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  • Repeat use of Schema / Rich Snippets Markup i.e LocalBusiness Data

    - by bybe
    I am unable to find official wording and I'm hoping that some Rich Snippets/Schema Guru can give me some insight into proper usage of repeated content when it comes to using markup. I'm building a site that wants to use Schema as the markup type and the owner would like as much usage as possible. The business name, telephone and address will appear on every page now is it valid or even useful to use Rich Snippets on every page where this information is displayed. For example this information appears in the header, and footer of every page of the site and too give you an example of my current markup see below: <body itemscope itemtype="http://schema.org/LocalBusiness"> <header> <a itemprop="url" href="http://www.domain.co.uk/"> <img itemprop="logo" src="image.png" alt="Company Name Logo" /> </a> <span itemprop="telephone">01202 000 000</span> </header> <div> This is where the content will go</div> <footer> <span itemprop="name">Company Name</span> <span itemprop="description"> A small little bit about this company</span> <div itemprop="address" itemscope itemtype="http://schema.org/PostalAddress"> <span itemprop="streetAddress">Address Goes here</span> <span itemprop="addressLocality">Area Here</span>, <span itemprop="addressRegion">Region Here</span> </div> </footer> </body> !-- Local Business Schema Now Closed --> So as you can see above this information will be displayed on every single page.... Is this valid or bad to repeat usage of this information in schema format...

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  • At what point would you drop some of your principles of software development for the sake of more money?

    - by MeshMan
    I'd like to throw this question out there to interestingly see where the medium is. I'm going to admit that in my last 12 months, I picked up TDD and a lot of the Agile values in software development. I was so overwhelmed with how much better my development of software became that I would never drop them out of principle. Until...I was offered a contracting role that doubled my take home pay for the year. The company I joined didn't follow any specific methodology, the team hadn't heard of anything like code smells, SOLID, etc., and I certainly wasn't going to get away with spending time doing TDD if the team had never even seen unit testing in practice. Am I a sell out? No, not completely... Code will always been written "cleanly" (as per Uncle Bob's teachings) and the principles of SOLID will always be applied to the code that I write as they are needed. Testing was dropped for me though, the company couldn't afford to have such a unknown handed to the team who quite frankly, even I did create test frameworks, they would never use/maintain the test framework correctly. Using that as an example, what point would you say a developer should never drop his craftsmanship principles for the sake of money/other benefits to them personally? I understand that this can be a very personal opinion on how concerned one is to their own needs, business needs, and the sake of craftsmanship etc. But one can consider that for example testing can be dropped if the company decided they would rather have a test team, than rather understand unit testing in programming, would that be something you could forgive yourself for like I did? So given that there is something you would drop, there usually should be an equal cost in the business that makes up for what you drop - hopefully, unless of course you are pretty much out for lining your own pockets and not community/social collaborating ;). Double your money, go back to RAD? Or walk on, and look for someone doing Agile, and never look back...

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  • Brain picking during job interview

    - by mark
    Recently, I had a job interview at a big Silicon Valley company for a senior software developer/R&D position. I had several technical phone screens, an all day on-site interview and more technical phone screens for another position later. The interviews went really well, I have a PhD and working experience in the area I was applying for yet no offer was made. So far, so good. It was an interesting experience, I am employed, absolutely no hard feelings about this. Some of the interviewers asked really detailed questions to the point of being suspicious about new technologies I have been working on. These technologies are still in development and have not come to market yet. I know some major hardware/software companies are working on this too. I have had many interviews before and based on my former interviewing experience and the impression some of the interviewers left behind, I know now all this company wanted from me is to extract some ideas about what I did in this field. Remember, I am referring to a R&D position, not the standard software developer stuff. Has anybody encountered this situation so far? And how did you deal with it? I am not so much concerned about "stealing" ideas but more about being tricked into showing up for an interview when there is no intension to hire anyway. I am considering refusing technical interviews in the future and instead proposing a trial period in which the company can easily reconsider its hiring decision.

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  • What should happen at the start of a software project startup?

    - by Willem
    A quick introduction My college semesters include a 8 week project working for an actual company with a software need in order to get some much needed practical experience. I have just started such a project with 5 other students. We're required to spend roughly 40 hours a week per student on this project. We're working with SCRUM as the software development method, this was assigned by our teachers. The question Day one of the project just ended which has created some questions for me as to how to start a project in the 'real world'. Our first day included working on a project planning document (not sure what the English term is), creating a appointment with the company for an introduction and the opportunity to start specifying the requirements and setting up some standards for the behavior within the group. However these items didn't take that long to finish. We've made some concrete plans for tomorrow and the day after we'll meet the company. This still leaves several hours of 'work-time' unspent. Is it usual not being able to fill every hour of a day for work at the start of a project or are we simply too inexperienced to see what work needs to be done at this stage of a project, or are we, perhaps, going through the above list too fast? How does this work in the 'real world'? Do you spend your time wondering 'what should I do now', or do you have a clear view of what you're supposed to do at that moment?

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  • Failed Project: When to call it?

    - by Dan Ray
    A few months ago my company found itself with its hands around a white-hot emergency of a project, and my entire team of six pulled basically a five week "crunch week". In the 48 hours before go-live, I worked 41 of them, two back to back all-nighters. Deep in the middle of that, I posted what has been my most successful question to date. During all that time there was never any talk of "failure". It was always "get it done, regardless of the pain." Now that the thing is over and we as an organization have had some time to sit back and take stock of what we learned, one question has occurred to me. I can't say I've ever taken part in a project that I'd say had "failed". Plenty that were late or over budget, some disastrously so, but I've always ended up delivering SOMETHING. Yet I hear about "failed IT projects" all the time. I'm wondering about people's experience with that. What were the parameters that defined "failure"? What was the context? In our case, we are a software shop with external clients. Does a project that's internal to a large corporation have more space to "fail"? When do you make that call? What happens when you do? I'm not at all convinced that doing what we did is a smart business move. It wasn't my call (I'm just a code monkey) but I'm wondering if it might have been better to cut our losses, say we're not delivering, and move on. I don't just say that due to the sting of the long hours--the company royally lost its shirt on the project, plus the intangible costs to the company in terms of employee morale and loyalty were large. Factor that against the PR hit of failing to deliver a high profile project like this one was... and I don't know what the right answer is.

