SOA BPM

These days I am concentrating on this space..More soon...

Stefan Thomke ...On Innovation...

Stefan Thomke of Harvard Business School has written a definitive book on the importance of experimentation. "Experimentation Matters" argues that every company’s ability to innovate depends on a series of experiments (successful or not), that help create new products and services or improve old ones. That period between the earliest point in the design cycle and the final release should be filled with experimentation, failure, analysis, and yet another round of experimentation. “Lather, rinse, repeat,” Thomke says. Unfortunately, uncertainty often causes the most able innovators to bypass the experimental stage.
In his book, Thomke outlines six principles companies can follow to unlock their innovative potential.

1. Anticipate and Exploit Early Information Through ‘Front-Loaded’ Innovation Processes
2. Experiment Frequently but Do Not Overload Your Organization.
3. Integrate New and Traditional Technologies to Unlock Performance.
4. Organize for Rapid Experimentation.
5. Fail Early and Often but Avoid ‘Mistakes’.
6. Manage Projects as Experiments.

Thomke further explores what would happen if the principles outlined above were used beyond the confines of the individual organization. For instance, in the state of Rhode Island, innovators are collaboratively leveraging the state's compact geography, economic and demographic diversity and close-knit networks to quickly and cost-effectively test new business models through a real-world experimentation lab.

Innovation and research

With so much focus being on innovation for increasing productivity and success, companies are finding more efficient ways to nurture innovative ideas and try to convert as many random creative thoughts into structure innovation vehicles. Obviously, thoughts, processes and technologies that break our existing norm need to be welcome and channeled correctly. There are some interesting thoughts around this which I plan to read upon in the coming days.

First entry from India

Its been a while since I last wrote...Moved to India and things been hectic since the last 1.5-2 months...Saw an interesting article today :
http://www.founderblog.com/

Virtual Labs

I have been working on a bunch of Virtual Labs for MOSS 2007 and BTS 2006...

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/traincert/virtuallab/office.mspx

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/virtuallabs/aa740373.aspx

ESB

Since this has become the new buzzword, I decided to read up some of the stuff on the internet that has been published in this sphere...I liked the way Wikipedia defines ESB http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enterprise_service_bus While trying to see what Microsoft thinks is a good way to implement the ESB, I cam across the following article http://blogs.msdn.com/mikewalker/archive/2007/06/19/looking-for-microsoft-esb-guidance.aspx something I have been wanting to read in a long time...Thanks Mike Walker for the great insight

Synnovation...

Since I have been looking around for magazines, articles that talk about Innovation..another very good series I found was at :

http://www.eds.com/services/alliances/agility/synnovation/index.aspx

Some of these writers have given an indepth analysis of ways to innovate..Found some very nice info in these..

Innovations

Found an interesting book on innovation
http://www.themedicieffect.com/index.html

Frans Johansson has done a great job in explaining innovation. Good read!

WSE Unearthed

In an amazingly simplified series of articles about WSE, Scott Mitchell outlines the different enhancements that have been bundled with WSE..A must read I think(courtesy 4guysfromRolla):

Part 1 - Examines the basics of Web services, what Web services are, and the technologies and standards that serve as the underpinnings of Web services. (October 8th, 2003)
Part 2 - Examines creating Web services using Visual Studio .NET. Looks underneath the hood of the code created by VS.NET. (October 15th, 2003)
Part 3 - Examines creating a client application that consumes a Web service. Discusses the purpose and structure of a WSDL document, along with creating and using proxy classes to consume a Web service. (November 5th, 2003)
Part 4 - Examines the utility of Web services and common scenarios where Web services make sense. A business-oriented look at Web services. (November 19th, 2003)
Part 5 - Takes an in-depth look at XML serialization, which is the process of converting a data type, such as an integer, array, or custom class, into its XML representation, and back again. Every time a message is passed to or from a Web service, XML serialization transpires. (December 17th, 2003)
Part 6 - Looks at sending metadata to a Web method through the use of SOAP headers. Examines defining and accepting a SOAP header on the Web service end, and looks at sending a populated SOAP header from the client. (December 31st, 2003)
Part 7 - Examines how the incoming and outgoing messages to a Web service can be programmatically modified via SOAP Extensions. (January 21st, 2004)
Part 8 - Learn about the Web Service Enhancements (WSE) and Microsoft's free class library for implementing the WSE standards. (June 30th, 2004)
Part 9 - See how to implement UsernameToken authentication using the WSE 2.0 Toolkit. (July 14, 2004)
Part 10 - Learn how to send large amounts of data as attachments using DIME and WS-Attachments. (September 8th, 2004)

