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Getting Real, Barcamp, etc.
Saturday, August 19, 2006
But first some stuff I've been working on -
Matt & Mary Kay's wedding site: A fun project involving the lovely Radiant CMS powered by Rails, some PHP, a good bit of JavaScript and just enough Flash wrapped up in an rather Web 2.0-inspired design—it's monstrous :). I'll have to say it was a great honor to be asked to do this and I had a good time with it. I learned a lot in those last few minutes of Opera-debugging and figuring out how to get rid of the extra scroll from the reflection image. Radiant was very smooth to work with and I look forward to using it for other things in the future.
MovableType theme: A simple blog layout. Somehow it won in one of the categories at the style contest put on last month by Six Apart, Adobe, & West Civ @___@;;. Which is cool because finally, I feel deserving of a Mac and now I have the funds to get one :D
Northwoods Conference Center: This I did a while ago for work. It was probably the most exciting IBLP project I've done so far, as I was the main designer/coder on it and I got to try some new things like drawing the icons for the Directions/Weather buttons and creating a floor plan image with Xara. Lots of great photos to work with too! Made me wish I was there again.
Onward -
Basically, the Getting Real Workshop is a 1-day seminar about web development put on by a small and successful Chicago-based company closely tied in with the Rails framework. As a student, it was a pretty awesome opportunity to be sent there by IBLP considering the credentials, experience, position, etc. of the average type of person who's able to attend these kinda things ^^;;.
Actually, learning the Getting Real principles really made me appreciate my own little web team more. We're so accustomed to few laborers each doing a variety of different tasks to fill in the holes and we're always having to deal with limited time and meager funds. This kind of small and flexible team is preferable to 37signals; in fact, they recommended putting no more than three people on version one of any software project. Here are a few more of their ideas:
Focus on now: Don't make long-term plans, staff up for an uncertain future, or worry about scaling software ahead of time. Lower the cost of change by making many small decisions as you go, as those don't end in huge mistakes. Figure out what you're going to do along the way instead of using spec docs, because "the future should drive the future."Less mass: Embrace constraints like not enough people, time, and money. Make less code, because less is easier to write and maintain. Include less features, as most of what people ask for doesn't actually matter—say no to a new feature request by default and let it marinate for a while before it turns into a maybe or a yes. Make opinionated software—provide less user preferences because the developer should be making all the tough decisions, not the users.
Design first: Let the interface drive the product. Design exactly what the customer should see, be in front of it as much as possible, and use it while you're building it.
Have a flexible and happy team: Hire generalists, not specialists who can't understand/appreciate everyone else's work. Hire happy people rather than disgruntled gurus, and maintain a happy environment—you want happiness-driven development.
The female/male ratio wasn't as bad here (15% female), probably because it was for designers and business types as much as it was for programmers.
At Barcamp Chicago I saw only about 5 women in the ~100 people attending, and I think with the exception of one or two, they were all wives/gf's tagging along. Honestly, geeky impromptu "unconferences" are bad places to take your girlfriend XD;.
But, I was fascinated by the experience. The tech events IBLP sends me to are all held at big, clean university meeting rooms, classy convention centers, or fancy hotels. As for this... this was definitely the first time in my life I'd been somewhere with KEGS of free beer—lol—in a room that was kind of the attic of a quirky little downtown art gallery, fans blasting for the lack of AC (this was during that 95+ degree weekend), walls taped up with paper for the free-for-all presentation schedule and for people to write out their ideas. Something about the whole thing seemed so artsy to me that I couldn't help but love it.
Oh, and JIMBO WALES was there! Very pleasant person in real life; pretty much like how I imagined he'd be :D. He talked a bit about Wikipedia and went in detail about his new project, Campaigns Wikia. Basically "participatory politics," encouraging people to get involved in intelligently and non-biasedly discussing political sides and issues. It was inspiring to realize that he was achieving a certain level of world peace in his work, yet without compromise—he'd rather be banned in China than allow censorship of the Chinese Wikipedia!
Another presentation I found encouraging was Sean Johnson on "How to Not Burn Your Business to the Ground." Here are my notes:
1. Stop stalling.
- Nine out of ten businesses fail, but that just means you gotta start ten businesses.
- Don't fear failure—it's part of the steps to success.
- With Web 2.0, having only a small team is no longer a problem.
- Everything is not going to be there when you start.
- "How hard is it to learn to ride a bike if you don't have a bicycle? How hard is it to learn how to start a business… without starting a business?"
2. Have a mission.
- You're idea should be something important to you as a person; something that goes beyond you and the business.
- Business is the best opportunity to practice what you believe. It's a way to express yourself.
3. The idea's not as important as you think.
- It's ok to have a mediocre idea as long as you execute it well. Focus on building your skills.
4. Sell, sell, sell
- Sales are as much an art as marketing.
- Don't be too proud to pound on doors. Call people, get instant feedback, work on your pitch.
5. Focus on your cash flow.
- Establish credit with vendors and suppliers. Treat them well.
- Have a good relationship with your banker and get advice from him/her.
- Invoice immediately to keep the money coming in.
- Put together a cash budget. Make sure you know where you stand by keeping your books.
- Get help with taxes.
- Make connections.
6. Find a great team.
- Be picky about who you work with.
- Go do things you're insanely passionate about, and you'll attract the kind of people who will be able to help you.
- Be a giver and don't worry about what you'll get back.
- Search for passionate people to work with you, not just talented ones.
- Spend time with people who support you and build you up—you need the energy.
My mind was so full of all the ideas and inspiration and wants and dreams from these events that for a couple days I couldn't concentrate on anything in my normal life, and even now I'm a bit restless. I have no idea how this is all going to manifest itself, but I hope I'll be able to keep everything in perspective ^^;;. This adventure is meaningless unless it's what God has for me and I have yet to figure out if that is so.
Doodle:
