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© 2015 The Regents of the University of Michigan
Tips from a Fellow Traveller…on the Road of Application Development
Bob Riddle, Technologist [email protected] 15, 2015 Presentation to xHub Addis (talk abstract)Slides are at: slideshare.net/tag/xhubaddis
What is a technologist?• http://www.thefreedictionary.com/technologist• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technologist
– 16 definitions, including the name of a European magazine• http://curioustechnologist.com
– a General Technology Specialist, skill-sets in many different areas
• bobriddle.notcom : someone who knows a little about a lot of things
Swiss army knife is Image public domain fromhttps://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Swiss_army_knife_open_20050612_(cropped).jpg
Specialist Technologist“someone who has deep, specific skills in one area” “someone has an intense curiosity in technology in
general, thus developing skills and experience in a variety of fields.”
“The result of spending years of education and experience on a single thing, an “expert” in that area”
“The result of becoming familiar with many different aspects, a good person to know if you’re trying to solve a problem and you’re not quite sure how to go about it.”
Why listen to me?• I have experience – writing code,
developing applications since 1973• What is experience?
–Oxford English Dictionary: “Practical contact with and observation of facts or events”
–Riddle’s Unpublished Dictionary: “What you learn from making mistakes, proceeding with ignorance, and joining the “methodology of the month club”, and watching others as they do similar things”
• “If I had to do it all over again, I would …”
How do I know if this is a great idea?
• Google phrase - > 387,000,000 results• Feel free to read all of these … one must be right!
• If I knew the answer to this, I would be giving a different talk!
• It’s up to you to peer into your own crystal ball–Things I missed that made millions of
dollars:• Pet rocks, Snuggies, Doogles• Chia pets, dog wigs, Big Mouth Billy Bass
• So … let’s move on to something I know …
Time to market matters!• Big difference I discovered when
moving from corporate world to academic world:–Banking example: Government changes
law on interest calculation/reporting that takes affect in 90 days … if bank is not compliant, they are “closed”.
–Provost insists on new student registration system and wants it deployed in 2 years. If it is not deployed in 2 years, the university is still “open”
• In the “real” world, time to market matters!–Being the 2nd, 3rd, nth to market is rarely
profitable!
so … some “rules” for the road• Focus on what matters – avoid scope
creep• My “nail in the wall” proposition, can you truly
“hang” it there?• Build a “car” before you build a “factory” to build
cars• Just because you can do something, doesn’t mean
that you should do something – avoid the “techie” temptation
• Iterative development allows ongoing feedback, remember the “customer” is always right even when they are wrong
• Form (appearance) matters as much or more than function
• Providing less sooner is usually better than providing more later – learn the difference between done and finished
• Know when to wave the “white flag” and to move on
Questions?
© 2015 The Regents of the University of Michigan
Thank you!
Contact me:Bob Riddle– [email protected] - + 1 734.330.2533www.msis.med.umich.edu
Terms of use: This presentation is shared under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License (http://www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)Swiss army knife image is …..