Sharepoint WebParts

Found an interesting set of articles for Sharepoint development:
ASP.NET 2.0 Web Part vs Sharepoint 2007 Web Parts
Resources
Sharepoint Web Parts Overview http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms432401.aspx
Windows SharePoint Services Web Part Infrastructurehttp://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms415560.aspx
Walkthrough: Creating a Basic SharePoint Web Parthttp://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms452873.aspx
Walkthrough: Creating Connectable SharePoint Web Partshttp://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms469765.aspx
Creating Web Parts in Windows SharePoint Services http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms367238.aspx
Working with the Windows SharePoint Services WebPart Class http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms473203.aspx
Channel 9 Video: Building ASP.NET Web Parts for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 http://channel9.msdn.com/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=192071
15 Seconds: Building Web Parts for Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 http://15seconds.com/issue/060824.htm
15 Seconds: Building an ASP.NET 2.0 Web Part for Deployment to WSS V3.0 and MOSS 2007 - Part 1 http://15seconds.com/issue/060914.htm
Scott Guthrie (MSFT): Writing Custom Web Parts for SharePoint 2007 http://weblogs.asp.net/scottgu/archive/2006/09/02/Writing-Custom-Web-Parts-for-SharePoint-2007.aspx
Mark Kruger (SharePoint MVP): Great resource link site for almost everything Sharepoint http://www.sharepointblogs.com/mkruger/archive/2006/05/25/7570.aspx
If anyone has any great resources on comparisons between the two let me know I would be interested ...

Hmm....Mangoes now in the US

With the latest news that Indian mangoes are now available in the US, I am sure it has brought water to the mouth of at least some people..It's been a while since I tasted those Alphansoes...
Tasty stuff...:)

India - A Trillion dollar economy

As the dollar plumetted, I am sure lot of the economists were going "told you so"..As has been well known the strong dollar was not sustainable given the huge US deficits..but quietly behind the scenes a lesser known fact dawned. India has now become the 12th nation in the world to join the Trillion dollar economy club at least at these dollar levels..I had noticed that it was skirting at 900 bil levels for some time but never thot the D Day would come so soon..

Oh well...It has...Another sleeping giant has gotten up...

Really busy...

Have not been blogging as much as I would like to...Couple of reasons..Getting a project that was originally on a death march pretty much on track and keepin up with the latest in MSFT Tech.

PM has been kinda interesting off late as well...Patterns, Methodologies...I think I like those..

Will blog in detail about some of those soon..

PMP Certification and Technical Interview Quest

As mentioned in an earlier blog, looks like PM has come to be the most important title/role these days..With that in mind, I am taking some PMP Training classes and intend completing the certification by EOM April. Hopefully should work out fine.

Meanwhile I am also trying to create a small database of MSFT Technologies interview questions that will be helpful to everyone..

PMP Training

Hi,
Now Project Management seems to be the flavor of the day everywhere I see. Our company seems to be enroute to creating a pool of PMs who can help other depts manage their projects and processes. I will b out attending the PMP training at Hilton Computers Apr 2 - 6. Having done certain aspects of PM in CMMi I think it should not be that difficult. Lets see..

Orcas

Having played around VSTS for some time now(Beta 2, Tech refresh and the live one), I would love to see what MSFT has in store for the Orcas version. Apparently chief among their concentration areas are:

• Delivers innovative new programming language features, such as those found with in the .NET Language Integrated Query (LINQ)
• Enables designers and developers to work together more effectively than ever
• Enable Web developers to quickly build applications with the broadest possible reach and a rich, browser based client experience
  

I really hope MSFT can live upto its promise.

Case Study with MSFT

Apparently, we (SCI) was the first company that MSFT knows of, that got CMMi certified using the VSTS tool and the accompanying methodology. Interesting!
We have been invited to write a case study based on this...Should be interesting!

Project Server 2007 and MOPS 2007 POC

Our company is in the midst of doing 2 POCs for these products. Any comments on the gotchas of these softwares would be welcome.

Back from India...

I came back 2 days back and straight in the grind. Couple of interesting developments that happened in India...will write more about them soon.

Vibha

Since the time I had seen Vibha active again about 2 weeks ago...I have been wanting to participate in this org..Nice NGO...Check it out...