Title: Question: Where is the C in E-Type Systems? Answer: IN Tent Making
1Question Where is the C in E-Type
Systems?Answer IN Tent Making
2Discussion Points
- Scope
- Background
- Information systems
- Is there a link?
- Seeking Answers
- The nature of E-Systems
- Tent making opportunities
- With the user
- Between developers
- Software engineering and Faith
3IS Professionals
IS professionals must have a broad business and
real world perspective. IS professionals must
have strong analytical and critical thinking
skills. IS professionals must have interpersonal
communication and team skills and have strong
ethical principles. IS professionals must design
and implement information technology solutions
that enhance organizational performance.
Source IS 2002 Model Curriculum and Guidelines
for Undergraduate Degree Programs in Information
Systems Association for Computing Machinery
(ACM) Association for Information Systems
(AIS) Association of Information Technology
Professionals (AITP)
4Attitude
The longer I live, the more I realize the impact
of attitude on life. It is more important than
appearance, giftedness or skill. .I am convinced
that life is 10 what happens to me and 90 how I
react to it. -Charles Swindol The way you
act, your feelings, and even your private
opinions will influence your team. - Watts
Humphrey, TSP, Leading a Development
Team Welcome changing requirements, even late
in development... This is a statement of
attitude. Robert C. Martin, Agile Software
Development
5We asked professed Christians in the work force
about the link between their faith and what they
do.
6Initial Questions
- How long have you been a software engineer or
involved in software engineering? - What best describes your professional life?
- What best describes your organization?
- What best describes your view of integrating
faith with the practice of software engineering? - What best describes the reason for your
participation in this study? - What best describes your history as a Christian?
- Briefly describe any specific area where your
faith has influenced how you develop software. - Skill sets C, C, Java, Perl, COBOL, Project
management, Linux, etc
7Involvement in SW Development
8Motivation
9Other Reasons to Participate
- Just because you asked
- I have some sense of how my faith influences my
practice, but am interested in how others
approach the area - I value the education I received at Calvin and I
respect their desire to do the study. If my
involvement can assist in any way, I would be
glad to participate. - Just for grins
10Where does faith play a role?
11Sample Comments
- It affects how I view my work to ensure it is of
the highest quality to bring glory to God. My
faith leads me to be more patient with my team
and our testing department. It has given me
courage to admit to mistakes and aim for
correction. - My work ethic has probably been influenced by my
faith, but that's about it - Frankly, I don't see any connection between one's
faith and software development - I prayed for my hacks to work, and they did!
12Phone Interview Team
- Jared Staal (07)
- Information Systems
- Jessica Holtrop (07)
- Communication Arts and Sciences
- Michael Bailey
- Religion
13Basic Approach
- Talk about their daily life and let the Christian
perspectives naturally evolve from the
conversation.
14General Observations
- Some reasons why a link is found
- Stewardship
- Craftsmanship (do it for the glory of the Lord)
- Opportunity to witness (tent making)
- Hiring practices
- Technical ability carries the most weight
- Character is important, but difficult to measure
- Variety of methods exists, but less than perfect
- General communication ability is critical
- No one said explicitly they consider a persons
faith
15General Observations
- Development platforms
- Open source is appreciated for the community of
giving - Open source is not always preferred.
- The problem with open source is that an
application can have the focus of a lot of
developers, but if it is no longer exciting,
support begins to wane. - Im not adamant about everything being open
source.
16Faith In the Workplace
- I think about what does it mean to do my work and
do it in excellent ways. Im called to
excellence and helping teams to do that. I
continue to wrestle how my faith ought to clearly
shape the way I do technology. - Put your focus on building relationships.
- Using my skill is my form of tent making.
17Tent Making in E-Type Systems
18System Types
- S Small systems that can be proven
mathematically - P Approximation of a problem. Changes are made
to come closer to solving the problem. (a chess
game) - E Think of the E as in Enterprise Systems
that live in the real world. The problem they
solve is likely to change. Acceptance is based
on perception.
