Great UML Cheat Sheet

A while back I went in search of a great, concise, and up-to-date notation summary for UML and was surprised not to find a decent one, so my colleagues at Improving and I created one. We're happy to share it, and I hope you'll pay it forward by passing it around to others who are learning and/or using UML. The link to the cheat sheet, or as we prefer, "Improving Sheet" is on my sidebar (see the UML logo) or click here. By the way, if you forget who we are, just Google "Improving" and you'll find us at the top of the list. ;-)

Business Requirements vs Technical Requirements

I wanted to blog about the difference between business requirements and technical requirements (because I know you're dying to know.) Instead, I found a clear exlanation/illustration here. You can't go wrong with a whoopie cushion example -fart humor is always a clear winner.

Harder than I thought!!!

So I re-read my previous post on "facts" vs. "opinions" and underlined anything that is an undisputable fact. Of the 20 or so sentences in the posting, I could only tag five as facts. That's 25% fact / 75% opinion - way more slanted than I thought. If that's the nature of blogs, I'm still puzzled (and flattered) that people who don't know me go to the trouble of reading my blog, and hence, my opinions. This is a heavy responsibility that I don't plan to take lightly.

I'm inclined to think that opinions are more interesting than facts. When smalltalking about the weather, I could say, "It's unbearably hot outside today." An alternate: "The temperature today is 20 degrees warmer than the 5-year average temperature for this date" - is completely factual, more thorough, and indisputable. It makes for far less interesting conversation. There's no conflict, no tension, no points to argue. Maybe we like opinions because they provide for more recreational conversation. Or maybe not. Just one man's opinion...

Facts vs. Opinions and Cred Factor

Throughout the U.S. we're in the midst of opinion season. It's time for politicians to gaze into their crystal balls and paint a picture of the future state of the country as they'd like us to believe they can create. Since facts are always about the past, any projection of the future is an opinion, a conjecture, an educated guess, etc. Sometimes blogs are used to convey facts; more often they are used to express opinions. So why should you care what a blogger thinks? Every day we feed our brains with the many facts and opinions we encounter. First things first, separating fact from opinion is not always as cut and dry as you may think. Test your ability to discern facts from opinions here.

When it comes to opinions, we each have our own built-in credibility filter. Many parents followed Dr. Spock's parenting advice. Years later, Dr. Spock's family suffered the tragedy of the loss of his child to suicide. Does that erase his credibility? In a non-gray world some choose to believe that either his advice is credible or it's not. True or not, some believe that Dale Carnegie committed suicide - does that make his best seller "How to Stop Worrying and Start Living" a crock? Both Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton lied to us all on TV - did that completely erase their ability to get people to subscribe to their opinions?

Thoughts like these cross my mind as I blog. I try to be careful not to blabber opinions without consideration of fact-based examples. My blog has had a lot of hits worldwide lately, and I've discovered that factual entries get much more traffic than those that are predominantly opinions. I'll bear that in mind as I blog on. (By the way, due to the high number of hits, I am now the #2 spot on google when you search for "Fast Vista". My home FTP/NAS Server setup instructions are also very popular. In the future I plan to stick to fact or fact-based as much as possible.)

Requirements Antipattern # 312: Never Always Follow All of Some Rules

(The title actually really does make sense if you study it a bit.) When it comes to prescribing process, the goal is supposed to be to repeat a positive experience. Pilots are required by the FAA to explicitly follow and check off items on a checklist every time they follow pre- and post-flight procedures. There is no latitude (no pun intended) given regarding this rule because there is sufficient evidence to demonstrate that positive results can be expected when procedures are followed.

On projects, prescriptive processes can be helpful to newbies. I've always felt that project participants ought to earn the right to change or bypass the process. That right is earned through experience and positive results. As a consultant I've worked with many large and small companies over the years. Larger companies have a tendency to over-prescribe process primarily because there is less confidence and knowledge about the wisdom and experience of project participants. Smart companies (large or small) tend to hire skillful facilitators/leaders to run projects. A skilled and wise leader can keep the project ahead of the many unpredictable things that occur on projects - things that a prescriptive process could never anticipate.