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  • What alternative is better to diagram this scenario?

    - by Mosty Mostacho
    I was creating and discussing a class diagram with a partner of mine. To simplify things, I've modify the real domain we're working on and made up the following diagram: Basically, a company works on constructions that are quite different one from each other but are still constructions. Note I've added one field for each class but there should be many more. Now, I thought this was the way to go but my partner told me that if in the future new construction classes appear we would have to modify the Company class, which is correct. So the new proposed class diagram would be this: Now I've been wondering: Should the fact that in no place of the application will there be mixed lists of planes and bridges affect the design in any way? When we have to list only planes for a company, how are we supposed to distinguish them from the other elements in the list without checking for their class names? Related to the previous question, is it correct to assume that this type of diagram should be high-level and this is something it shouldn't matter at this stage but rather be thought and decided at implementation time? Any comment will be appreciated.

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  • What are some good seminar topics that can be used to improve designer&developer communication?

    - by tactoth
    Hello guys the thing I'll tell is what happens in the company I work for but I know it's more like a common issue in software companies. I'm development team leader in a internet service company that provides service that's very similar to dropbox. In our company we have mainly two divisions: the tech division and the designers division, both have their own reporting hierarchy. Designers focus on designing UI and prioritizing features, while developers focus on implement designers' ideas (more like being driven as our big boss has said). Then here comes our issue: the DEV team and DES team communicate very bad. DEV complain DES for these reasons: Too frequent changing of requirements Too complicated interaction (our DEV team has actually learned many HCI principles) Documents for design are incomplete, usually you just get 'design principles' and it's up to DEV to complete design details. When you find design defects, you ask DES team to resolve them, then DES team quickly change the principles and you gonna spend another several weeks because the change is so fundamental. While DES complain DEV for these reasons: Code architecture is not good enough to adapt to changing requirements (Obviously DES knows something about software development) Product design is about principles, not details. DEV fails to realize this. Communication should be quick and should be mainly oral. Trying to make most feature discussion in document for reference is too overloaded and doesn't make sense. As you can see, DEV and DES have different ideas on product design, and encourages very different practice. We have this difference because of the way we work. So our solution is that we should plan some seminars to make each part more aware of the way the other part work. Then my question is, what are some good topics for such seminars? Guessing some people may not think seminars can solve this problem, please also suggest your solution.

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  • How should I describe the process of learning someone else's code? (In an invoicing situation.)

    - by MattyG
    I have a contract to upgrade some in-house software for a large company. The company has requested multiple feature additions and a few bug fixes. This is my first freelance style job. First, I needed to become familiar with how the application worked - I learnt it as if I was a user. Next, I had to learn how the software worked. I started with broad concepts, and then narrowed down into necessary detail before working on each bug fix and feature. At least at the start of the project, it took me a lot longer to learn the existing code than it did to write the additional features. How can I describe the process of learning the existing code on the invoice? (This part of the company usually does things in-house, so doesn't have much experience dealing with software contractors like me, and I fear they may not understand the overhead of learning someone else's code). I don't want to just tack the learning time onto the actual feature upgrade, because in some cases this would make a 'simple task' look like it took me way too long. I want break the invoice into relevant steps, and communicate that I'm charging for the large overhead of learning someone else's code before being able to add my own to it. Is there a standard way of describing this sort of activity when billing for a job?

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  • Ideas to tackle unwanted bad press/review on Google's SERP?

    - by Rob
    After Googling our company name to our horror we've found someone on Yelp.co.uk has reviewed our company. On the SERP your eye is immediately drawn to the 2 star review some complete stranger has written, which to be honest is pure slander! The most infuriating thing is the person who reviewed our company has never even been a client/customer. It's a bit like me reviewing a restaurant having never eaten or even been in there! We've sent her a private message on Yelp to remove the review and also sent a complaint to Yelp themselves but have yet to get a reply. We've resisted going mad at the reviewer and also requested that she re-review us having just relaunched our new website (it still riles us that she's not even a client though!). We've had genuine customers/clients review us on Yelp yet this 2 star review remains on Google's SERP. Roughly how long would it take to for our new reviews to over take this review? Does anyone have any suggestions as to how we can push the review off the 1st page of Google's SERP or any creative ways in which we can tackle this issue?

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  • Could these people get arrested? [closed]

    - by Vinicius Horta
    I have seen many of what is called 'private servers' mmorpg (multiplayer online games), which uses stolen sources,modified executable, clients and server. People launch up their own server using VPS or dedicated server and distribute online service among players disclaiming it has educational purposes only, saying they are studying the game engine and selling items for players disclaming it as 'donations', so it seems like they are getting donations to keep studying. We all know it's a comercial method. All of it is copyrighted material from enterprise ABCD. (ABCD = Fictional name, I'm not mentioning names). At their website they include the following: "Private Server XXXX" does not allow/support any conection to any company/organization associated with the game "XXXX". If you are anyway affiliated with enterprise "XXXXXXX", or any other company/organization associated with the game "XXXX" you may not view/open/read/execute/play/download any part of "Private Server XXXX" nor view "Private Server XXXX" website, if any company/organization requests you to investigate our website/server, you may not view "Private SERVER XXXX" or execute any action mentioned above. Any person caught disobeting this disclaimer will be punish to the fulleste extent of law. Can this guys get arrested? Do they disclaimer works? If I'm owner of enterprise X and I know people stole my source and are using them but they have such disclaimer I'm not allowed to investigate them?

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  • IDC Recommends Oracle Solaris 11

    - by user12611852
    IDC published a research report this week on Oracle Solaris 11 and described it as "Delivering unique value."  The report emphasizes the ability of Oracle Solaris to scale up and provide a mission critical platform for a wide variety of computing. Solaris built-in server and network virtualization helps to lower costs and enable consolidation while reducing administration costs and risks. Learn more about Oracle Solaris and the recently announced 11.1 update. In their conclusion, IDC reports: Today, Oracle is a multi-OS vendor that is adjusting to the opportunities presented by a significantly expanded product portfolio. The company has a long history of supporting Unix operating systems with its broad product portfolio, but the main difference is that now Oracle has direct control over the destiny of the Solaris operating system. The company has made a strong commitment to Solaris on both SPARC and x86 systems, as well as to Linux on x86 systems, and expects to continue to enhance Oracle Solaris 11 with update releases once a year as well as Solaris 12, which is already on the road map. Oracle is working to help its customers understand its strong commitment to Oracle Solaris and the product's role as a single operating system that runs on both SPARC and x86 processors. While Oracle Solaris and Oracle Linux are critical assets, the company's crown jewel is the deep collection of software that runs on top of both Oracle Solaris and Oracle Linux, software that creates a robust application environment. The continuing integration and optimization of the software and hardware stack is a differentiator for Oracle and for customers that run an Oracle Solaris stack.