19Lehmans Laws
20Relationships
21- Geeks and suits dont communicate well.
- Geeks and suits dont respect each other.
- Technology people and business people dont trust
each other
22Users and Technology
23Maybe the problem is
- Human cognition has a problem anecdotal
thinking comes naturally whereas scientific
thinking does not Anecdotal associations are so
powerful that they cause people to ignore
contrary evidence. - Michael Schermer, Jama and the Mountebank, Nature
Magazine, Vol 451, 7 Feb 2008, pg 628
24Imagine several dozen pages of this
- The system shall allow entry of a patrons
library card number. - The system shall flag patron records as
non-useable if there is an overdue book
associated with the account. - The system shall flag patron records as
non-useable if there is an overdue book
associated with the account. - The system shall allow entry of a book
identification number for checkout. - The system shall maintain the status of a book.
Statuses include available, checked-out, reserved
and destroyed. - The system shall maintain the status of a video.
Statuses include available, checked-out,
reserved, being-viewed, on-order and destroyed. - The system shall mark a book as checked out for a
patron provided the patron ID is entered, the
patron record is not flagged and the book status
is available. - The system shall mark a video as checked out for
a patron provided the patron ID is entered, the
patron record is not flagged and the video status
is available. - The system shall apply a date two weeks from the
current date as the due date for a book. - The system shall apply a date one week from the
current date as the due date for a video.
25Compared to
- When a patron brings books or videos to the
checkout desk, the clerk will do the following - Request the library card from the patron and
enter the number into the system. - The system will let the clerk know if the patron
may check out materials. - The clerk will enter the identification number of
each book and video into the system. - The system will create a receipt listing material
checked out and each due date. Books are allowed
to be checked out for two weeks and videos are
allowed to be checked out for one week.
26Ship first, test later.
27Testing View Differences
I Internal View The tendency of the person
responding is to have a thorough knowledge of the
code itself before determining a testing
approach. S Specification View The
respondent places greater value on the design and
specifications of a system to determine a testing
approach. B Business Value The respondent
has more of an expert customer/user view of how
to test software. Further, economic factors are
a significant factor in their consideration. R
Real World/ Randomness The respondent
believes that most things are unpredictable and
that testing in the real world is typically the
most likely approach to discovering the majority
of faults or patterns. This does not necessarily
imply recklessness.
28Project Mgrs I S B R
1 0 11 7 3
2 3 10 6 2
3 6 4 10 1
4 1 11 7 2
5 1 7 7 6
6 4 4 10 3
7 1 4 15 1
8 11 4 2 4
9 2 2 8 9
10 5 5 4 7
Totals 34 62 76 38
SW Developers I S B R
1 6 14 2 6
2 5 15 3 5
3 7 8 10 3
4 3 14 3 8
5 2 10 8 8
6 4 17 6 1
7 2 10 13 3
8 19 0 2 7
9 4 8 8 8
10 10 5 9 4
Sub Totals 62 101 64 53
29Agile Practices
- Business people make the business decision,
technical people make the technical decision - Limit work to 40 hours a week
- Determine the quality desired first (test driven
development) - Iterative development (better communication)
30Talk the Talk
- O Lord, I have never been eloquentI am slow of
speech and tongue. - Then the Lords anger burned against Moses and
he said What about your brother Aaron the
Levite? I know he can speak well..I will help
both of you speak and will teach you what to do. - NIV, Exodus 410-16
31Mike McIntosh
- Against Optimism
- humble and human share the same Latin root
humus. To be humble and to be human is to know
oneself to be of the earth and not one of the
gods. The Hebrews knew God made Adam from the
earth. Such humility makes us teachable and
ready to learn from our mistakes.
Mike McIntosh Project Manager, Amway
32Tent Making Between Developers
33What is the value of one line of code?
