2018-03-24 Saturday - Crypto Invest Summit West, April 30 - May 2nd, LA

I've submitted a request for a Press Pass to the Crypto Invest Summit West, that will be held April 30 - May 2nd, in LA

Goal: Publish interviews with attendees and speakers, exploring the intersection of challenges and opportunities in emerging technology for crypto investing.

https://cryptoinvestsummit.io/

2018-01-05 Friday - Meltdown and Spectre

If you have an interest in understanding the technical details of the Meltdown and Spectre bugs - here are a couple of papers and write-ups that are worth reading...

https://meltdownattack.com/

https://googleprojectzero.blogspot.com/2018/01/reading-privileged-memory-with-side.html

https://cyber.wtf/2017/07/28/negative-result-reading-kernel-memory-from-user-mode/

https://krebsonsecurity.com/2018/01/scary-chip-flaws-raise-spectre-of-meltdown/

https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2018/01/spectre_and_mel_1.html

2017-10-15 Sunday - Rabid Agile, A Gentle Criticism

One dictionary includes this definition for "Rabid": "Having or proceeding from an extreme or fanatical support of or belief in something."

This posting is intended to be a placeholder for collecting what I view as examples of fanatical Agile viewpoints held (or promoted) by others - based on my own frame of reference.


Signs You Might Be A "Rabid Agilist":


1. You Believe "The Source Code is The Design | The Documentation"

• https://intltechventures.blogspot.com/2018/07/2018-07-28-saturday-gentle-rebuke-to.html
• https://www.infoq.com/presentations/The-Code-is-the-Design
• https://less.works/less/technical-excellence/architecture-design.html
• " … the only software documentation that actually seems to satisfy the criteria of an engineering design is the source code"

2. Every Project Team Makes All Architecture Decisions Locally - No Governance

• You've misunderstood (or misread, or misapplied) the Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe)
• https://www.scaledagileframework.com/decentralize-decision-making/
  

3. You Think Every Project Can Be Forced to Fit Agile

I find the most rabid proponents of Agile (ready-fire-aim for every size project) have no appreciation for scale of when that is appropriate (perfect example of when NOT: fixed price contracts with vendors, massive development coordination between dozens of service providers, fixed deadlines - driven by market and regulatory forces) 

To an untrained eye, and based purely on that external person's observation, one might conclude that the Rabid Agilist revels in flagrant waste. 

Assuming an ∞ budget - they fail to recognize that the business has little tolerance for ∞ rework.

4. You Promote #NoEstimates Nonsense

 

• https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasonlegris/
  
• https://www.linkedin.com/posts/jasonlegris_ive-grown-to-feel-refining-an-itemstory-activity-6858089501529645056-Q4FO 
• "Estimation is reading tea leaves"
• "My plans don't have a time component."
• "Creating software is a lot like mining. It doesn't matter how much you estimate and plan, you don't have any idea what paths you will end up taking after you dig that first shaft. Reality does not bend to accomodate our wishes. Logic dictates we optimize around reality."

You are not being tasked with building a "warp drive" - most software development isn't breaking new theoretical ground - this isn't rocket science - many systems (of similar kinds) have been built (and rebuilt, and rebuilt) over many decades - so it is a poor excuse to whine it has never been done before. 

5. You Believe That The Only Participants That Matter are Developers and Customers

Fred George's "Programmer Anarchy" seems to hit all of the above, and then some:

• https://www.slideshare.net/fredgeorge/programmer-anarchy-and-managerless-processes
• GOTO 2015 • The Secret Assumption of Agile • Fred George

Caveat: Agile is a goodness, but certain practices/applications of it are not appropriate for every type/size of project.

Finally, I offer you: Meeks Software Architecture Conjecture #1:

The source code may (or may not) be a full implementation of the desired capability needed by the business - but is more likely just an approximation (constrained by permitted time, allocated budget, and available skills/talent of the team involved). Therefore it should not be confused with the actual or desired (or envisioned) design - that may require multiple years to achieve - of which the current source code may only reflect a partial (and incomplete, or inaccurate) representation.

 

Updates:

2024-05-15 Friday: 

An interesting 2023 post by Michael Küsters

• 10 Signs You're Facing an Agile Fanatic 
•  

 

2026-06-25 Thursday:  

Additional suggested reading:

• Marc Booker (VP/Distinguished Engineer at Amazon Web Services)
• Code Only Says What it Does 

 

2017-10-15 Sunday - Self-Organized Criticality - and Cycles of Corrective Collapse

In my reading this weekend - I happened upon the concept of "Self-Organized Criticality" - and that led me to consider the possible implications for evolutionary constraints on the design of some complex software systems.  The idea of "ongoing cycle of corrective collapse" resonates well with my casual observations of software needing to be refactored / rewritten - to simply make it maintainable and testable.

The point here is that organizations, generally, do not plan for such rework - they wait until the "corrective collapse".

"In 1987 a Danish physicist named Per Bak released a landmark paper introducing the concept of self-organized criticality. Bak observed that complex systems draw stability through an ongoing cycle of corrective collapses that keep the overall system from becoming too over-extended."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-organized_criticality



I've created this posting as a reminder to come back and revisit this idea in the future - I would like to explore it further in some white papers, when I have more time to write.

2017-09-17 Sunday - Cloud Decision Frameworks / Cloud Migration Strategies

On Sunday, I started collecting links to articles, checklists, and presentations that touch on the topic of providing guidance on Cloud Migration Strategies - as well as Cloud Decision Frameworks.

https://github.com/intltechventures/Lab.Architecture/blob/master/CloudComputing/Cloud_Strategy.md

Hopefully this may be of benefit to others.