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  • Should CV contain cases where certain party fools me and not pay salary? Is it "holiday" time or not?

    - by otto
    Suppose I am fooled to work in a start-up or a company that has been a very small over a long time, let say 10 years. I work them 3 months and I really enjoy the work -- I learn a lot of new skills such as Haskell, MapReduce, CouchDB and many other little things. Now the firm did not pay any salary: A) I may be unskilled, B) I did not meet some deadline (I don't know because I am not allowed to speak to the boss but I know that I am not getting any payment) or C) I was fooled. Some detail about C I heard that the firm have had similar cases from my friend, "The guy X was there and he said he does not trust the firm at all so he went to other firm". I don't know what the term "trust" mean here, anyway the firm consists of ignorant drop-outs that hires academic people, a bit irony. They hire people from student-organizations and let them work and promise ok -compensation but -- when you start working the co-employer starts all kind of instructions "Do not work so hard, do not work so long, do not work so much" -- it is like he is making sure you do not feel sad when he does not pay any salary (co-employer is an owner in the firm). Anyway, I learnt a ton in the company but it was very inefficient working. I worked only alone, not really working in a "company". Now should by resume contain references to the firm and the guy who did not pay me anything? Or should my resume read that I worked in XYZ -technologies -- but 1 year's NDA -- what can write here? Now I fear that if I put the firm to my resume: they will lie about my input to my next employer. I feel they are very dishonest. On the other hand, I want to make it sure that I have worked over the time. So: Should my CV contain the not-so-good or even awful employers that may be fooling people to work there? I am pretty sure everyone knows the firm and its habbits, circles are small but people are afraid to speak.

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  • How to tackle an experienced C# Programmer?

    - by nandu.com
    I am a noob in c# and asp.net developing. I have spent 6 months in design and another 6 in sql and asp.net programming. I just know the basics of asp.net and C#. I was programming as per the instruction of my tech leads and all good things changed in a day. :( All my tech leads (2+ experienced) left the company complaining about salary. And instead of those, company has recruited a 5+ experienced programmer cum tech lead (who is very strict), he is expecting me to code anything he says. Previous seniors of me, would say 'use ajax for this, use query for this instead of coding' and so on. I will do it exactly. I am not experienced enough to perform it myself. Now I am in a dilemma. I want to stay in the company and learn some more, but this new tech lead is expecting me to learn everything myself (he is telling me to learn jquery, javascript menus, session and chart in .Net, and so on and do things myself without asking him anything...I mean anything) :(((( PLease suggest to me some good tips to handle him. I think all programmers world wide would have faced a similar problem atleast once in the big programming life. So please..help .. 911

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  • Should a software developer get a yearly equipment budget?

    - by CrazyDart
    I am looking at a new position with a new company. I have talked to some people in the past (in general, not at this company) that they had been given a yearly budget to buy new computer stuff to keep up to date. Now why I feel this question is worth asking here is that Joel comes right out and says an employer should pay for the best equipment money can buy... within reason of course. From The Joel Test: 12 Steps to Better Code 9. Do you use the best tools money can buy? Writing code in a compiled language is one of the last things that still can't be done instantly on a garden variety home computer... Top notch development teams don't torture their programmers. Even minor frustrations caused by using underpowered tools add up, making programmers grumpy and unhappy. And a grumpy programmer is an unproductive programmer... Does anyone know if the industry has such a standard to offer an allowance or budget? I have never worked for a company like this, but I am thinking I should toss this in the ring for negotiations. Seems reasonable. How do bigger companies like MS, Google, and Apple handle this? If you say yes, give a range... I have been told numbers from $5k to $10k. Seems high to me, but hey I would gladly take it.

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  • Need Directions to become a programmer [closed]

    - by Omin
    Before youguys go on about how there are many types of programmers, please read through the post. Long term goal: Develop my own software (company) Short term goal: Get a job that involves coding/programming Current status: Support Analyst (at a software company but does not involve any programming) with 40k salary, 3rd year computer engineering student I had everything figured out. I'm going to develop a 2D scrolling game for iphone or android, publish the app, sell a bunch, and then apply at a studios as a software developer. And then something hit me. I think I need to get a job that involes programming to learn as much as I can in the shortest time possible. So I got a phone interview at a fast growing start up software company, passed that no problem, but then had to take an online technical assessment. That failed miserably. I thought that if I could just present myself, show that I am hard working, positive attitude, eager to make self improvements, type of a guy, I could get the job. I was wrong. And now, I am lost. Im thinking of staying with my job until I find a new one as a programmer. I will be working, self studying, and trying to make this happen without finishing university. I forgot to mention that the online technical assessment was based on data structures/algorithms, OO design, runtime complexity. I was hoping that I could get some guidence. Should I be focusing on app development or study computer science fundamentals? I have a list of books I can be going through: Learning C# O'Reilly (I got interested in C# because of Unity3D and Mono), C# 5.0 in a Nutshell, Head First Design Patterns, Code Complete, Introduction to Algorithms, Programming Interviews Exposed, Cracking the Coding Interview, The Google Resume.

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  • EmblaCom Oy Maximizes Database Availability and Reduces Costs with MySQL Cluster

    - by Bertrand Matthelié
    Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0cm; mso-para-margin-right:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0cm; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} Headquartered in Finland, EmblaCom Oy provides turnkey and cloud-hosted voice solutions to mobile operators around the globe. Since launching the original mobile private branch exchange (PBX) in 1998, the company has focused on helping its partners provide efficient voice communications to their key business customers. The company’s voice solutions are used by millions of subscribers, worldwide. EmblaCom Oy needed to replace several database engines with a standardized, scalable, development-friendly database solution to maximize availability and cut costs. The company chose MySQL Cluster Carrier Grade Edition, which has maximized accessibility to EmblaCom’s services for its clients and their hundreds of thousands of subscribers. The initiative has also reduced, by half, the cost of the database solution installation for customers, as well as lowered maintenance and customer service costs. Read the entire case study here.

