Machine Readable Patents
Posted: June 8, 2007 Filed under: Brian Farn, IBM, Patents, WDSC Leave a comment »Whenever you and I write software, we usually find ourselves having to design and code a few algorithms or systems. The developers on our team, have always been encouraged to submit novel methods as invention disclosures for review and patenting so that our published products are covered from an intellectual property standpoint.
Read the rest of this entry »
Visualizing the Process
Posted: June 1, 2007 Filed under: Application Diagram, Brian Farn, System i, WDSC 3 Comments »There are times when each of us needs to see the big picture. A software application contains so many layers of details that as we develop software, our brains prevent us from recalling those details and their relationships. When working on some aspect of an application, I need to remind myself of where it fits into the overall scheme of things. This is especially true if I am working four levels deep within an application call stack and a task switch occurs, such as for lunch, or a meeting, or when my spouse calls with a shopping list. I need to overcome my inertia and regain my bearings by popping my previous state off of my internal stack. These days, this can be quite a hurdle, especially right after lunch.. As such, I find that the tooling that both you and I use isn’t very helpful.
Read the rest of this entry »
The Value of Accessibility
Posted: May 25, 2007 Filed under: Accessibility, Brian Farn, IBM, WDSC Leave a comment »For decades, accessibility for people with impairments has always been a corporate priority at IBM. Yet, for the most part, the software industry tends to treat accessibility as an afterthought, even though there are various government standards such as Section 508. As our user interfaces have progressed from terminals, to desktop clients, to web pages and continue through to immersive three dimensional environments, such as Second Life, providing for accessibility becomes more difficult.
Read the rest of this entry »
The Evolution of Product Information
Posted: May 18, 2007 Filed under: Brian Farn, ID, WDSC Leave a comment »A few posts ago, I expounded at length about how people are partly unfamiliar with the usage of their devices. Until we discover a process that allows us to learn how to use things instantly, such as with a consensual mind meld, or through direct neural imprinting, we will continue to have this affliction. Even if we had one of these abilities, some of us would no doubt struggle to use it effectively.
Customers that use evolving products like WDSC, and perhaps your own creations, go through a constant learning process, which includes looking for answers to specific questions. The implication in Don Yantzi’s RSE Advanced blog post is that the power of any tool is best realized after users have gained sufficient knowledge and experience in using and combining the multiple abilities of the tool.
It is a difficult task to provide detailed information for any relatively complex product. At times it can seem like a hit and miss proposition, like casting a net only to discover that there are holes in it. To complicate matters, these questions are being asked by people with varying levels of experience, from novices who ask general introductory questions, to experienced users who ask specific, granular questions. So your net has to be both thick with large holes, and thin with small holes. Also, questions vary in scope. Some questions may involve a process that touches many features of your product, while others are confined to a small component. Is there a solution to this problem?
Read the rest of this entry »
The Continued Longevity of the Client-Server Model
Posted: May 11, 2007 Filed under: Brian Farn, VisualAge for RPG, WDSC, WebFacing Leave a comment »A recent news article, where IBM’s chairman, president and CEO Sam Palmisano declares that the ‘PC client-server model has run its course‘, raises questions about the future of desktop applications. My first reaction would be to say that there are applications, such as WDSC, that are best suited for the desktop. But is this really true?
Read the rest of this entry »
Implications of Your Internet Footprint
Posted: May 3, 2007 Filed under: Brian Farn, WDSC 1 Comment »Recently, I was made aware of a present-day practice by some employers to research potential employees by examining what they find on the Internet. Curiosity led me to investigate the nature of my own Internet footprint. I found the usual suspects, such as this blog and a few patents that I had authored. But, I also discovered a few things that I had forgotten about, including an article that I wrote for a print publication, some photographs, and bug reports that I had submitted. I soon found myself wondering, in the unlikelihood of a change in my job status, whether my Internet footprint accurately reflects what I want to convey to prospective employers, and their customers, or in the case of self employment, what I would prefer to convey to my own customers. How well does your Internet Footprint fit you?
Read the rest of this entry »
Technologies are so misunderstood
Posted: April 27, 2007 Filed under: Brian Farn, WDSC Leave a comment »About a week ago, while I was at work, an elderly neighbour of mine frantically knocked on our door and asked my wife to call emergency services. Apparently, there was a beeping in her house and she suspected that her carbon monoxide detector was emitting the sound. The fire department promptly arrived and initially had some difficulty locating the source of the aberrant behaviour. It was finally discovered that it was my neighbour’s digital clock on her oven that was at fault. One press of a button was all it took to silence the problem.
Read the rest of this entry »
The Advent of Dualing Mice
Posted: April 20, 2007 Filed under: Brian Farn, IBM, Web 2.0 3 Comments »With the advancements of computing power, storage and memory capacity, we are now able to experience software applications that most of us have never even dreamed of. It isn’t until some remarkable forward thinking people demonstrate new user interface paradigms, such as this impressive one on Multi-touch devices that we begin to realize that our descendants will think that our current graphical user interfaces are antiquated.
Read the rest of this entry »
Survival of a Programming Language
Posted: April 13, 2007 Filed under: Brian Farn, Easy of use, RPG 3 Comments »As I awoke this morning, I cast my gaze onto a set of pleated curtains and came to realize that I was looking at an array of pleats. As an array is a programming concept, I started pondering why our children are not given lessons about stacks, queues, lists, and hierarchical trees, how to recognize them in the world that surrounds them, and how to use them to organize their lives. Are these not as important as the different types of simple machines, such as levers, wheels, axles, and pulleys? And if our children are aware of these concepts, wouldn’t they expect to find them in a programming language?
Read the rest of this entry »
The Salvation of RPG
Posted: April 5, 2007 Filed under: Brian Farn, Easy of use, iSeries, RPG, System i 6 Comments »The other day while watching a Mac versus PC advertisement, I was reminded of other historical comparisons such as Betamax versus VHS and OS/2 versus Windows. Today we have their equivalents such as PS3 versus XBox, Blue-ray versus HD DVD, and the list goes on. For each technology or product, its success depends on the growth of an ecosystem and an entire industry built around a set of supporting products. One only has to look at the phenomenal number of accessories that have been created for the iPod. Whenever a person chooses one product over another, that person buys into a particular ecosystem and is limited to purchasing items that are compatible with it. Therefore the availability, cost and potential value of a system is weighed against those of other systems. So what about the System i and RPG?
Read the rest of this entry »