Undesirable things can happen when someone rotely follows the rules without question, as this true story from this months' Readers Digest illustrates: Hospital regulations require a wheelchair for patients being discharged. However, while working as a student nurse, I found an elderly gentleman already dressed and sitting on the bed with a suitcase at his feet-who insisted he didn't need my help to leave the hospital. After a chat about rules being rules, he reluctantly let me wheel him to the elevator. On the way down, I asked if his wife was meeting him. "I don't know," he said. "She's still upstairs in the bathroom changing out of her hospital gown.

Requirements Anti-Pattern #267: Unknown Knowns

A perfect engineering storm happened in Warsaw this week. The project was carefully chunked into separate well bounded smaller projects, which would all be integrated near the end of implementation. Team 1 built the train tunnel, and team 2 was responsible for the train tracks. It wasn't really necessary for the tunnel builders to talk to the track builders, after all, they had all done similar projects many times before. After construction was complete, inspectors discovered that the newly engineered tracks are taller than previous installations, therefore, the tunnel is not tall enough to fit a train.

Thanks to Rumsfeld, we've all heard of Known Knowns, Known Unknowns, and Unknown Unknowns. This Polish project fiasco introduces another phenomena I refer to as Unknown Knowns - Requirements folks make assumptions based on what they think they already know, but due to change, they're wrong.

So what are the engineers in Warsaw to do? Raise the roof? Lower the tunnel base? Reengineer the track height? I suggest they look into building smaller trains. ;-)

Fast Vista - Finally!!!

I've been a frustrated Vista Ultimate user for a while now. Frustrated at how painfully slow it was running on my 1.83 Ghz Dell Laptop with 2GB RAM. After making the following adjustments, I'm thrilled with the performance of my machine:

1) Deleted files I didn't need. My hard drive was near capacity, so this had to be bogging down the virtual memory. Old media files can be huge, and an 80GB laptop hard drive is no place for them.

2) Uninstalled programs I'll never use.

3) Cleaned out additional junk files using CCCleaner (freeware). I'm not really sure if this helps, but the cleansing process feels good nevertheless.

4) Turned off the Vista Sidebar. It's cute, but seemed to consume a lot of system resources I'd rather use for something else.

5) Turned off most of the Vista visual effects. Again, cute, but after the initial appeal has worn off, they didn't do much for me.

6) Ran MSCONFIG and un-ticked a few startup programs and services I didn't need.

7) Turned off Google Desktop. Vista's search works great, so Google Desktop is redundant.

8) And now the biggie - I installed the Vista Service Pack. I thought I already had it, but as it turns out, Windows Update had repeatedly failed to install it. I searched the Microsoft site and downloaded and installed it manually, and it made a HUGE difference to the performance of my laptop.

9) And by the way, I also bought a replacement battery. When I ran a battery utility I discovered that my battery was only operating at 10% of its design capacity. Every time my PC went to sleep, it would run out of juice and perform a total shut-down. Now I can avoid time consuming boot-up, and just wake up my laptop when needed.

Next on my to-do list is to set up my flash drive for ReadyBoost, which is supposed to add up to 2GB additional RAM.

Cherish Now

I'm stunned. Another fellow school parent died last night. That's two this week, three this year. Two heart attacks, one car accident. These are all people close to my age, with kids who still desperately need a parent. They must still need a parent, I know I do. Another wake-up call to remember that every day matters, to live for now not later, cherish the treasures in my life, and to re-read the famous "wear sunscreen" speech.

Tear Down This Wall (not really)

There's going to be a lot of fuss about The Wall over the next couple weeks. The picture is at the very rugged Mutianyu, around an hour northwest of Beijing. While it's awesome and inspiring to see, it is highly reminiscint of times of endless war, slavery, oppression, and death. The original intent was to keep others out, but in modern times it could be representative of holding people in.

Hopefully the Beijing Olympics on the world stage will move China toward a freer society with complete and utter protection of human rights and dignity.

User Beware - Translate Server Error

Thanks to my good friends at Schlumberger, I had the tremendous opportunity to do some work in Beijing around five years ago.

