-to-2-8m-65233-24307674/) stuck it to the council over a 383% growth in the cost of the website... it went from £580,000 to £2.8m.
Where does the £48.4m come from? It comes from Capita's case study which IS NOT about the web site (http://www.capita.co.uk/about-us/Pages/Birmingham.aspx) Birmingham Council may or may not be doing the smart thing and Capita might be ripping off the good people of Birmingham... if it's like City Councils where I live then they are probably screwing up badly but this article is a load of crap
It's not much money really but the media attention that it's going to bring (not too mention the slashdot effect) will bring in a heap of money. "If Bill's funding it it must be good" (Like Vista????)
You haven't stated what you're needing this for, I assume it's not just for your own consumption.
I work in Business Intelligence (Kimball Method Dimensional Modeling etc) and we use PeopleSoft ERP in our workplace.
We have found that the best way of displaying/using this type of eclectic data is to model it in star schemas and put it in data cubes.
This way the people who use the data can really use the data for analytical purposes... any other way just makes more work for us IT people, this is great for our pay packets but BAD for our work/life balance
You miss my point entirely... but then I didn't really articulate it very well
A few years ago I taught beginner adult computer class
One of the mums in one of the courses was concerned about her 14 year old looking at porn on the net. I went through filtering software; how to monitor what he's wanting etc but I said the best way was to have the computer in a location that meant that he could be caught at any time (she had the pc in a downstairs basement). "Oh I don't want a messy looking computer in my living area". I suggested that her son would continue to look at porn then
My concern with a specific domain is that is simply will not give protection but Mr and Mrs Ignorant will think it does; it is the parent's responsablilty to monitor their children; not the ISP; not anyone else. So I certainly concede the point that people are already ignorant and that this won't make them more ignorant; maybe this will help but I just think it will make porn easier to find
Oh and what is wrong with coding in Assembler???;-)
This is a bad idea IMHO - anything that makes mum and dad ignorant think that the Internet is a safe environment and absolves them of responsablitly for supervising their children on the internet is a bad idea.
Some aussie groups want ISPs responsible for the internet content - I think this is a bad idea for the same reason
And 55% of car deaths are because of not wearing seatbelts, that is 24 thousand deaths a year because seat belts are optional. In Australia we get fined if we don't wear a seat belt but there are thousands saved a year because of this.
It depends on the the makeup of your organisation:
Do you do ITIL?
Do you have SOX obligations or something similar if outside the USA?
Are you agile?
Can you automate your releases?
What technologies do you use?
My organisation is a large user of IT but we are not an IT company (we're a University). We have a network of about 8000 Computers (Solaris, Linux and Windows) and are heavy users of Oracle products.
We have a focus on workflow automation at all levels in the business and have around 200 IT staff. Our developers prepare releases but a dedicated team does the migrations. We use a workflow system to automate migration requests etc.
We use the releases to the user acceptance test areas as a test of the release package - Is everything there? Does it compile? etc. Some of our releases are fully automated ie PHP applications but our ERP releases are almost completely manual. We are currently running a project to increase the level of release automation.
Our process works because we treat the release package as a deliverable; we test the release mechanism along with the code in the acceptance test environment and we keep an audit trail of what is released and when.
In summary, we programmers and other IT people only want to only release tested and approved code; and to achieve this with good processes. I think a good process is a process that achieves this goal with the least amount of effort and overhead.
I was just about to submit my response when I saw your post. I think you're 100% correct
People who give money to third world projects want to know that it is being efficiently and effectively and they want to know that you're meeting a real need and really helping people.
I know this is nothing like the same scale but I was involved in some volunteer IT work at my children's school and most of the other parents involved were looking for an opportunity to sell IT equipment to the school but after a while we got down to just a small core of sincerely interested people without agendas.
Talk to groups who are looking to fund third world projects of various types. To get this kind of funding you need to be able to talk about your project to non IT people (so my sixty year old mother can understand it as I like to say). I'd emphasise the great volunteers you have and how much you can do with so little etc etc etc.
One other point. I note that you're looking for funding to help with planning too. There are groups who won't fund planning but will fund implementations. But there are also groups who like to fund planning. You may need two sets of funds for a project.
