2020-05-22 Friday - Sparx EA 15.2 Beta - New Modeling Capabilities

https://sparxsystems.com/products/ea/15.2/index.html

There are some significant new capabilities with the Sparx EA 15.2 Beta release.

In particular, I noted the integration of a number of JavaScript libraries: Charting, Simulation Solver Classes (supporting integration with MATLAB and GNU Octave), Maths (Cephes)

source: https://sparxsystems.com/products/ea/15.2/images/dynamic-charts.png

I'm also intrigued by the new dashboard capabilities:

source: https://sparxsystems.com/products/ea/15.2/images/dashboard-two-col.png

2020-05-14 Thursday - What Could I Do To Help You?

Photo by ian dooley on Unsplash

Yesterday I had an immensely enjoyable hour-long call with an entrepreneur and CEO - who is very active in her local angel network.

It was an hour of brainstorming, free-flowing exchange of ideas, suggestions, and intense synergy.

Through this unstructured, and wide ranging call - several follow-up actions were identified.  

Two of the start-ups within her local incubator may benefit from some introductions that I may be able to help facilitate with potential investors or partners. An initial call with the founders of the first startup is scheduled for Friday at 1pm tomorrow.

I was also able to help the CEO identify a strategy for overcoming a channel conflict issue in growing her own Artificial Intelligence venture, identifying a completely different strategy for growing her business; and identified several new revenue-generating services and products - and have offered to make two introductions on her behalf with two other women CEOs who may be intrigued/enticed/interested in either investing - or perhaps providing some mentoring to her.

I'm happy to help her - and those start-ups in their local incubator program.

This is the true purpose of my life - to help others.

What could I do to help you?

Photo by Jeremy Yap on Unsplash

2020-05-13 Wednesday - There Is No Free Lunch

Photo by Divyadarshi Acharya on Unsplash

Today's Meditation: There is no free lunch.

If someone is trying to sell you a "silver bullet" solution/platform - something that they claim is faster/cheaper/easier - you need to stop and ask some deep and probing questions - of them, and of yourself.

How open/available is access to their documentation and training for their platform?

Is their source code available to you, as a customer (i.e. think risks to your own business continuity)?

Are they willing to put their source code in escrow - to include all of the DevOps scripts that would be needed to automate standing-up your own instance (i.e. if they were to cease business operations)?

How frequently can you obtain full data extracts (and, what will be ongoing costs to keep a recent/fresh extract updated)?

What are you giving up?

What risks are being transferred to you?

What choices are being taken away?

What are the unintended consequences of the trade-offs being made?

What will you do if that company goes bankrupt?

How will you recover your data?

How will you replace/rebuild the functionality their platform delivered?

How quickly can you recover/replace that business functionality (and data) - if they were to cease operations tomorrow?

Even if you did obtain a guarantee of source code being held in escrow - how long would it take you to assemble an engineering team and configure the required infrastructure resources to self-host the solution?

Is it even feasible for you to test this apocalyptic scenario - on a regular basis?

And, if someone is dismissive of these kinds of concerns - or, dismissive of your architects who may raise them - you should really pause and ask what is their true agenda.

2020-05-12 Tuesday - Book Suggestion: Grokking Artificial Intelligence Algorithms

Today I received my preview copy of the latest version of Manning's "Grokking Artificial Intelligence Algorithms" - which I helped with during the early stages of technical editing review.

Thank you Ivan Martinovic and Manning Publications Co.

And congratulations to Rishal Hurbans on the completion of his book.

 

 

2020-05-07 Book Suggestion: Practical Guide to Agile Strategy Execution

If you are facing resistance to the idea of Digital Transformation within your organization - I suspect this recently published book, by Daniel Lambert, may be of some benefit - if it were to be broadly read across your organization:

Practical Guide to Agile Strategy Execution: Design, Architect, Prioritize, and Deliver your Corporate Future Successfully
https://www.amazon.com/Practical-Guide-Agile-Strategy-Execution/dp/B084P856HY

You may also be interested in some of Daniel's other business architecture and thought leadership writing - which I've mentioned here.

2020-05-05 Tuesday - Python Linters

I'm spending some time today researching code quality tooling for Python - and found some interesting tools that I was not previously familiar with - mentioned in Alexey Smirnov's concise write-up from November 2019:  

• Python linters for better code quality

 
This is a placeholder post - and I'll have more content in a few days - as I do some hands-on exploration of some different Python linter tools.
 
 

2020-05-05 Tuesday - YouTube Channel - Wild West Hackin' Fest

YouTube Channel: Wild West Hackin' Fest

Many deep security vulnerability insights that would be very beneficial to software engineers, architects, and managers

• https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCef0TWni8ghLcJphdmDBoxw

Some of their interesting videos:

2019

• 2019 Wild West Hackin' Fest Talks  
• Elevating your Windows Privileges Like a Boss! - Jake Williams 

2017

• 2017 Wild West Hackin' Fest Talks 

2020-05-05 Tuesday - Simple Key Test of EA Value

Photo by Dikaseva on Unsplash

A simple key test to determine whether your Enterprise Architecture (EA) practice is valued, engaged, and thriving: Count the number of times [n] in a year that the CIO has met with the EA team (to communicate their vision, share their priorities, asked for input, listened with intent to understand where is "the pain", etc.).

If [n] < 1 - your EA practice is dead (like a parrot).

If [n] < 2 - your EA practice is probably just on life support, and is likely comatose - and it likely exists only as a simulation (in your CIO's mind) - and is likely not actually producing any recognizable real value/contribution.


Note:
I wrote this posting today - as a comment in reply to Wolfgang Goebl's posting on LinkedIn of a link to an article he recently wrote: Is Enterprise Architecture Dead?

2020-05-04 Monday - A Metaphor for The Absence of Enterprise Architecture

Public Domain

A beautiful inverse metaphor for the practical value of Enterprise Architecture and Governance.

Put another way, a perfect example of the __absence__ of Enterprise Architecture.

Today's analogy: Every user/department - deciding to have their own dedicated/different application. No reuse. No governance. Also, point-to-point integration strategies, tight coupling, and single points of failure.

A telephone tower in Stockholm, Sweden, 1890. The tower served 5,500 subscribers. Each subscriber had their own dedicated cable.

• https://rarehistoricalphotos.com/the-stockholm-telephone-tower-1890/

2020-05-03 Sunday - Three Words of Encouragement: Fortitude. Faith. Focus

Photo by JOHN TOWNER on Unsplash

Three words of encouragement I send out to those who have recently suffered the loss of their job: Fortitude. Faith. Focus.

The turning of the spheres WILL bring new opportunities your way.

I know it will be hard to reach the other side - but, don't give up. There are forces that will rise to your aid - sometimes, all you need to do is ask for help.

Within your network of connections are 2nd and 3rd order connections - that once they are aware - may step forward from the shadows to aid you.

Even in the best of times - going through a job loss can be a monumentally isolating experience - and we are certainly in more difficult times now.

For those that see someone in need - even if you can't offer them an opportunity - or an introduction - just by your action in responding - you create ripples of chance: Some 2nd or 3rd order connection may see your interaction with that person - and be in a position to offer help or hope.

Be kind.

While the world may seem to be crashing around you - decide that even if you cannot help yourself - help another.

Be the light for others.

Don't let time slip away from you - invest this time in developing news skills, expanding your connections, offer to help a non-profit - whatever you can offer - get (and stay) engaged.