With all the buzz about the Olympics, which start this week, I've spent a lot of time reflecting on my time in China. Five years ago, there were marginal attempts to provide English translations on signs, but the quality of those translations was not always what I'd expect. For example, note this sign on a fire hydrant by the elevators at the Schlumberger office in Beijing...

Recently with all the visitors expected for the Olympics, there has been a mad dash to translate signs to attract commerce from visitors. So where to the translations come from? Maybe from an English-Chinese/Chinese-English dictionary...maybe from a bilingual friend or family member...or maybe from an online translation website such as Babelfish. I must admit that if I used an online tool to generate Chinese characters from my English phrase, I would probably accept the translation it provides me as accurate. Therefore, the reverse must also be true.

Check out this photo of a sign in front of a Beijing restaurant...

The Wisdom of Fireflies

Business sociology can be very interesting - the dynamics of departments, groups, teams, or other blobs of people working together toward a common goal. In business school they called this organizational behavior, but I think organizational sociology sounds much cooler.

Incidentally, the Org Behavior question was the only one I missed on the comprehensive final I took when I got my MBA, but I'm a lot wiser in they ways of how groups operate now. I'd probably still fail that exam question, though, because memorizing categories and lists of labels from theorists hasn't been particularly useful to me in the real world.

So, in terms of useful information we can use, I'm hip to how (despite the hassles and overhead of group dynamics) groups are more successful than individuals. Always. If you want to learn more about the science behind this; to hear about how fireflies the in Thailand all flash on and off in synchronicity; to hear the original exercise that inspired James Surowiecki's jelly bean jar guessing exercise -- tune in to the best Podcast on the web (imho) -- Radiolab. You can download a free standard MP3 or podcast of the "Emergence" episode here.

Afterwards, you can thank me for turning you on to Radiolab. Then you can join me in complaining that they only put out 5 new episodes per season.

There's no such thing as a $99 Brake Job

I have a rant today. This isn't my typical blog content, but I wanted to get it off my chest, and hopefully save others from the troubles I experienced yesterday.

My son took the car to Just Brakes yesterday for the $99 brake job that is the cornerstone of their advertising. Brilliant marketing - poor execution. Actually, brilliant execution if their goal is not to sell $99 brake jobs. An hour after my son dropped off the car I got the call - my $99 brake job was going to cost a minimum of $530 for just the rear. It was like pulling teeth to get a detailed breakdown of the costs over the phone- the manager kept telling me that they would all be on the printout I receive after I pay for my repaired car. Interestingly, he told me that in addition I needed to seriously consider new brakes in the front too. This was interesting since I just got new brakes in the front 3 months ago.

Anyway, to make a long story short, I discovered that $99 only applies to certain brakes that they have in stock. After some Googling I learned that this is a common ploy that they use. In Marketing 101 they called this "bait and switch", but that's illegal, so there must be a loophole that the Just Brakes folks have found a workaround for.

Anyway, I finally got the detailed breakdown of costs and called a reputable mechanic that I've used in the past. He quoted me a price that was half of the Just Brakes price, so I picked up my unrepaired car from Just Brakes and won't be back again.

Who else out there is modestly envoweled?

I suppose I was distressed to learn that because 31% of the letters in my name are vowels, and 74% of names have a higher vowel make-up, I am considered to be modestly envoweled. This 'fun fact' is one of several I discovered about my name, including a statistically based estimate of the total number of people in the U.S. who have the same first/last name combination as me.

You can check out fun facts for your name here.

More about Pigs

The reaction to the 3 Pigs was awesome - Yanic from Belgium put a lot of work into his thorough rework of the problem. Check it out here. I realize he's selling a product, but regardless, I really enjoyed his comments.

I agree with most of the feedback I received, although the spirit of the models was more conceptual'ish than design'ish, which tends to accommodate looser implementation precision.

The one choice I regret the most is sending the "eat()" message to each of the first two Pigs, which is actually telling the Pig to eat. To correct this, either the message to Pig is "getEaten()" or the message eat(Pig) is sent recursively to the Wolf (as Don suggested.)

Nevertheless, I'm really digging the idea of modeling a well known story as a means to hone my UML skills. Maybe I'll tackle Aesop next...