Good for the economy, but bad for the 80% in my opinion... but then I can joke about it because I live in one of the wealthy countries mentioned, but I guess if I didn't I probably wouldn't be writing this
The Commonwealth Government already know all about you if you:
1. Pay taxes
2. Get allowances for your children or
3. Have a child born.
When our 4th child was born I earned too much money to be able to claim the $15.00 per fortnight allowance so we didn't fill in the forms in the hospital ($15.00 I don't have to earn is better than a poke in the eye with a blunt stick right?). Three years later when Ethan was going to day care they (the Commonwealth Public Servants) had kittens
"When did you adopt Ethan?", "Are you his natural mother?" "When did you get possession of Ethan?" His birth certificate sorted it out in the end.
For the non Aussies out there the State Government registers births and issues birth certificates but the Commonwealth Government pays the $15.00 per fortnight and childcare allowance.
Typical of Microsoft: "Microsoft have been granted exclusive contracts to be the sole suppliers" sounds like anticompetative to me... look out... here comes the Justice Dept with a Sherman Tank
Slashdot Mirror
Well said my friend
I WAS a little unsure if BIg Data was another fad, wank word but now that SAS has a VP for Big Data I KNOW it's a Wank Word
When I hire a new graduate I look for two things.
1. Have they had a job? Not necessarily a programming job but just some job. I can't abide with having to teach the basic stuff like arriving on time (and on time is up to 10:00am ino ur team), calling in when sick and dressing tidy (daily showers are a bonus). But more importantly I don't want to hire someone who has good grades because mum and dad paid all the bills so they could spend all their time studying. If they've done 20 hours a week somewhere and received good grades they I'm really interested. It's nice if they've got outside interests too, Football, Church, Charity, Travel whatever. Oh and volunteer work is a huge bonus
2.Can they fit in with my team? Do they have a personality that will fit in or are they a really smart turd?
Once they start with me us I expect it to take six months before I'm getting class work out of them. I expect them to take on some of the crap jobs to start with (another reason work experience helps) but I have a plan in place. I start them on something important but not urgent so there is time for them to do rework. I expect them to make mistakes, I expect them to fix their own problems with support of peers and I expect to spend time mentoring them. They are an apprentice and I treat them like they still need training. I do not accept other developers fixing the trainees mistakes without their involvement.
If we get it wrong we cut the relationship.
I spend a lot of time on them and expect them to work hard but we're very generous with ensureing that they become a very worthwhile team member.... then the challenge is keeping them but that is a whole other story...
I love a "The Government are Idiots" story as good as anyone but this one just doesn't make sense. Last year the Birmingham Post (http://www.birminghampost.net/news/politics-news/2009/08/04/cost-of-new-birmingham-city-council-website-spirals-to-2-8m-65233-24307674/) stuck it to the council over a 383% growth in the cost of the website... it went from £580,000 to £2.8m. Where does the £48.4m come from? It comes from Capita's case study which IS NOT about the web site (http://www.capita.co.uk/about-us/Pages/Birmingham.aspx) Birmingham Council may or may not be doing the smart thing and Capita might be ripping off the good people of Birmingham... if it's like City Councils where I live then they are probably screwing up badly but this article is a load of crap
No Shit?
It's not much money really but the media attention that it's going to bring (not too mention the slashdot effect) will bring in a heap of money. "If Bill's funding it it must be good" (Like Vista????)
You haven't stated what you're needing this for, I assume it's not just for your own consumption. I work in Business Intelligence (Kimball Method Dimensional Modeling etc) and we use PeopleSoft ERP in our workplace. We have found that the best way of displaying/using this type of eclectic data is to model it in star schemas and put it in data cubes. This way the people who use the data can really use the data for analytical purposes... any other way just makes more work for us IT people, this is great for our pay packets but BAD for our work/life balance
No wonder the poor guy's upset - he lives in a Post Office Box
Gulp... Hope they don't ban slashdot too ;-(
You miss my point entirely... but then I didn't really articulate it very well
;-)
A few years ago I taught beginner adult computer class
One of the mums in one of the courses was concerned about her 14 year old looking at porn on the net. I went through filtering software; how to monitor what he's wanting etc but I said the best way was to have the computer in a location that meant that he could be caught at any time (she had the pc in a downstairs basement). "Oh I don't want a messy looking computer in my living area". I suggested that her son would continue to look at porn then
My concern with a specific domain is that is simply will not give protection but Mr and Mrs Ignorant will think it does; it is the parent's responsablilty to monitor their children; not the ISP; not anyone else. So I certainly concede the point that people are already ignorant and that this won't make them more ignorant; maybe this will help but I just think it will make porn easier to find
Oh and what is wrong with coding in Assembler???
