William Adams' WebLog : Daily Grind

Logs and Blogs Laughing like Frogs

wadams — Tue, 02 Nov 2004 21:21:00 GMT

What the heck?

Well, I'm making a statement about blogging. How does a frog laugh? I'm sure you can fing it on someone's blog somewhere. I can tell you that the frogs in a backyard pond in Hawaii make a more raspy croaking sound when they think they can attract a mate. Now I bet if you go search Google for laughing frogs, you'll come across this posting.

I have a new job. And since blogging is nothing more than the dumps of our brains to an audience of one (our own minds), I'll talk about my thoughts ont he matter.

I joine Microsoft almost 6 years ago. At the time I joined what was then the newly formed MSXML team. Their job was to ship XML technologies (the very first from Microsoft). In the intervening years, I've had the pleasure of helping drive the XML strategy and technologies for Microsoft, ranging from what to put into the System.Xml managed code, what to do with XQuery, when to create XML tools, and how to incoroporate XML and data programming into our core languages (C#, VB).

As we used to say in the group "Webdata is at the center of the universe, and it's hot at the center of the universe". You can't imagine getting an angry email from the likes of Brian Valentine, or worse David Cutler telling you how some mistake in your little component is costing the company millions of dollars because it has haulted the smooth functioning of the build system for Windows. Or better yet, trying to survive the onslaught of seething hatred stired by the admission that the cause of the slammer virus, and subsequent shutdown of the Korean internet, or Ford Motor company assembly line, was all your fault.

Yes, it's hot a the center of the universe, but, from within such a furnace are forged the most awesome and effective components that have had more impact on shaping data access and data interchange than any other components in recent programming history. So, although it was challenging in the extreme, I loved almost every minute of it.

What now then? Well, here at Microsoft, we have this little team known as "Engineering Excellence". Identifying, developing, consolidating, disseminating, and otherwise synthesizing best practices for engineering, to improve the engineering process across all of Microsoft, that's what we're about.

What a job!! I get to help program Microsoft itself. Much more than writing code for a small component that is part of a larger component, which is in turn a part of a larger component, which ships in Windows, I'm engaged in engineering the very DNA of Microsoft. What does success look like? Well, that we ship fewer bugs to begin with. That we ship products in a predictable and replicatable way. That our customer satisfaction is the highest in the industry, and we are held up as a beacon for innovation as well as quality much as Nasa had been in the past as they created the space program.

So, with my new job, I have a new tablet PC, a nifty new office (half the size of my old one), and a new level of energy and excitement about changing the world (at least Microsoft) through better software development. That's whta's on my mind, so that's what I'm sharing.

The Prince - Presents Positively Passionate Political Platitudes

wadams — Thu, 04 Mar 2004 04:42:00 GMT

Niccolo Machiavelli - The Prince

Penguin Classics - ISBN 0-14-044752-0

I've been reading this of late. It's interesting. This Machiavelli guy (1469-1527) is talking about statecraft, and makes many observations as to how things have come about in the Europe that he lived in. Lots of tales of Papal pontiffs, politicians, patriarchs, and the like. If it were an operate, there would be many patricians in tights singing in Italian with plenty of blood and guts.

It's interesting because it's old stuff, yet it is new again. There are interesting section headings such as “How a prince should organize his troops”, “How cities or principalities which lived under their own laws should be administered after being conquered”, and the like.

It's like a training manual with case studies on how various princes should go about ruling their principalities depending on how they came to them in the first place. “New principalities acquired by one's own arms and prowess”.

In modern terms, I think the precepts and concepts can be applied to modern business situations. Tonight I read about the Michael being dismissed as the Master of Mickey. Certainly a coupe in the making. Since spring is in the air, there are certainly a round of mergers and acquisitions, reorgs, and whatnot across the computer industry. It will be interesting to see what patterns these various machinations appear to be following. Having recognized the beginning of one pattern, I'd like to read to the end of the associative chapter in the book to see how it's going to end.

A more modern treatment of a similar subject is “The 48 Laws of Power”, Rober Greene. Also from Penguin ISBN- 0-14-028019-7

This one has such sage advice as “Win through your actions, never through argument”.

41 - Avoid stepping into a great man's shoes

46 - Never appear too perfect

47 - Do not go past the mark you aimed for; in victory, learn when to stop

They each go into great detail with case studies to prove the point, and teach how to avoid the pitfalls. Interesting stuff.

So, I look at my modern landscape with “The Prince” and “48 Laws” as guiding lights. I see what we are doing in the computer industry, and I simply think “interesting”.

All things old become new again

wadams — Fri, 20 Feb 2004 07:18:00 GMT

As I'm perusing various blogs, I'm reminded of two things. BBS, and “Snow Crash”. The first one reminds me of my Commodore PET, and my 300 baud modem. Of course there was FidoNet also operative at the time. But, it was basically a “community”...(read more)

Are Heroes more than just sandwiches?

wadams — Sat, 14 Feb 2004 02:00:00 GMT

So, I'm what they call a dev manager. It's the most interesting and powerful job in all of Microsoft. I fly air cover for the men and women who are on the ground grinding out the code that makes this company great, and makes the world go round.

Programmers are the bread and butter of the software manufacturing industry. Without programmers, there would not be a heck of a lot of code out there in the world. There would not be a lot of hackers, or spammers, or bugs either, but that's beside the point. Without this basic bread and butter, we have nothing.

My job is to service and lead these hard working folks. How do I do that? Well, every good team needs leadership that is driven by a solid vision, and mission. Around that, they wrap some strategy and tactics, and you have a well oiled fighting machine that's rarin and ready to go.

This week in the Webdata XML team, we had a all hands meeting. In that meeting, I got in front of our entire group, with my peers Jim and Charlie, and we talked about the agonizing process by which we had crafted the perfect vision and mission for our group going forward. We waxed poetic about the greatness of tools, the brightness of the future, the clarity of our vision... Oh yah, this clarity comes at a cost. We'll be making some cuts today to better align with our future.

Well, if there's on sight that's sure to scramble programmers faster than cockroaches in a dark room once the lights come on, it's the mere mention of the word "cut".

But, cut we must, and cut we did. Yes, there is collateral damage. Yes, I may be a brain dead leader who couldn't find my way out of a wet paper bag, and yes, it hurts like a bee sting on the back of your neck, but it's a necessary part of doing business, at least in a business that is dynamic.

The other bread and butter of the software business are the VCs. In my case, the VC comes in the form of my direct GM and VP chain up to Steve Ballmer. They pay the bills. They pay us a lot of money to create a future in which everything is bright and cheery and Microsoft is on top. They pay top dollar to ensure that at the end of the day, when they reach their hand back into their quiver, they have some killer arrows to draw from that are sure to hit the mark. They give us money, stock, soda, food, clothing, housing, education, planes, trains and automobiles. They expect us to deliver.

Our developers expect me to deliver a consistent message, to keep them away from feature creep, to keep their schedules sane. Our management expects me to keep the team happy, healthy and producing, to deliver quality code on time, and to make the company a lot of money by delighting customers.

Between these two pieces of bread, and butter, you find me, the dev manager. Comfortably sandwiched, providing the mayo pickles and lettuce that makes the sandwich whole. Together, we are a whole sandwich, not just separates. And that's what my job is all about.