The Three Little Pigs - in UML

I like modeling. Not the kind Tyra does, although I do like it when Tyra does it, it's just not something that I do, not that I'd be any good at it anyway...

Sorry, got off track. Anyway, I like to build models that express information in an organized and precise way. The notation I use doesn't really matter much, as long as it's easily understood by the reader. I have used a lot of notations in my career. I still have that green plastic IBM flow chart template that my Dad gave me years ago (I wonder what that would fetch on eBay?); I suffered through the CASE tool years (thanks James Martin); and I used notation from OMT, Booch, and OOSE before becoming an early adopter of UML starting with version 0.9 in 1996. UML has stuck with me through the years, and it has become a casual and efficient way to take notes and express things.

Earlier this week I was talking with a coworker about models and modeling, and I proposed an idea: What would a children's story look like if expressed in UML? I took this to task that night and produced The Three Little Pigs, in UML. Check it out and let me know what you think. The PDF document can be downloaded here. (It's set up to print it double sided on legal sized paper.)

A Greener Work Week

Green this, green that...it's the buzz these days. So let's get real, how about a greener work week? During the first dozen years of my working life, I had the benefit of working for a forwarding thinking company that had a 4-day work week, or as we like to refer to it: 3-day weekends. If the majority of companies were to adopt the 4-day work week, the impact to the environment and the economy is staggering.

For illustration, let's say ACME employs 10,000 employees at it's various offices. Each employee commutes an average of 15 miles each way and drives a car which gets an average of 20 mpg. Based on $4/gallon, the savings is $300 per employee per year, and $3,000,000 for the company's entire workforce. I realize that employees may choose to drive on their day off, which offsets the savings, however, that expense becomes a choice rather than a necessity. Scaling up that idea, if 100 Million people (or less than 1/3 of the U.S. Population) eliminated one commute per week, the combined reduction is 150 million gallons of gas per week! That equals a $32 Billion reduction in gas consumption per year. Imagine what that could do to the supply/demand curve that causes the price of gas! Imagine the reduction in emissions, traffic congestion, accidents, injuries, commuting angst, yada, yada...

So back to the 4-day work week. If you're concerned that it makes slackers out of us, consider this: Companies that adopt a 4-day work week gain a week and a half of work days per employee each year. How? Employees work 40 hours every week, including holiday weeks. So if Friday is your normal day off and there's a holiday on Monday, you would be off on the holiday but would work Friday that week. Employees tend not to complain on those weeks because they get to enjoy a 3-day weekend every week of the year. Thuse, company gains 8 working days per year from every employee.

Additionally, those companies that put all employees on the same 4-day work week can reduce power consumption and costs by shifting to a weekend HVAC profile on one additional day each week. For companies that must have employees present 5 days a week, rotating the extra day off can reduce the need for parking and office space if managed smartly.

Mapping an FTP Drive in Vista

As an update to my previous post, NetDrive is incompatible with Windows Vista, and no, it won't run in compatibility mode (just tried it.) You don't need it though. Vista has built-in mapping to FTP locations. Just follow the drive mapping dialogue in Windows Explorer and select "other computer location", etc, etc. The steps are intuitive. By the way, I was surprised that SyncToy wasn't built into Vista, but the free download (v 1.4) works in Vista.

Personal Remote Backup Solution

I recently set up a 500GB NAS Head on my home network to use for backup of my home PC as well as for my sons to use to back up their computers when they're away at college. There were a lot of options, and there was a lot to learn to set this up properly. I thought I'd share what I learned and also welcome comments from anyone who has suggestions to improve the configuration.

Step 1: Get a NAS (Network Attached Storage) device. This is an external hard drive that connects to your Internet Router using a standard Ethernet cable. It has a built-in FTP server. These devices used to be epensive, but the prices are dropping. Last week Frys had a Buffalo 500GB NAS on sale for $139.

Step 2: Plug it in, connect it to your router, and install any software that comes with it on (one of) your home PC(s). This software is used to set up partitions, ftp, etc. on the NAS.

