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What Really Counts to Run a Successful Transition
Exploitation Vs. Exploration
The Decision to Self-Insure Your Software
Every software executive that faces the decision whether or not to ship code must answer the question, "Do the economic benefits of shipping outweigh the economic risks?" To decide, the executive must have a view of each. The hoped-for benefits are clear in that they are up front in the decision to build the software.
Social Technologies and Architecture
Bring-your-own-device (BYOD) means allowing the use of personally owned devices to access enterprise architectural assets and public networks of functionality and data.The emerging Semantic Web and the related changes in Web and social technologies introduce a change that is widely called the "consumerization of IT."
Risks Made to Order
As I write this, General Motors (GM) has announced its 49th through 54th recalls of the year, involving some 8.5 million vehicles. Overall, GM has recalled a staggering total of 28 million cars and trucks worldwide so far in 2014, or nearly the equivalent to all of its worldwide vehicle sales since 2011. And GM is letting it be known that yet still more recalls may be on the horizon.
Risks Made to Order
As I write this, General Motors (GM) has announced its 49th through 54th recalls of the year, involving some 8.5 million vehicles. Overall, GM has recalled a staggering total of 28 million cars and trucks worldwide so far in 2014, or nearly the equivalent to all of its worldwide vehicle sales since 2011. And GM is letting it be known that yet still more recalls may be on the horizon.
Enterprise Agile Transformation Through Centralized Practice Group -- Benefits and Challenges
Large enterprises going through the Agile transformation journey tend to set up Agile coaching groups or centers of excellence to promote and scale Agile in the organization. In this Advisor, I share the benefits and challenges of having such a central group to drive enterprise agility.
Mentoring, Diversity, and the Changing World of IT
Earlier this year, members of the International Society of Service Innovation Professionals (ISSIP), including myself, Yassi Moghaddam, Haluk Demirkan, and Jim Spohrer, wrote an article for Cutter IT Journal (CITJ) entitled, "How to Thrive as IT Professionals in a Converging ICT World." In the article, we discussed today's changing business environment and how individuals can proactively prepare for its dynamic nature.
42, Babel fish, Word Lens, and Google Glass, Part III: The Future Is Almost Here
Those of you who have been anxiously following this series of Advisors about the advances in translation technology and who have dreamed of one day having your very own Babel fish may have been wondering when "instant translation" might be available . You are about to be shocked. As it turns out, one of the largest high-tech companies in the world has announced that you will be able to do instant translation next year! That's right, next year. And it's not coming from any of the companies I've been singling out -- not Google, not WebLens -- not any of the companies that I thought were leading the translation pack. No, this instant translation is coming from a subsidiary of Microsoft, namely Skype.
Operational (Nonfunctional) Parameters in Maintenance
Given the major importance and impact of nonfunctional requirements (NFRs) on an operational system, it's worth focusing a bit more on them in the context of infrastructure and maintenance. These NFRs (often called "operational" requirements for obvious reasons) describe the many parameters of a system as it becomes operational.
Hidden Domain Knowledge
Domain analysis has been defined as "the process of identifying and organizing knowledge about some class of problems -- the problem domain -- to support the description and solution of those problems."Â Increasingly, such domain knowledge has been seen as a prerequisite for architectural understanding of a domain.
Wearable Devices in the Workplace
Mobility and Analytics: A Curious Tale
The relationship between mobile and analytics is far from simple, and it is loaded with opportunity. There's an extraordinary number of mergers and acquisitions in this area, and companies developing services include Google, IBM, Amazon, Facebook, all of the analytics firms, and a host of relative newcomers. Why is this?
Uncertainty and Organizational Self-Actualization
Attaining and Sustaining Meaningful Client Involvement
People and Their Styles
Google Glass at Work
The list of mobile devices for enterprise use has expanded to include not just smartphones and tablets, but also wearable computers like smart watches, smart glasses, badges, and other devices (to this list you can also add drones, which I covered in "D
Agile Benchmarking in Cross-Platform Product Development
An ongoing challenge in development projects that you are "making up" as you go along -- that is, incrementally adding and adjusting features through sprints -- is that it can be difficult to know how much more you have to do to be "done." A great deal of thought and effort tends to go into the definition of done at a story and epic level in Agile,
The Enterprise "Power Tool" Problem
The CIO has big problems to worry about. Intractable legacy challenges. Mobile devices in everyone's pocket. Then there's the cloud. On the one hand, new applications, increasingly powerful tools, and rising stakeholder expectations -- all within the context of constrained budgets -- lead the IT executive to focus on doing more with less. On the other hand, the complex, brittle mess of legacy continues to loom like some giant spider in a Middle Earth lair.
Using Analytics in the Big Data World: An Interview with Bart Baesens
Cutter: In your new book, Analytics in a Big Data World: The Essential Guide to Data Science and its Applications, you discuss how to target and leverage business opportunities using big data and analytics. Could you expand on what these business opportunities might be?