Virtual Pragmatics

Collective Action

Dave Winer kindly posted his recording of Howard Rheingold's speech at Harvard earlier this week. I'm listening to it now. He discusses a number of different threads of research in collaboration, and draws this analogy with science: Descartes realized that the 'old ways' had run their course, and it was time for something new, a philosphical framework for scientific inquiry. Rheingold sees hints of another 'something new' in terms of how we understand how people work together, although its much to early to nail it down. Very interesting speech and discussion.

Master of Fine Arts, Software

Richard Gabriel has developed a proposal for a 'MFA in Software', devoted to the idea that software developemnt is a performing art, and that by reading and writing a lot of software and by paying careful attention to how it is done, extraordinary practitioners will be developed. I really like this idea, described here.

David Redmiles...

is a professor of Computer Science at UC Irvine who has done some work on the people aspect of software engineering. This post is a reminder to myself to read through the papers and other information here. Looks like some interesting stuff is in there.

Lifelong Learning

I went through the MIT Open Courseware catalog today, and came up with nearly two dozen courses I'd like to take. Which triggered the thought... I could be at this my whole life. Which triggered the thought... well, why not? Not everyone who could benefit has the 2-4-8 years, and 100K+ dollars to spare that it takes to move to Boston and go to school. But what if the courses could come to me? I could take one or two at a time, from here on out.

What I need to do is figure out how to create my own learning environment, peer group, and instructors, and get a steady diet of courses, probably for the rest of my career. And the best way to do that is probably to help others to do the same.

Has anyone read 'The Life Long Learner' by Ronald Gross?

Of course, I bet this would make a great Phd research area.

MIT Open Courseware

MIT has posted a tremendous amount of its teaching materials online, here. Anyone, anywhere, has access to materials used on campus at MIT. It's enough to make a geek drool.

The only things missing are the professors, labs, fellow students, and tuition. The tuition I can do without, but how to simulate the rest of the MIT environment, especially the bright students, teachers and researchers?

I'm looking at meetup.com, but there just aren't that many tech-heads hanging around Broward county looking to take MIT courses. At least, I haven't found them yet.

Cobwebs on the brain?

I took the GMAT yesterday. I got a good score that was below my expectations, for a reason that puzzles me. Up through my late 20's, when I took an SAT/GRE type test, my verbal and quantitative scores were comparable, within 20-30 points of each other, sometimes swapping places, always giving me totals that looked good. On yesterday's GMAT, my verbal scores remained high, but my quantitative scores were just ok. Given the amount of time I spend spinning logic and numbers around in my head, I thought that I'd retained the basics of setting up and solving equations and such. The test results tell me otherwise. It's been a long time since I drilled geometry problems, but I do something like word problems most every day as a programmer. It might be just me, but has anyone else noticed a slowdown in their algebra processing speed/quality with age, time, disuse?

Lifelong Learning

There are two strains of advice when I talk to trusted friends about the MBA idea. One is to go for it, being that education is valuable and I'm cut out for more of it.

The other flavor is that 'You can do it yourself'. I've got a reading list worth at least two-three years worth of study, with or without paying tuition. The thing I need to figure out is how to get myself to read, work the exercises, get feedback in a more systematic way than I do now. It seems clear that a set of priorities, and a curriculum would also be in order. I really do need to start a book club, or start having lunch with someone to chat over these things. In a way, that's what I'm trying to accomplish with the blog... writing in public has a way of bringing focus where it was not present.

Why leave Paradise?

Let's review the facts: I work from home, have a great boss and co-workers, make a very good living doing work that ranges from routine to interesting, live in tropical South Florida, have many great friends, own my home (well, ok, the bank and I), love my wife, love my life.

What am I trying to accomplish by doing anything different? As I write, the things on my mind are that I'm looking to grow, looking for a challenge, looking to make an impact. A friend of mine once said I had a lust for learning. I want to hang around more often with people much smarter than I am, try to do things that haven't been done before, do things that are useful beyond paying the bills and meeting the requirements, do things that matter. And be well-compensated as well!

My problems are not really problems! Seems like the best thing to do is go find someone else's problems to concern myself with, something like poverty, or homelessness, or loneliness, or despair.

Yet another statement of purpose...

I have been watching and participating in the software industry for a long time, and there are three primary things I would like to accomplish in the next round of my education:

• Exploration of software engineering as a human activity, focusing on team dynamics as well as the precise specification and measurement that is the current SE stock-in-trade.
• A grounding in the tools and language of business management, at the level of an MBA.
• A deeper appreciation for the theoretical jewels of computer science, through acquiring mathematical rigor.

Most 'software engineering' programs in academia focus on precise, mechanical specifications of systems in code and documentation. An analogy is to blueprints and buildings that are artifacts of the architectural disciplines. But I think that software engineering lies as much or more in the collective mind of the builders as it does in the specifications and code themselves. As I suspect is true with construction, it takes practiced insight, common sense and heart as much as it does blueprints to build a quality building, certainly a great one. This is not a new insight. Many writers (Weinberg, Brooks, DeMarco, McConnell, McCarthy, Beck, Cunningham, Cockburn, Fowler, Spolsky) have alluded to or dealt with this.

Most software development projects in industry avoid theory, and even methodology, if not in letter then in spirit, like the plague. It seems like too much work to apply formalisms to systems when the job 'just needs to get done, now'.

When I first read the 'Agile Mainfesto', it rang absolutely true to my experience and my sense of the real priorities of efficient and effective software development. I've been following the writings of many of the participants for years, and I see understandings emerging that I think are the way of the future in SE. I would like to add my efforts to theirs.

A recent goals list...

Things I would like to accomplish professionally...

• Join the highest rank of professionalism as a software engineer and educator.

  I wish to do this through combinations of doing, learning and teaching.
  

  
  
  • Doing: Imagine, design, build software systems that are useful and well-made, to the best of my ability as an individual and as a team member. 'ActLocally', 'LendingLibrary',
    
    
    
    • Useful: I would like to aim for more than serving the purposes of the people who contracted for the system, although doing that efficiently and responsibly is included in my definition. I would like to be involved with systems that manage to meet a greater societal good. I am inspired by things like 'VolunteerMatch' and 'MeetUp', and even 'eBay' as means for accomplishing worthwhile things that would not be possible without the web.

    • Well-Made: Produced through the application of appropriate best practices, in a collaborative environment, and of a quality sufficient to serve as examples of work to be proud of.
      
    
    
  • Learning: greater rigor in the abstract concepts required for software engineering, an appreciation for and technical facility with the artifacts and concepts of money and business, and an in depth study of individual and group dynamics, targeted at the software profession.

  • Teaching: The best way to learn something is to teach it. Teaching can be a force multiplier. What you know can be multiplied out among many. And you learn so much from your students.
    

• Get an MS, Phd, write articles, papers, courses, seminars, useful software, thesis

• Train next two-three generations in software engineering (HS, College level, junior staff teaching)

• Do research on Software Engineering as a Human Activity

• Build a software engineering training/consulting/delivery firm - SE as a Human Activity