Step 3: The NAS should be instantly viewable by other PC's on your home network. The router will assign a unique IP address to it. You'll probably want to map it as a network drive so you can easily access it without needing to know the IP address.

Step 4: For local backup, I prefer to sync files. There is no compression on the backup disk, but it's easy to navigate and find files on the backup device using a standard sync. My two favorite sync tools are FileSync and SyncToy. I'm using SyncToy now with the "Echo" setup, because it's easy to schedule it to run each night. Check for instructions in the Help screen.

Step 5: For remote backup, several additional steps are required. For brevity, I'll assume that you have a dynamic IP address and I'll just tell you what to do without explanation:

5a: Find out your current "real" IP address (not the one assigned by your Router). Get this at http://www.whatismyip.com/.

5b: Go to http://www.no-ip.com/ and sign up for a free account. Assign an friendly name alias for your IP address. (e.g., johndoe@myftp.org)

5c: Still at http://www.no-ip.com/, download and install software on your home PC that keeps your alias updated with your IP address whenever it changes.

5d: Connect to your NAS to set up and start the FTP service. The easiest way to access the NAS software is to open a web browser and type in the local IP address of the NAS (probably 192.168.n.n) If you don't know the IP address, open a command window and type IPCONFIG /all. The NAS software should allow you to set up username/passwords and set NAS folder access (none, read only, read/write) for each user account. Once set up, this should run automatically when the NAS is turned on. Your home PC does not need to be powered on for the NAS to work.

5e: Connect to your router and find/follow the instructions for port forwarding. Make sure port 21 (the default FTP port) is set to forward to the NAS device. Port 21 can only be forwarded to one of the devices on your network. Any inbound traffic to port 21 on your router will then automatically be redirected to your NAS.

5f (option 1): Use this option for standard FTP access from a remote PC to your NAS. From a remote PC, install and run an FTP client. A good free one is Filezilla. You just need to enter three things: 1) your IP address alias from step 5b (johndoe@myftp.org), 2) your username and 3) your password from one of the FTP accounts you set up in step 5d.

5f (option 2): Use this option to set up synchronization (as described in step 4.) Get FTPSync here, and set up access using the same three items shown in option 1.

5g (option 3): This is the slickest option, which is what I'm going to try first. On your remote computer, install NetDrive (freeware download here), which let's you setup a virtual local drive. It looks and acts like a local Windows drive, but it processes corresponding FTP traffic behind the scenes. You'll need to set up the three security items from option 1 in the NetDrive configuration. Once the virtual drive is set up, you can use your favorite Sync option from step 4 to handle backups. Or you can just access and use the drive. NetDrive was developed by Novel and is unsupported freeware, so it may not stand up to future Windows updates. There is a similar product call WebDrive, but it's not free.

If anyone has any better ideas, please share!

The Immortality of Humans

Simply put, ignoring all other factors, scientists have discovered that all creatures large and small have one common characteristic related to mortality: their hearts beat an average of 1.5 billion times over their lifetime. Finally - a biology problem that can be solved using a spreadsheet! That is, all creatures except human beings, whose heart beats as much as double that number - closer to 3 billion. (Go ahead, do the math, I know you're dying to.) When you put your spreadsheet together, notice what happens to your life expectancy when you drop your average pulse from 70 bpm to 60 bpm. Makes all that that exercise you've been thinking about seem more important than you may have thought.

Humans weren't always so askew from the rest of the creatures. Over time, through science and other evolutionary changes, we have managed to throw a kink in an otherwise perfect correlation. It hasn't been easy, though. As we introduce technologies that extend our lives, we also introduce new risks that may shorten it. (There wasn't much risk of getting hit by a bus in 500 B.C.)

Some scientists believe that it's plausible to push the life expectancy of newborns born in the next decade up to the age of 100. If you think the Social Security system is in peril now, just wait!