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  • How to handle the fear of future licensing issues of third-party products in software development?

    - by Ian Pugsley
    The company I work for recently purchased some third party libraries from a very well-known, established vendor. There is some fear among management that the possibility exists that our license to use the software could be revoked somehow. The example I'm hearing is of something like a patent issue; i.e. the company we purchased the libraries from could be sued and legally lose the ability to distribute and provide the libraries. The big fear is that we get some sort of notice that we have to cease usage of the libraries entirely, and have some small time period to do so. As a result of this fear, our ability to use these libraries (which the company has spent money on...) is being limited, at the cost of many hours worth of development time. Specifically, we're having to develop lots of the features that the library already incorporates. Should we be limiting ourselves in this way? Is it possible for the perpetual license granted to us by the third party to be revoked in the case of something like a patent issue, and are there any examples of something like this happening? Most importantly, if this is something to legitimately be concerned about, how do people ever go about taking advantage third-party software while preparing for the possibility of losing that capability entirely? P.S. - I understand that this will venture into legal knowledge, and that none of the answers provided can be construed as legal advice in any fashion.

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  • How to build an API on top of an existing Rails app with NodeJs and what architecture to use?

    - by javiayala
    The explanation I was recently hired by a company that has an old RoR 2.3 application with more than 100k users, a strong SEO strategy with more than 170k indexed urls, native android and ios applications and other custom-made mobile and web applications that rely on a not so good API from the same RoR app. They recently merged with a company from another country as an strategy to grow the business and the profit. They have almost the same stats, a similar strategy and mobile apps. We have just decided that we need to merge the data from both companies and to start a new app from scratch since the RoR app is to old and heavily patched and the app from the other company was built with a custom PHP framework without any documentation. The only good news is that both databases are in MySQL and have a similar structure. The challenge I need to build a new version that: can handle a lot of traffic, preserves the SEO strategies of both companies, serve 2 different domains, and have a strong API that can support legacy mobile apps from both companies and be ready for a new set of native apps. I want to use RoR 3.2 for the main web apps and NodeJs with a Restful API. I know that I need to be very careful with the mobile apps and handle multiple versions of the API. I also think that I need to create a service that can handle a lot IO request since the apps is heavily used to create orders for restaurants at a certain time of the day. The questions With all this in mind: What type of architecture do you recommend me to follow? What gems or node packages do you think will work the best? How do I build a new rails app and keep using the same database structure? Should I use NodeJS to build an API or just build a new service with Ruby? I know that I'm asking to much from you guys, but please help me by answering any topic that you can or by pointing me on the right direction. All your comments and feedback will be extremely appreciated! Thanks!

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  • Upon Reflection

    - by foxjazz
    During my tenure at the last company, I didn't let my career stagnate as others have and as time moved along.When at work or home, spend 10% of your time learning something new about some aspect or segway of your job so that your skills are marketable in case you lose it. From experience let me reinforce that it pays off. It pays off in your current job because of the education received and the competence increase of your skills which applied will bring recognition.In these days and times, loyalty to a company is truly at an end. However many companies do care about cultivating their employees which creates a brand of loyalty that can't be replaced. Old companies with the Corp. mentality (or because of the corp. mentality) ever decrease their budgets on organizational sections and thereby do a RIF as a matter of business.The mistakes they make during this process can be risky. But who am I, but a lowly ole programmer, to judge risk. If you are laid off, be friendly with your past manager, and based on simple questions and help, give whatever help you can over the phone even though you are under no obligation to do so.It is also quite possible that there are opportunities to make at home with a new company in the future. Just remember that when inquiring about a position, take advantage of the training that is offered, and keep yourself emotionally and educationally fit.Talk soon,foxjazz

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  • Should I Open Source? [closed]

    - by Howdy_McGee
    My company recently created a full javascript, html & css Virtual Tour. Since it is html based there is no real way of securing our information/code so selling it could be flimsy. We are an extremely small company, barely on the map so I was thinking that by making this an open source project it could give us a chance to jump start our SEO by page views alone, especially if we provide documentation. Not to mention hopefully bring a community following on our blog. On the other hand though could this possibly hurt our sales as a web development company? If we are handing out this cool "plugin" we made what keeps people from making it commercial somehow? So I'm trying to weigh the options on whether I should make this Open Source or not and the pros / cons of each especially for a small business. What do you guys think about making things Open Source? How do I know if this product is the right thing to make Open Source? What are some pros and cons to going Open Source?

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  • Moving soon, fiancee has new job: how to transition?

    - by Anonymous
    I've found myself in a sort of conundrum lately and I figured Stack Overflow would be the place to ask this question. I normally post under my personal account here, but I'm writing in anonymously this time so as to make sure my co-workers don't find out too early that I'll be leaving them behind in a few months. My fiancee just landed a great software development job at a very large, stable company. She'll be starting after she graduates and just after we get married (May to June-ish). Her compensation and benefits package will be more than enough to take care of both of us, so I agreed to step down from my current position so we could move to a larger city with more opportunities. I'll probably take a few weeks off to decompress, but I don't want to stay unemployed very long. Since there will be less pressure on me to bring home a second income though, we're not as adverse to risk as we normally would be. I'm currently debating whether to eventually seek employment at a small company, a larger company, do contract work, or do something else entirely. I haven't been in the software development business long (2-3 years plus some small personal projects), but I've seen what things can be like at a startup (my first job) and at a more established, mid-sized business (my current job). Most importantly what I'm looking for out of a new employment opportunity is challenge and variety. Does this situation describe anyone on SO? If so, what did you do/what are you doing? How is it working out for you? Programming is a pleasure as well as a career skill for me, so I want to make sure it stays that way. Thanks to all in advance for any responses.

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  • What would be your thoughts in this situation?

