John Barton’s RFC.

Music

I loves my music I does, and 2011 was another corking year. Far from the madd(en)ing crowd, there’s always plenty of good stuff out there being made and re-discovered. The year started off with my continued rediscovery of Frank Zappa (one of my early music loves), and a special new liking for the 1981 album, You Are What You Is, which is as good an introduction to his music as any I reckon. Album of the year? I have two, both of which came out towards the end of 2011: 50 Words For Snow from my all-time favourite Kate Bush, and Grace For Drowning, a wonderful double album from Steven Wilson. About a month after Wilson’s album came out, I got to see him and his band live in London, and will be seeing him again in 2012: an absolutely stunning show—go and see him if you get the chance! Finally, honourable mention again for Kate Bush, this time with her May release (yes, two albums in 2011), Director’s Cut.

Work

Funny old year. In November 2010 I finished a long-term assignment in London, and decided not to jump back on the contract wagon straight away. Instead I opted for the freelance life for the next eleven months, working on all manner of projects and technologies. This has been absolutely fantastic in many regards: lots of mobile web development, some work with IBM Connections, and so on. There was some XPages action, but 2011 was really the year that Domino dropped off the radar for me, with a lot of Java, PHP, HTML5, Javascript and Ruby instead. I am now working on another contract assignment, this time in MediaCityUK, doing lots of new (and high profile) stuff, which has been a tremendous learning experience thus far.

This site

The aforementioned work events have thus left me with a wee dilemma when it comes to this site; I’m not really sure in which direction to take it. Earlier in the year I experimented with some Ruby-themed posts, and also some HTML5 and Javascript how-tos, but neither “series” made much of an impression. I guess I still get a lot of Domino people here maybe ;-) Anyway, I have a back-log of tech stuff to write about, some of which should be of interest to the yellow world, so stay tuned!

Enough navel-gazing. I wish you and yours all the very best for 2012: here’s hoping it’s better than 2011 for all of us (it’s already looking good, as Daniel Lieske has released the next chapter of his Wormworld Saga!)

Like I say, cannot wait. :-)

I realised that I hadn’t worked my ass off over the last 18 months only to hand my rights over to someone else. But I’m deeply thankful for their approach because it made me crunch my numbers and it got me thinking about the financial potential of the Wormworld Saga project. And I realised that it could work…

Daniel Lieske, I’m going fulltime with the Wormworld saga!

Let’s look at a typical cache file history over a typical day for a typical (nameless) developer. They start well:

#Build 017 09-Jun-2011 1520

They then… falter:

#WINGNUTS

Frustration kicks in…

#FOR FUCKS SAKE

And then we sometimes find ourselves in a very strange place indeed:

#SLANGPLOPPY doodle

But never fear dear (traumatised) reader! For after all this, we have TRIUMPH!

#HAH! I DID iT you BASTid!

(I can’t recommend moving on to #WHO'S YER DADDY though. That always ends in tears).

(Fret not, proper posts on this topic will be coming soon :-)).

Come now, get a grip. Everyone knows that proper developers (and, more importantly, their managers) measure productivity in lines of code.

So anyway, what with being a web geek, a sucker for adventure tales, and revelling in beautiful design, I couldn’t help but fall head over heels in love with the Wormworld Saga. I urge you to go and read the first chapter, and lose yourself in Daniel Lieske’s beautiful artwork. It’s OK, I can wait.

Fantastic eh? What’s even better, is that in a bid to make money so he can focus on the saga, he’s done really well with a Kickstarter project for a Wormworld app. And I am delighted. Both that he is now able to fulfil his dream, but also in seeing something like Kickstarter out there: it’s a fantastic idea:

Kickstarter is the largest funding platform for creative projects in the world. Every month, tens of thousands of amazing people pledge millions of dollars to projects from the worlds of music, film, art, technology, design, food, publishing and other creative fields.

A new form of commerce and patronage. This is not about investment or lending. Project creators keep 100% ownership and control over their work. Instead, they offer products and experiences that are unique to each project.