This is a bad idea IMHO - anything that makes mum and dad ignorant think that the Internet is a safe environment and absolves them of responsablitly for supervising their children on the internet is a bad idea. Some aussie groups want ISPs responsible for the internet content - I think this is a bad idea for the same reason
This will never take off... we Aussies like to drink our wine and beer not waste it on irrelevant things like clothing
And 55% of car deaths are because of not wearing seatbelts, that is 24 thousand deaths a year because seat belts are optional. In Australia we get fined if we don't wear a seat belt but there are thousands saved a year because of this.
Crap he is
It depends on the the makeup of your organisation:
Do you do ITIL?
Do you have SOX obligations or something similar if outside the USA?
Are you agile?
Can you automate your releases?
What technologies do you use?
My organisation is a large user of IT but we are not an IT company (we're a University). We have a network of about 8000 Computers (Solaris, Linux and Windows) and are heavy users of Oracle products.
We have a focus on workflow automation at all levels in the business and have around 200 IT staff. Our developers prepare releases but a dedicated team does the migrations. We use a workflow system to automate migration requests etc.
We use the releases to the user acceptance test areas as a test of the release package - Is everything there? Does it compile? etc. Some of our releases are fully automated ie PHP applications but our ERP releases are almost completely manual. We are currently running a project to increase the level of release automation.
Our process works because we treat the release package as a deliverable; we test the release mechanism along with the code in the acceptance test environment and we keep an audit trail of what is released and when.
In summary, we programmers and other IT people only want to only release tested and approved code; and to achieve this with good processes. I think a good process is a process that achieves this goal with the least amount of effort and overhead.
I agree, I'm much more interested in saving time when I'm going home... than when I get to work...
I was just about to submit my response when I saw your post. I think you're 100% correct
People who give money to third world projects want to know that it is being efficiently and effectively and they want to know that you're meeting a real need and really helping people.
I know this is nothing like the same scale but I was involved in some volunteer IT work at my children's school and most of the other parents involved were looking for an opportunity to sell IT equipment to the school but after a while we got down to just a small core of sincerely interested people without agendas.
Talk to groups who are looking to fund third world projects of various types. To get this kind of funding you need to be able to talk about your project to non IT people (so my sixty year old mother can understand it as I like to say). I'd emphasise the great volunteers you have and how much you can do with so little etc etc etc.
One other point. I note that you're looking for funding to help with planning too. There are groups who won't fund planning but will fund implementations. But there are also groups who like to fund planning. You may need two sets of funds for a project.
Good Luck, I admire your passion.
It worked for Knuth
Good for the economy, but bad for the 80% in my opinion... but then I can joke about it because I live in one of the wealthy countries mentioned, but I guess if I didn't I probably wouldn't be writing this
Why not outsource it to India????
My teenagers have managed to install spyware on ALL my computers... little did I know that they could earn a living at it...
Be careful... my wife and I used to have sex, and sleep and have private time... then the sex caused children.
Now there's no sex, broken sleep and definately no private time...
and now they're teenagers ahhhh...
The Commonwealth Government already know all about you if you:
1. Pay taxes
2. Get allowances for your children or
3. Have a child born.
When our 4th child was born I earned too much money to be able to claim the $15.00 per fortnight allowance so we didn't fill in the forms in the hospital ($15.00 I don't have to earn is better than a poke in the eye with a blunt stick right?). Three years later when Ethan was going to day care they (the Commonwealth Public Servants) had kittens
"When did you adopt Ethan?", "Are you his natural mother?" "When did you get possession of Ethan?" His birth certificate sorted it out in the end.
For the non Aussies out there the State Government registers births and issues birth certificates but the Commonwealth Government pays the $15.00 per fortnight and childcare allowance.
Typical of Microsoft: "Microsoft have been granted exclusive contracts to be the sole suppliers" sounds like anticompetative to me... look out... here comes the Justice Dept with a Sherman Tank
Isn't fetching beer a violation of the first law of Robotics (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_laws_of_roboti cs)