    - by craftsman
    Imagine there's a businessman who has a solid internet idea. He hires you as his first employee and pays you well (also offers you shares if product generates revenue). You code the product for more than a year. But the product is not properly marketed and left almost unused. You get frustrated by loneliness and working endlessly on an unused product. You start applying at different companies. You don't get response from anyone. After a month, you realize that things are beginning to change. The businessman has started to give more attention to the product. You have defined a solid marketing plan with him. Things are almost sure to work. Suddenly one day, you get a call from a big company you yearned to work for. They invite you for an interview. If you respond to the interview and get the job, you will lose the chance to earn something from your one year hard-work. If you don't respond, you will obviously miss the chance to work in the big company. If your marketing doesn't work as well (you will know it in a couple of months), you will probably not get a chance in the big company again. What would be your decision?

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  • In Email, Image (img) Source (src) Tags are rewritten as relative links. How to fix?

    - by Noah Goodrich
    I'm working on sending out an html based email, and every time it sends the image src tags and some of the anchor href tags are modified to be relative url's. Update 2: This is happening between when the body of the email is generated and sent and when it arrives in my inbox. Update: I am using Postfix on a LAMPP server. In addition, I am using Zend_Mail to send the emails out. For example, I have a link: src="http://www.furnituretrainingcompany.com/images/email/highpoint_2009_04/header.jpg" And it gets rewritten as: src="../../../../images/email/highpoint_2009_04/header.jpg" What can cause this to occur and how is it corrected? Email headers: Return-Path: <[email protected]> X-Original-To: [email protected] Delivered-To: [email protected] Received: by mail.example.com (Postfix, from userid 0) id 6BF012252; Tue, 14 Apr 2009 12:15:20 -0600 (MDT) To: Gabriel <[email protected]> Subject: Free Map to Sales Success From: Somebody <[email protected]> Date: Tue, 14 Apr 2009 12:15:20 -0600 Content-Type: text/html; charset="utf-8" Content-Transfer-Encoding: multipart/related Content-Disposition: inline Message-Id: <[email protected]> Original content to be sent out: <table align="center" border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="600"> <tbody> <tr> <td valign="top"> <a href="http://www.furnituretrainingcompany.com"> <img moz-do-not-send="true" alt="The Furniture Training Company - Know More. Sell More." src="http://www.furnituretrainingcompany.com/images/email/highpoint_2009_04/header.jpg" border="0" height="123" width="600"> </a> </td> </tr> </tbody> </table> <table align="center" border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="600"> <tbody> <tr> <td valign="top"><img alt="Visit us at High Point to receive your free training poster" src="http://www.furnituretrainingcompany.com/images/email/highpoint_2009_04/hero.jpg" moz-do-not-send="true" height="150" width="600"><br> </td> </tr> </tbody> </table> <table align="center" border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="600"> <tbody> <tr> <td bgcolor="#ffffff" valign="top"><img alt="" src="http://www.furnituretrainingcompany.com/images/email/highpoint_2009_04/spacer_content_left.jpg" moz-do-not-send="true" height="30" width="30"><br> </td> <td bgcolor="#ffffff" valign="top"><font originaltag="yes" style="font-size: 9px; font-family: Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;" color="#000000" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="1"><big><big><big><big><small><big><b>See you at Market</b></big><br> </small></big></big></big></big></font> <font originaltag="yes" style="font-size: 9px; font-family: Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;" color="#000000" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="1"><big><big><big><big><small><br> </small></big></big></big></big></font><small><font face="Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif">Visit our space to get your free Map to Sales Success poster! This unique 24 X 36 color poster is your guide to developing high volume salespeople with larger tickets. Find us in the new NHFA Retailer Resource Center located in the Plaza. <br> <br> Don&#8217;t miss Mark Lacy&#8217;s entertaining seminar "Help Wanted! My Sales Associates Can&#8217;t Sell Water to a Thirsty Camel." He&#8217;ll reveal powerful secrets for turning sales associates into furniture experts that will sell. See him Saturday, April 25th at 11:30 AM in the seminar room of the new NHFA Retail Resource Center in the Plaza. <br> <br> Stop by our space to learn how our ingenious internet-delivered training courses are easy to use, guaranteed to work, and cheaper than the daily donuts. Over 95% report increased sales. <br> <br> Plan to see us at High Point. </font></small> <font originaltag="yes" style="font-size: 9px; font-family: Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;" color="#000000" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="1"><big><big><big><big><small><small><br> <br> <br> <br> </small></small></big></big></big></big></font><small><font originaltag="yes" style="font-size: 9px; font-family: Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;" color="#000000" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="1"><big><big><big><small> </small></big></big></big></font></small> <a href="http://www.furnituretrainingcompany.com/map"><img alt="Find out more" src="http://www.furnituretrainingcompany.com/images/email/highpoint_2009_04/image_content_left.jpg" moz-do-not-send="true" border="0" height="67" width="326"></a><br> <br> </td> <td bgcolor="#ffffff" valign="top"> <img alt="" src="http://www.furnituretrainingcompany.com/images/email/highpoint_2009_04/spacer_content_middle.jpg" moz-do-not-send="true" height="28" width="28"><br> </td> <td bgcolor="#ffffff" valign="top"><img alt="Roadmap to Sales Success poster" src="http://www.furnituretrainingcompany.com/images/email/highpoint_2009_04/image_content_right.jpg" moz-do-not-send="true" height="267" width="186"><br> <font face="Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif"><small><font originaltag="yes" style="font-size: 9px; font-family: Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;" color="#000000" size="1"><big><big><big><small><b>Road Map to Sales Success<br> </b><br> </small></big></big></big></font>This beautiful poster is yours free for simply stopping by and visiting with us at High Point. <span class="moz-txt-slash">Our space is located inside the </span>new NHFA Retailer Resource Center in the Plaza Suites, 222 South Main St, 1st Floor. We will be at market from Sat April 25th until Thur April 30th. </small></font><br> </td> <td bgcolor="#ffffff" valign="top"><img alt="" src="http://www.furnituretrainingcompany.com/images/email/highpoint_2009_04/spacer_content_right.jpg" moz-do-not-send="true" height="30" width="30"><br> <br> </td> </tr> </tbody> </table> <table align="center" border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="600"> <tbody> <tr> <td bgcolor="#ffffff" valign="top"><img alt="" src="http://www.furnituretrainingcompany.com/images/email/highpoint_2009_04/disclaimer_divider.jpg" moz-do-not-send="true" height="25" width="600"><br> </td> </tr> </tbody> </table> <table align="center" border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="600"> <tbody> <tr> <td bgcolor="#ffffff" valign="top"><img alt="" src="http://www.furnituretrainingcompany.com/images/email/highpoint_2009_04/spacer_disclaimer_left.jpg" moz-do-not-send="true"></td> <td bgcolor="#ffffff" valign="top"><img alt="" src="http://www.furnituretrainingcompany.com/images/email/highpoint_2009_04/spacer_disclaimer_middle.jpg" moz-do-not-send="true"><br> <font originaltag="yes" style="font-size: 9px; font-family: Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;" color="#666666" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="1"><big><big><big><big><small><small><small>If you are not attending the High Point market in April but would still like to receive a free Road Map to Sales Success poster visit us on the web at <u><a moz-do-not-send="true" class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="http://www.furnituretrainingcompany.com">www.furnituretrainingcompany.com</a></u>, or to speak with a Furniture Training Company representative, call toll free (866) 755-5996. We do not offer free shipping outside of the U.S. and Canada. Retailers outside of the U.S. and Canada may call for more information. Limit one free Road Map to Sales Success per company. Other copies of the poster may be purchased on our web site.