Now that’s what I call “social business” (if I really must…)

Here’s hoping for a splendiferous 2011 for us all (and let’s face it, it can’t be any worse than 2010, surely??!)

Last night was spent in the beautiful environs of the Royal Albert Hall enjoying the last night of the mighty Porcupine Tree’s current tour—and what a night it was! The gig started at 7.45, and went on ’til dead-on eleven. No support, just the band, with two small intermissions. The band opened with a semi-acoustic set at the front of the stage, featuring electric piano, guitars, double bass and brushed drums. After a break they then “went electric” and performed two cracking sets of material old and new, including much of their most recent long-player, The Incident.

Porcupine Tree are, without doubt, a force of nature. In a Facebook post last night, during one of the breaks, I said that they were (and stop me if I’m being too technical), “As tight as a gnat’s chuff.” Crikey, they were good. For example, I’ve spoken before about Gavin Harrison, and he didn’t disappoint: a truly mesmerising drummer, with a phenomenal groove underlying astonishing chops.

So… in case you’ve missed it, I really enjoyed last night (grin); it was a delight for this old muso wannabe to see musicianship of the calibre presented by Messrs Wilson, Harrison, Barbieri, Edwin and Wesley. Bravo!

(Someone has already compiled a comprehensive set-list for the night, so if you’re a fan, check it out. On a personal note, I was particularly thrilled that they did Sleep Together from 2007’s Fear Of A Blank Planet).

Now the band was right on it, the sound was crystal-clear, the venue splendid. What of the show, the visuals? Lasse Hoile has provided these for Porcupine Tree for some ten years now, and he stepped-up last night: atmospheric video and assorted imagery was projected on a pair of screens to the rear of the stage (Hoile also does all the photography and design work for their albums). The man himself came on stage at the end of the gig to photograph the audience: he makes for quite a striking character, reflected in his (often macabre) work.

A thirteen-month tour complete, what now? Happily, Steven Wilson is very prolific, and is now working on a new solo release, and this is especially exciting for me, as he has recorded with none other than Steve Hackett and Nick Beggs. Oh I think 2011 will be a good year for choons :-)

The software developer is a simple soul. Whilst you should keep yours caffeinated and with a steady supply of things to whine about (I think everyone knows those rules), there is a fine line on the “whingeing” part: you can go too far with your developer! Here are some tips to bear in mind when trying to optimise your developer experience. The focus for today’s selection is “Project management” (yes, that mythical concept). Here are some tips:

• Do not maintain covens of “Business Analysts” whose sole function is to chase developers for the status of any given issue (ignoring the expensive issue tracking system put in place to do just that)
• Timesheets. Just don’t
• Do not issue random miscellaneous report requests
• Do not assign upwards of three issues at once and expect all to be resolved within minutes, whilst running around organising emergency meetings and shouting (this is also known as “flailing”)
• Multiple issue tracking systems. Pick one, and stick to it.
• Never send round miscellaneous issues in a random email or spreadsheet (see above)
• If you assign an issue to a dev, leave it at that. No chopping ’n’ changing!
• Never invite devs to interminable meetings where issues are debated. Thrash them out first, then communicate the issues quickly. So, you know, the work can get done
• Developers aren’t so naïve as to expect managers to consult them re deadlines. But can they at least communicate them?
• Timesheets. Just… don’t
• Don’t ask developers knee-deep in code to suddenly switch focus and perform deployments. Time-table your releases in all environments, and set expectations accordingly
• Do not expect your devs to reel off every single change / fix in a given version of the software, past present and future. That’s what you bought that tracking system for (see above)
• Never say, “Where are we with this?”—that’s what you bought that tracking system for (see above)
• Estimates (AKA “guesses”) should not become absolutes
• Fucking timesheets. No no no!
• Do not combine two disparate issues into one. Once the developer has worked on part 1 for day or so, proceeding to tell him or her that part 2 is the vital bit, (“in fact we need it in UAT, like ten minutes ago!”) is likely to cause mayhem

I hope this has been educational and insightful; please feel free to add to the list in the comments…