If you find this stuff interesting, listen to Robert Krulwich explain in more detail in his Podcast here: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=12877984&ft=1&f=1007

The Immortality of Lobsters

Some believe lobsters could live forever if external forces left them alone and allowed them to continue to eat, molt, and grow. The largest lobster ever found (and recorded) was over two feet long and weighed 42 pounds! The reason that lobsters don’t live forever is that external forces seem to step in at some point, leading to the demise of the lobster: bacteria, lobster traps, predators. If we wanted to test the immortality of a lobster, we would probably have to create a highly controlled setting that blocks these external forces. Even then, it’s possible that the nature of the controlled setting itself could create additional emotional forces that negatively impact the lobster's life expectancy. These thoughts form the basis for a train of thought I’ll continue in the next blog: The Immortality of Humans.

Change Agent – Brubraker Style

In a fictionalized account of the 1960's Arkansas prison scandal, the 1980 film Brubraker depicted Robert Redford as a mole prisoner. In the film, Brubaker was imprisoned and subjected to abuse and corruption that had become de facto at the prison. After witnessing and experiencing the many problems at the prison, Brubaker eventually reveals himself as the new warden. His first hand experience with the problems at the prison provided Brubraker with insight to fix the problems that could have been impossible to discover if had taken over the prison more conventionally.

Around 15 years ago I was working on a large software development project at a major insurance company. A new employee named Bill was brought onto the team. We didn't know much about his background, but he was hard working, productive and he seemed to study everything and everyone around him with great interest. We would learn later that he had recently retired from a distinguished career as a military officer and leader. On the day it was announced that he was promoted to Vice President of our 250 person project, it was evident that this had been the plan all along. Bill had the enviable opportunity to lead an organization that he understood from the inside out. This is very different from the typical "promote from within" strategy, where the new boss has a history of relationships, biases, and un-repaid favors that could constrain his leadership effectiveness.

In my career as a consultant, I've had many opportunities to perform as an invited change agent. In those situations, I was often challenged with discovering deficiencies that were well hidden by those who felt threatened by me. I've also worked in organizations where I was a member of a dysfunctional team in a dysfunctional organization. A decent change agent ought to still be able to implement change in that situation, but macro-level change from within the organization is very time consuming, frustrating, and often impossible. What a tremendous opportunity it would be to quietly study an organization from within, then step forward to not only recommend needed improvements to the organization, but to take responsibility and full accountability for making those changes happen.

Do Your Second Best

A colleague recently told me about the struggles he and others experienced when working on their doctoral dissertations. He told me that many tended to struggle with perfecting their research and preparation for defense of their dissertation. Christian author and scholar Ramsay McMullen visited with them one day and listened to their rants about the challenges of completing their work. Ramsay told them, "If you are a perfectionist, then do your second best." There is a certain profoundness in that statement. I have been a victim of perfectionism in the past, and many I've worked with have experienced the same struggle.

By the way, for a less pragmatic version of the same idea. Look to philosopher and writer Voltaire, who said, "Le mieux est l'ennemi du bien.", or "Perfect is the enemy of the good."

Often, results offer greater value than perfection. So if your work tends to stall, and results come slowly, try your second best.

Content Cornucopia

Yes, the Internet has a lot of high value content. Unfortunately it also has a lot of crud you have to weed through to find the good stuff. Wikipedia can't be the only place to find quality commercial free content. I found it: www.archive.org.

For text, it contains the complete Gutenberg collection (classic novels, literature, non-fiction, etc.) There are a multitude of audio recordings for free download (old time radio shows, broadcasts, and music) , classic videos (old newsreels and some youtubeish stuff) , computer software, and more.

Examples I noticed include Tom Sawyer, The Time Machine, The Bible, video of the Hindenburg explosion, "Leisure Suit Larry" software program, Burns & Allen radio show, CBS Radio Mystery Theatre, Dragnet.

Oh, and for additional fun, check out the wayback machine on the same site. Remember what was on your company's website 10 years ago? Key in a URL of any website and you can pull up an archive of what that website looked like on previous dates.

Now you have something to do over the holidays. Enjoy ;-)

Bob Hope TV Special Taping at SMU

Members of the SMU Mustang Band performed as part of this TV special, taped in Moody Coliseum on 10/28/1983. This video excerpt includes the introduction and monologue. I was somewhere on the back row, but you can't see the band members very well. I can make out a few familiar faces laughing at the lame humor - I'm glad they didn't catch me on camera fake laughing too. ;-)

I also have the Bonnie Tyler performance and the Police sketch with Hope and Morgan Fairchild, which I'll post another time.

