Not micro-projects, necessarily, but micro-team: Greg and I.
I thoroughly enjoy project management, enough so that I’m willing to do it at least a little in my free time every day. That’s checking on tasks’ statuses, project timelines, testing projects in progress, offering feedback and suggestions, and gently kicking in the ass.
behavioral advertising icon – Coincidentally crossing my plate right after this tidbit of narrow-sightedness (see Greg’s comment there, too), I had to cackle a bit. I like the idea of disclosing–all the time, not just when you register for a service–that a site is gathering your behavioral information. I also agree that a weird triangle icon in the midst of a column of ads (text or image) won't get noticed and won't make sense.
Release management, or “How to de-version your app” – Nice examination of the thought processes behind an app being released as a "beta", but not labeled as such, along with the classic features vs. budget vs. quality vs. timeline debate.
WordPress Custom Post Types Guide – Quite handy, as I'm working on a new WordPress website at the moment (not my own–it's volunteer work) and didn't really want to have to find plugins to do things better suited to custom post types… like events.
Looking Back — Discord&Rhyme – "To be successful at bootstrapping, you have to cut every feature except those you think are absolutely necessary. Then you cut some that you thought that you absolutely had to have. You compromise your design because you need to get the product to market. You ignore automated testing and documentation because your code is too unstable to be held back by rigorous processes."
Statement by Apple on App Store Review Guidelines – Courtesy of Greg. Apple seems to be getting off their high horse with regards to development tools. I'm not sure yet if this means I'll be springing for Plants vs. Zombies on the iPhone.
These Dance Moves Are Irresistible – ScienceNOW – Courtesy of Michael. "The most important factor to the women was how much the man moved his head, neck, and torso, the researchers will report online tomorrow in Biology Letters." This is a really cool-sounding study. Thinking about the types of dancing I like to watch and see done well–hip-hop, even bellydance–I like fancy foot-work, but tight (pop and lock) torso and head movements do draw my eye more. Flailing arms are just hilarious.
Action Not Words: The Difference Between Talkers and Doers – Wonderfully (and miserably) timely for me. The last few weeks for me have been very slothful (as evidenced by the lack of posts here), with correspondence and projects piling up while I squander my time. I've taken to returning to my 3 Most Important Things per day. If I get nothing else done in a day, I will get whatever those three things are done. I know from experience that having the 3 MITs builds momentum so that I'll rarely only ever get those three things done.
We’re Not Paid To Write Code – This is a really well-written article on how we're paid to deliver a product, not sling code. This is a hard-won lesson for every comp sci major worth their weight I've ever met in their first 2 years out of college, myself included. I'm still not great at balancing quality vs. out-the-doorness on personal projects, but I've learned a lot more about what's acceptable business-wise.
I’m going to put on my team lead hat for a minute. Many moons ago, I stumbled across and read Johanna Rothman and Esther Derby’s excellent Behind Closed Doors. One of many great managerial practices and recommendations in the book is to do one-on-one meetings: a regular (weekly) meeting between a manager and each of her charges to discuss project statuses, job satisfaction, progress in and reevaluation of professional goals, etc.
Coding Horror: The Non-Programming Programmer – Unfortunately, I’ve worked with a programmer who truly could not program, and it wasn’t pleasant. He talked a decent game and was crunk about technology, but he couldn’t bang out solutions to problems, and we all paid for it. That said, I’m in the middle of Seth Godin’s “Linchpin”, and while if you’re looking for a programmer, you should screen for that, rapport and general intelligence are pretty damn important. Also: I really like Noahlz’s February 22, 2010 6:48 PM comment in that thread.
Nice process, but what about the engineering bits? – "The major issue is in focusing so much effort and time on project management with what amounts to willful ignorance of the technical and engineering practices will inevitably leads to disaster."
