Mark Schneider's SharePoint Taxonomy and Governance Blog

What to do with the Network Store

It not a good business model to spin undifferentiated (and unusable) data at 7200 RPM for all eternity, no matter how cheap disk is.  Though this is obvious, the network store is a time honored institution around the world and will not easily be made obsolete.  I wonder how much useless, undifferentiated and duplicate information is quietly going round and round all over the world?  I need to buy stock in a drive manufacturer.

Will SharePoint replace the network store?  Man I hope not!  The whole concept of a network store is dysfunctional.  We don't want to replace it we want to render it unnecessary.  We want future generations to laugh at the very concept of a network compost heap of useless data.  Essentially the model is (in my opinion) to use SharePoint to house, manage and use live information.  When the information in SharePoint is either ready to retire or be archived, then it is best migrated to FileNet or Documentum (or similar technology).  If the taxonomy, metadata and process models for SharePoint are well thought-out and implemented, the metadata pedigree for the file can be used to populate the metadata model in the permanent storage environment.

So does SharePoint replace the network store?  NO!  The goal is to ultimately hunt down and eliminate anything that resembles a network store by rendering the entire concept obsolete.  Keep in mind this is not a "Mercury Capsule" project.  It may not even be an "Apollo Capsule" project.  It must be, however, the long term vision for data storage in your organization.

This is one of the reasons my Governance and Taxonomy Workshops are "technology agnostic."  The leadership and governance teams need to focus on the business goals and needs, without being distracted by the minutiae of what any particular technology can and can't do in actual practice.  Define the problem set, the business requirements, and let IT develop the solution set using whatever technologies they choose to standardize upon.

©Copyright Mark Ragar Schneider, 2009 All Rights Reserved

Of Viruses and Clouds

Ages ago I was writing realtime process control software on a Tektronix 8540/8560 PDP-11 development system.  At the time I was pretty high on FORTH, which was a language originally developed to control astronomical radio telescopes.  FORTH had almost no overhead and functioned more like a meta-language than a language, i.e. you used it to shape and define your own language environment.  It was a language equivalent in concept to UNIX.

FORTH gave me amazing control of the guts and gizmos in the PDP-11 hardware.  I realized at one point that, after I was through commandeering the system, I could have my software keep part of it indefinitely.  I could then write self-replicating software that would "live" in the system resources I kept.  This was before I'd even heard of viruses, and I became obsessed with synthetic life.  FORTH was the ideal language for this and so I played.  It was a lot quieter than my prior efforts at generating music using Markov equations and fractals, so my then-wife considered it a move in the right direction.

Recently I asked myself a fundamental question-- "what is the most successful software concept in history?"   I think it would be safe to say that the most successful (in a Darwinian sense) software concept is the software virus, which first caught my interest so many years ago.  These simple little critters can be written and deployed almost anywhere.  They manage to survive numerous attacks to eradicate them when traditional technologies take great effort to keep operational.  They reproduce and move.  They are a royal pain in the nether regions.

So, it seems that future software might eventually become more virus-like.  Since the cloud is closer to viral than is a traditional deployment, I'm thinking that a viral concept may well be the next stage in software infrastructure evolution.

There is currently a bit of a debate on whether cloud architectures will endure.  Since they are the most virus-like, I think they stand a very good chance.

©Copyright Mark Ragar Schneider, 2009 All Rights Reserved

Ragan Media / Newsgator Webinar on SharePoint Secrets Went Well

It was an honor to speak on Governance and Taxonomy during Ragan Media and Newsgator's online seminar "SharePoint Secrets Revealed" this week.  Here is a link to the slides that I presented.

(CLICK HERE FOR COPIES OF MY SLIDES)

(CLICK HERE TO GO TO THE REGAN MEDIA SITE FOR THE WEBINAR)

(CLICK HERE TO GO TO     RAGAN MEDIA)

(CLICK HERE TO GO TO     NEWSGATOR)

Does SharePoint have any competition?

Stay tuned... I'm going to jump into dangerous territory... does SharePoint 2007 have any competition, and what are the trade-offs?

To give you a preview, SharePoint occupies a new niche in the ecology of computing systems and standards.  There are a number of other entries into this same niche, but the niche is so new that it is still taking shape.

It is a big topic, but I'm going to discuss the more obvious attempts to define and dominate this new market niche.

Comments, as always, are welcome.

What is a "disruptive technology," anyway?

People tend to understand new concepts through analogy.  This is especially true in the world of technology.  When there is a groundbreaking technology that has no analogy, it is considered to be disruptive.  Disruptive technology is so revolutionary that those who use it effectively will do well, and those who do not will fail.  Disruptive technologies disrupt the status quo.