<br> <br> </small></small></small></big></big></big></big></font> <font color="#666666"><small><font originaltag="yes" style="font-size: 9px; font-family: Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="1"><big><big><big><small><small>We hope you found this message to be useful. However, if you'd rather not receive future emails of this sort from The Furniture Training Company, please <a moz-do-not-send="true" href="http://www.furnituretraining.com/contact">click here to unsubscribe</a>.<br> <br> </small></small></big></big></big></font></small><small><font originaltag="yes" style="font-size: 9px; font-family: Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="1"><big><big><big><small><small>&copy;Copyright 2009 The Furniture Training Company.<br> 1770 North Research Park Way, <br> North Logan, UT 84341. <br> All Rights Reserved.</small></small></big></big></big></font></small></font><br> </td> <td bgcolor="#ffffff" valign="top"><img alt="" src="http://www.furnituretrainingcompany.com/images/email/highpoint_2009_04/spacer_disclaimer_right.jpg" moz-do-not-send="true"></td> </tr> </tbody> </table> <table align="center" border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="600"> <tbody> <tr> <td bgcolor="#ffffff" valign="top"><img alt="" src="http://www.furnituretrainingcompany.com/images/email/highpoint_2009_04/footer.jpg" moz-do-not-send="true"> </td> </tr> </tbody> </table> <br> <br> Content that gets sent: <table border=3D"0" cellspacing=3D"0" cellpadding=3D"0" width=3D"600" al= ign=3D"center">=0D=0A<tbody>=0D=0A<tr>=0D=0A<td valign=3D"top"><a href= =3D"http://www.furnituretrainingcompany.com"> <img src=3D"http://www.fur= nituretrainingcompany.com/images/email/highpoint_2009_04/header.jpg" bor= der=3D"0" alt=3D"The Furniture Training Company - Know More. Sell More."= width=3D"600" height=3D"123" /> </a></td>=0D=0A</tr>=0D=0A</tbody>=0D= =0A</table>=0D=0A<table border=3D"0" cellspacing=3D"0" cellpadding=3D"0"= width=3D"600" align=3D"center">=0D=0A<tbody>=0D=0A<tr>=0D=0A<td valign= =3D"top"><img src=3D"http://www.furnituretrainingcompany.com/images/emai= l/highpoint_2009_04/hero.jpg" alt=3D"Visit us at High Point to receive y= our free training poster" width=3D"600" height=3D"150" /><br /></td>=0D= =0A</tr>=0D=0A</tbody>=0D=0A</table>=0D=0A<table border=3D"0" cellspacin= g=3D"0" cellpadding=3D"0" width=3D"600" align=3D"center">=0D=0A<tbody>= =0D=0A<tr>=0D=0A<td valign=3D"top" bgcolor=3D"#ffffff"><img src=3D"http:= //www.furnituretrainingcompany.com/images/email/highpoint_2009_04/spacer= _content_left.jpg" alt=3D"" width=3D"30" height=3D"30" /><br /></td>=0D= =0A<td valign=3D"top" bgcolor=3D"#ffffff"><span style=3D"font-size: xx-s= mall; font-family: Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; color: #000000;">= <big><big><big><big><small><big><strong>See you at Market</strong></big>= <br /> </small></big></big></big></big></span> <span style=3D"font-size:= xx-small; font-family: Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; color: #0000= 00;"><big><big><big><big><small><br /> </small></big></big></big></big><= /span><small><span style=3D"font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;">Vi= sit our space to get your free Map to Sales Success poster! This unique= 24 X 36 color poster is your guide to developing high volume salespeopl= e with larger tickets. Find us in the new NHFA Retailer Resource Center= located in the Plaza. <br /> <br /> Don&rsquo;t miss Mark Lacy&rsquo;s= entertaining seminar "Help Wanted! My Sales Associates Can&rsquo;t Sell= Water to a Thirsty Camel." He&rsquo;ll reveal powerful secrets for turn= ing sales associates into furniture experts that will sell. See him Satu= rday, April 25th at 11:30 AM in the seminar room of the new NHFA Retail= Resource Center in the Plaza. <br /> <br /> Stop by our space to learn= how our ingenious internet-delivered training courses are easy to use,= guaranteed to work, and cheaper than the daily donuts. Over 95% report= increased sales. <br /> <br /> Plan to see us at High Point. </span></s= mall> <span style=3D"font-size: xx-small; font-family: Verdana,Arial,Hel= vetica,sans-serif; color: #000000;"><big><big><big><big><small><small><b= r /> <br /> <br /> <br /> </small></small></big></big></big></big></span= ><small><span style=3D"font-size: xx-small; font-family: Verdana,Arial,H= elvetica,sans-serif; color: #000000;"><big><big><big><small> </small></b= ig></big></big></span></small> <a href=3D"http://www.furnituretrainingco= mpany.com/map"><img src=3D"http://www.furnituretrainingcompany.com/image= s/email/highpoint_2009_04/image_content_left.jpg" border=3D"0" alt=3D"Fi= nd out more" width=3D"326" height=3D"67" /></a><br /> <br /></td>=0D=0A<= td valign=3D"top" bgcolor=3D"#ffffff"><img src=3D"http://www.furnituretr= ainingcompany.com/images/email/highpoint_2009_04/spacer_content_middle.j= pg" alt=3D"" width=3D"28" height=3D"28" /><br /></td>=0D=0A<td valign=3D= "top" bgcolor=3D"#ffffff"><img src=3D"http://www.furnituretrainingcompan= y.com/images/email/highpoint_2009_04/image_content_right.jpg" alt=3D"Roa= dmap to Sales Success poster" width=3D"186" height=3D"267" /><br /> <spa= n style=3D"font-family: Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;"><small><span style= =3D"font-size: xx-small; color: #000000;"><big><big><big><small><strong>= Road Map to Sales Success<br /> </strong><br /> </small></big></big></bi= g></span>This beautiful poster is yours free for simply stopping by and= visiting with us at High Point. <span class=3D"moz-txt-slash">Our space= is located inside the </span>new NHFA Retailer Resource Center in the P= laza Suites, 222 South Main St, 1st Floor. We will be at market from Sat= April 25th until Thur April 30th. </small></span><br /></td>=0D=0A<td v= align=3D"top" bgcolor=3D"#ffffff"><img src=3D"http://www.furnituretraini= ngcompany.com/images/email/highpoint_2009_04/spacer_content_right.jpg" a= lt=3D"" width=3D"30" height=3D"30" /><br /> <br /></td>=0D=0A</tr>=0D=0A= </tbody>=0D=0A</table>=0D=0A<table border=3D"0" cellspacing=3D"0" cellpa= dding=3D"0" width=3D"600" align=3D"center">=0D=0A<tbody>=0D=0A<tr>=0D=0A= <td valign=3D"top" bgcolor=3D"#ffffff"><img src=3D"http://www.furnituret= rainingcompany.com/images/email/highpoint_2009_04/disclaimer_divider.jpg= " alt=3D"" width=3D"600" height=3D"25" /><br /></td>=0D=0A</tr>=0D=0A</t= body>=0D=0A</table>=0D=0A<table border=3D"0" cellspacing=3D"0" cellpaddi= ng=3D"0" width=3D"600" align=3D"center">=0D=0A<tbody>=0D=0A<tr>=0D=0A<td= valign=3D"top" bgcolor=3D"#ffffff"><img src=3D"http://www.furnituretrai= ningcompany.com/images/email/highpoint_2009_04/spacer_disclaimer_left.jp= g" alt=3D"" /></td>=0D=0A<td valign=3D"top" bgcolor=3D"#ffffff"><img src= =3D"http://www.furnituretrainingcompany.com/images/email/highpoint_2009_= 04/spacer_disclaimer_middle.jpg" alt=3D"" /><br /> <span style=3D"font-s= ize: xx-small; font-family: Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; color: #= 666666;"><big><big><big><big><small><small><small>If you are not attendi= ng the High Point market in April but would still like to receive a free= Road Map to Sales Success poster visit us on the web at <span style=3D"= text-decoration: underline;"><a class=3D"moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href= =3D"http://www.furnituretrainingcompany.com">www.furnituretrainingcompan= y.com</a></span>, or to speak with a Furniture Training Company represen= tative, call toll free (866) 755-5996. We do not offer free shipping out= side of the U.S. and Canada. Retailers outside of the U.S. and Canada ma= y call for more information. Limit one free Road Map to Sales Success pe= r company. Other copies of the poster may be purchased on our web site.<= br /> <br /> </small></small></small></big></big></big></big></span> <sp= an style=3D"color: #666666;"><small><span style=3D"font-size: xx-small;= font-family: Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><big><big><big><small= ><small>We hope you found this message to be useful. However, if you'd r= ather not receive future emails of this sort from The Furniture Training= Company, please <a href=3D"http://www.furnituretraining.com/contact">cl= ick here to unsubscribe</a>.<br /> <br /> </small></small></big></big></= big></span></small><small><span style=3D"font-size: xx-small; font-famil= y: Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><big><big><big><small><small>&co= py;Copyright 2009 The Furniture Training Company.<br /> 1770 North Resea= rch Park Way, <br /> North Logan, UT 84341. <br /> All Rights Reserved.<= /small></small></big></big></big></span></small></span><br /></td>=0D=0A= <td valign=3D"top" bgcolor=3D"#ffffff"><img src=3D"http://www.furnituret= rainingcompany.com/images/email/highpoint_2009_04/spacer_disclaimer_righ= t.jpg" alt=3D"" /></td>=0D=0A</tr>=0D=0A</tbody>=0D=0A</table>=0D=0A<tab= le border=3D"0" cellspacing=3D"0" cellpadding=3D"0" width=3D"600" align= =3D"center">=0D=0A<tbody>=0D=0A<tr>=0D=0A<td valign=3D"top" bgcolor=3D"#= ffffff"><img src=3D"http://www.furnituretrainingcompany.com/images/email= /highpoint_2009_04/footer.jpg" alt=3D"" /></td>=0D=0A</tr>=0D=0A</tbody>= =0D=0A</table>=0D=0A<p><br /></p><br><hr><a href=3D'http://localhost/ftc= /app/unsubscribe.php?action=3DoptOut&pid=3D6121&cid=3D19&email=3Dmarkl@f= urnituretrainingcompany.com'>Click to Unsubscribe</a>