Cotton Bowl 1983

This video is of the SMU Mustang Band halftime performance at the Cotton Bowl (SMU vs. Pitt) on January 1, 1983. To make this fit in YouTube, I edited out the performances of the Pitt Band, Kilgore Rangerettes, and the combined band "Tribute to the USA". This copy has been edited to just show the Mustang Band. Some great closeups of active members of the alumni band as well as some old friends I haven't seen in a long time.

11-19-1983 SMU/Arkansas Post Game Performance

ABC didn't show us at halftime, but after the game (and monsoon) in Little Rock, the members of the Mustang Band were the only remaining souls in the stadium. Announcer Curt Gowdy is talking over us as we perform Shanty Town and acknowledges us as we sing Varsity.

SMU won the game 17-0.

SMU UT 1983 Halftime Show

I found a couple very old videos I converted from VHS to DVD and am posting online to share. Here's the first one - Halftime show from the SMU-UT game on 10/22/1983.

#2 Texas beat #9 SMU 15-12 at Texas Stadium. This was our first year without the Pony Express (Dickerson/James) but we still had a winning season. One of the last before the program was squashed by the NCAA Death Penalty.

Are you in a "Product" or a "Process" job?

If you are in a Product-centric job, you spend most of your day with stuff: creating, updating, innovating, maintaining, fixing, changing, moving, archiving, restoring, refactoring, etc. Typical product-centric jobs include software developers, artists, designers, engineers, factory workers, accountants, loan underwriters, and tax attorneys.

If you are in a Process-centric job, you spend most of your day interacting with others: talking, emailing, selling, negotiating, motivating, intimidating, inspiring, communicating, etc. Typical process-centric jobs include sales, project managers teachers, trial lawyers, CEO's, loan officers, and managers.

Most people tend to prefer one or the other, and often find themselves in a job that is not in their preferred category. The result is often fatigue and general job dissatisfaction. If you stick process-centric people in an office all day with a stack of work to do, they'll be bored out of their mind and find as many chances as possible to wander to the water cooler to find out what's going on in the world. Likewise, if you send product-centric people out in the world to attend meetings, engage in lively conversations, and talk all day, they will get exhausted and feel like the day was a total waste of time because they didn't get anything done.

If the world had only process-centric people, there would be a constant buzz of activity, but little would ever get accomplished. If the world had only product-centric people, a lot of quality work may get done, but there's great risk that its value and usefulness may be questionable.

It's healthy to understand that it's normal for there to be misunderstanding and conflict between process and product people. Accept the need for both types and move on. Also, if you are a product person in a process job (or vice versa,) a job change could reduce your stress.

Download the Internet Here

I am a recovering pack rat. I've been accumulating 'stuff' for years, which totally contradicts my no-nonsense, practical, straightforward approach to most other things in life. Fortunately I am truly in recovery. I have started purging 'stuff' and was surprised to discover that it feels good.

So now that my closet and attic have lightened, I need to work on my next issue - being a media pack rat. All sorts of media: Music, videos, digital photos, electronic documents, etc. Many of these things are very personal and I will never purge them. Storage is cheap, so why not.

The media that I could probably let go of is the reference material that is readily available on the Internet: articles, white papers, web page content, etc. I have a tendency to take a snapshot of this information and store it on my computer for later use. That demonstrates a lack of confidence in our distributed information society - I don't have full confidence that I'll be able to find it again when I need it. As a matter of fact, maybe I better just buy a bigger hard disk and download the whole Internet to my computer so I'll always have my own copy.

Here's the link, in case you want a dowload a copy of the Internet for yourself: http://www.w3schools.com/downloadwww.htm

Cool!

A diversion from my ramblings, check out one of the coolest projects which combines great computer graphics with an upbeat new age composition. I first saw it on a PBS special, and there are clips on this website: http://www.animusic.com/clips/pipe-dream2.html

I had absolutely nothing to do with this, but I saw the videos on PBS and thought I should post so others who may be interested will know about it.