34Expertise
Since the cost of fixing a defect often increases
the longer the defect goes undetected, early
detection can reduce redevelopment and rework
costs. For example, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory
(a NASA software supplier) estimates it has saved
7.5 million over 300 inspections, yielding an
average cost savings of 25,000 per inspection
2.
Tyran, Craig K. et al, Improving Software
Inspections with Group Process Support
COMMUNICATIONS OF THE ACM September 2002/Vol. 45,
No. 9 pg 87
35Examples of Christian Influence
- A rule of thumb for reviews
- Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your
mouths, but only what is helpful for building
others up according to their needs, that it may
benefit those who listen. - Ephesians 429
36Pair Programming
   9 Two are better than one,       because
they have a good return for their work    10
If one falls down, Â Â Â Â Â Â his friend can help
him up. Â Â Â Â Â Â But pity the man who falls
      and has no one to help him up!
372 John 12
- I have much to write to you, but I do not want to
use paper and ink. Instead, I hope to visit you
and talk with you face to face, so that our joy
may be complete.
38More than data interfaces
Nightly feed
Mainframe Database
The system we are building.
Report data
Updated Records
Web server
Report Request
39Maintenance
- Some perception that something is finished.
- Up to 75 of a system is developed after it is
finished - Programmer ratio reduction of 7 to 1
- Often entry level developers
- Maintenaners spend approximately 50 of their
time studying code - Go from different pockets of ownership to full
ownership - Pride
- Not exciting
- Not as challenging
40Tent Making with Him
41Some challenges we consider
- You have a lot of young people making a lot of
money who care more about themselves than helping
others, explained one Internet CEO. Maybe so,
but such an explanation misses the broader ethos
of cyber culture. High-tech endeavors are
usually organized around short-term goals and
immediate practical needs ... Cyber culture is so
focused on the here and now that it implicitly
rejects the human need for a long-term vision,
let alone a moral compass. - -Quentin J. Schultze, Habits of the High Tech
Heart
42Ken Shafer
- design is His. Stewardship is ours. Software
is not an artifact to be created where in our
mind we own the software product. Rather,
software and its development is a means of
cultivating an awaremenss of who we are and what
role we are to play in a Master Plan.
Ken Shafer Consultant, Indianapolis, IN
43Coming Closer to Him
There is the creativity link. I see creativity
being part of joy. It is certainly an attribute
of God. Realizing how explicit you must be,
gives you some appreciation for the wisdom and
sovereignty of God. - Response to
questionnaire I talk to God while I develop
software, because He is smarter than I am and has
a better plan. Phone interview comment.
ASCII Values ASCII Values ASCII Values
Binary Decimal Character
01000001 65 A
01000010 66 B
44Craftsmanship
"Sometime look at a novice workman and compare
his expression with that of a craftsman whose
work you know is excellent  The craftsman isn't
ever following a single line of instruction. He's
making decisions as he goes along. For that
reason he'll be absorbed and attentive to what
he's doing even though he doesn't deliberately
contrive this. His motions and the machine are
in a kind of harmony. He isn't following any set
of written instructions because the nature of the
material at hand determines his thoughts and
motions, which simultaneously change the nature
of the material at hand. The material and his
thoughts are changing together in a progression
of changes until his mind's at rest at the same
time the material's right. Zen and the Art of
Motorcycle Maintenance
craftsman or craftsmen appear at least 41
times in the New International Version of the
Bible. Dynamic Link, pg 17
45Data Stewardship
- Collecting information is expensive
- Duplicating it is cheap
Ref Database In Peril, Nature 435, 1010 - 1011
(22 Jun 2005) New
46Managing Agreement
47Agreement on what we want
Religion
CULTURE
Leadership
Tradition
Role Specification
Strategic planning
Role Modeling
Measurements
Management
Authority
incentives
Power
Responsibility
SOP
Force
Agreement on how the world works.