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  • Display issue with jQuery dialog: form shows as separate window

    - by RememberME
    On my button click, the jQuery dialog appears with just the title and buttons. When you mouseover, then you see the form inputs in front of the dialog covering the buttons. When you scroll down, the form inputs do not move, so you can never see the last few textboxes. <div id="popupCreateCompany" title="Create a new company"> <form> <fieldset> <p> <label for="company_name">Company Name:</label> <%= Html.TextBox("company_name") %> </p> <p> <label for="company_desc">Company Description:</label> <%= Html.TextBox("company_desc") %> </p> <p> <label for="address">Address:</label> <%= Html.TextBox("address") %> </p> <p> <label for="city">City:</label> <%= Html.TextBox("city") %> </p> <p> <label for="state">State:</label> <%= Html.TextBox("state") %> </p> <p> <label for="zip">Zip:</label> <%= Html.TextBox("zip") %> </p> <p> <label for="website">Website:</label> <%= Html.TextBox("website") %> </p> </fieldset> </form> </div> jQuery: <script type="text/javascript"> $(document).ready(function() { $('input').filter('.datepick').datepicker(); $('#popupCreateCompany').dialog( { autoOpen: false, modal: true, buttons: { 'Add': function() { var dialog = $(this); var form = dialog.find('input:text'); $.post('/company/create', $(form).serialize(), function() { dialog.dialog('close'); }) }, 'Cancel': function() { $(this).dialog('close'); } } }); $("#create-company").click(function() { $('#popupCreateCompany').dialog('open'); }); On mouseover: After scroll down:

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  • Big Visible Charts

    - by Robert May
    An important part of Agile is the concept of transparency and visibility. In proper functioning teams, stakeholders can look at any team at any time in the iteration or release and see how that team is doing by simply looking at what we call Big Visible Charts. If you’ve done Scrum, you’ve seen these charts. However, interpreting these charts can often be an art form. There are several different charts that can be useful. In this newsletter, I’ll focus on the Iteration Burndown and Cumulative Flow charts. I’ve included a copy of the spreadsheet that I used to create the charts, and if you don’t have a tool that creates them for you, you can use this spreadsheet to do so. Our preferred tool for managing Scrum projects is Rally. Rally creates all of these charts for you, saving you quite a bit of time. The Iteration Burndown and Cumulative Flow Charts This is the main chart that teams use. Although less useful to stakeholders, this chart is critical to the team and provides quite a bit of information to the team about how their iteration is going. Most charts are a combination of the charts below, so you may need to combine aspects of each section to understand what is happening in your iterations. Ideal Ah, isn’t that a pretty picture? Unfortunately, it’s also very unrealistic. I’ve seen iterations that come close to ideal, but never that match perfectly. If your iteration matches perfectly, chances are, someone is playing with the numbers. Reality is just too difficult to have a burndown chart that matches this exactly. Late Planning Iteration started, but the team didn’t. You can tell this by the fact that the real number of estimated hours didn’t appear until day two. In the cumulative flow, you can also see that nothing was defined in Day one and two. You want to avoid situations like this. You’ll note that the team had to burn faster than is ideal to meet the iteration because of the late planning. This often results in long weeks and days. Testing Starved Determining whether or not testing is starved is difficult without the cumulative flow. The pattern in the burndown could be nothing more that developers not completing stories early enough or could be caused by stories being too big. With the cumulative flow, however, you see that only small bites are in progress and stories were completed early, but testing didn’t start testing until the end of the iteration, and didn’t complete testing all stories in the iteration. When this happens, question whether or not your testing resources are sufficient for your team and whether or not acceptance is adequately defined. No Testing With this one, both graphs show the same thing; the team needs testers and testing! Without testing, what was completed cannot be verified to make sure that it is acceptable to the business. If you find yourself in this situation, review your testing practices and acceptance testing process and make changes today. Late Development With this situation, both graphs tell a story. In the top graph, you can see that the hours failed to burn down as quickly as the team expected. This could be caused by the team not correctly estimating their hours or the team could have had illness or some other issue that affected them. Often, when teams are tackling something that is more unknown, they’ll run into technical barriers that cause the burn down to happen slower than expected. In the cumulative flow graph, you can see that not much was completed in the first few days. This could be because of illness or technical barriers or simply poor estimation. Testing was able to keep up with everything that was completed, however. No Tool Updating When you see graphs that look like this, you can be assured that it’s because the team is not updating the tool that generates the graphs. Review your policy for when they are to update. On the teams that I run, I require that each team member updates the tool at least once daily. You should also check to see how well the team is breaking down stories into tasks. If they’re creating few large tasks, graphs can look similar to this. As a general rule, I never allow tasks, other than Unit Testing and Uncertainty, to be greater than eight hours in duration. Scope Increase I always encourage team members to enter in however much time they think they have left on a task, even if that means increasing the total amount of time left to do. You get a much better and more realistic picture this way. Increasing time remaining could explain the burndown graph, but by looking at the cumulative flow graph, we can see that stories were added to the iteration and scope was increased. Since planning should consume all of the hours in the iteration, this is almost always a bad thing. If the scope change happened late in the iteration and the hours remaining were well below the ideal burn, then increasing scope is probably o.k., but estimation needs to get better. However, with the charts above, that’s clearly not what happened and the team was required to do extra work to make the iteration. If you find this happening, your product owner and ScrumMasters need training. The team also needs to learn to say no. Scope Decrease Scope decreases are just as bad as scope increases. Usually, graphs above show that the team did a poor job of estimating their stories and part way through had to reduce scope to change the iteration. This will happen once in a while, but if you find it’s a pattern on your team, you need to re-evaluate planning. Some teams are hopelessly optimistic. In those cases, I’ll introduce a task I call “Uncertainty.” With Uncertainty, the team estimates how many hours they might need if things don’t go well with the tasks they’ve defined. They try to estimate things that could go poorly and increase the time appropriately. Having an Uncertainty task allows them to have a low and high estimate. Uncertainty should not just be an arbitrary buffer. It must correlate to real uncertainty in the tasks that have been defined. Stories are too Big Often, we see graphs like the ones above. Note that the burndown looks fairly good, other than the chunky acceptance of stories. However, when you look at cumulative flow, you can see that at one point, everything is in progress. This is a bad thing. When you see graphs like this, you’re in one of two states. You may just have a very small team and can only handle one or two stories in your iteration. If you have more than one or two people, then the most likely problem is that your stories are far too big. To combat this, break large high hour stories into smaller pieces that can be completed independently and accepted independently. If you don’t, you’ll likely be requiring your testers to do heroic things to complete testing on the last day of the iteration and you’re much more likely to have the entire iteration fail, because of the limited amount of things that can be completed. Summary There are other charts that can be useful when doing scrum. If you don’t have any big visible charts, you really need to evaluate your process and change. These charts can provide the team a wealth of information and help you write better software. If you have any questions about charts that you’re seeing on your team, contact me with a screen capture of the charts and I’ll tell you what I’m seeing in those charts. I always want this information to be useful, so please let me know if you have other questions. Technorati Tags: Agile

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