Spreadsheets are my favorite example of a disruptive technology.  I'm old enough to remember when VisiCalc, the original spreadsheet, first entered the market.  I was working in an R&D lab developing real-time operating systems for factory control devices.  Some of the marketing folks came into my lab area and asked me to explain what this "VisiCalc thing" was all about.  So lucid and thorough was my description of spreadsheet technology that my audience nearly lapsed into a collective coma.  When i mercifully stopped lecturing, the Marketing Director asked "so it is like a word processor for numbers?"  Flabbergasted, I stammered and answered "sort of."  "Then we'll just type numbers into our spreadsheet, it is easier!" he replied.  On their way out, one of the marketing execs muttered "why didn't he just say it was a word processor?"

Of course it was nothing like a word processor, but people learn new concepts by making comparisons with things they already understand.  It takes a long time to form an entirely new concept, and ironically the people who understand the most about prior technologies have the toughest time adapting to the new concepts.  That is why disruptive technologies are disruptive-- they shake up the status quo and provide a chance for new businesses to overturn established businesses.  Now that everyone understands the concept of a spreadsheet, spreadsheet users are absolutely everywhere.

Although hard to imagine now, spreadsheets caused quite an upheaval in corporate culture.  Prior to spreadsheets, if you wanted a computer to calculate something for you then someone had to write a unique computer program.  With spreadsheets, literally anyone can create, modify and use a sophisticated business model without asking IT for assistance.  In fact, this originally created a huge problem for IT departments.  People tended to think that computers magically generated correct answers, and so they were unprepared for the spreadsheet's ability to make wrong answers look very impressive.  And so we come to Sarbanes-Oxley.

When spreadsheets generated wrong answers, the user would complain to IT that the spreadsheet wasn't working.  The hapless IT support person would answer with something like "what do you want me to do about it?  It is your spreadsheet!"  This did not improve IT's reputation with the rest of the business, and led to stress-eating and significant weight-gain among the IT people.  It took a long time for the average knowledge worker to gain a personal handle on the old adage "Garbage In / Garbage Out."  Each individual user had to take responsibility for spreadsheet results.  This was very awkward at the time, but it led to more effective integration of technology and business.

SharePoint represents a similar revolution in the technology world.  SharePoint, like the spreadsheet, puts the ability to create, modify and manage complex web solutions into the hands of every end user.  Just as anyone can use a spreadsheet, the intent is that anyone can use the building blocks provided by SharePoint to solve information management problems.

The problem facing SharePoint is not technical as much as it is cultural.  It may be awkward until the knowledge workers realize that SharePoint has set them free to make their own tactical decisions, but that with freedom comes responsibility.

Amazon's New Kindle is Amazing

Although it is now closed to the public, Rockford Illinois' "Time Museum" was one of my favorite places to spend an afternoon.  http://www.timemuseum.com/  It was a privately owned collection of timekeeping devices dating back to the Egyptians.  The exhibits were (of course!) organized in chronological order, and it was possible to walk through the entire museum and get a feel for how timekeeping technology changed over the centuries.

Since I'm invariably drawn to pivotal or "disruptive" technologies, the Time Museum was a place for me to ponder and learn.  It turns out that invention doesn't occur in even and manageable steps.  Technologies are refined and improved and then suddenly there is a huge shift to a new technology concept.  In regard to clocks, the introduction of mechanical gears, pendulums and springs was totally disruptive.  Sundials, waterclocks, and hourglasses were obsolete in a moment.  From that time onward timekeeping technology was a matter of housing better gears in more ornate and compact packages.

Then suddenly in the 1970s the first digital watch was introduced.  I'm old enough to remember these $800 marvels that used "hot" LED display technology, chewed through batteries quickly, couldn't be read in the sunlight, and could be stilled by a single drop of water.  And yet the world was forever changed by solid state timekeeping technology.  From then on in the museum exhibits were all about digital technology improvements.  Gears and springs were the stuff of quaint specialty watches and fashion statements.  The world had changed.

Ever since the offset printing press made its debut in the Middle Ages, bound books have been the method of choice for delivering written words.  Much effort has gone into creating electronic means for delivering books and periodicals, but none were compelling.  Books don't need batteries, can recovery from water damage, cost very little, are easy to read, and satisfying to hold.  Their electronic cousins just couldn't out book the books.

Amazon's new Kindle device is the first compelling electronic book replacement thingiemajob.  The fact that I haven't got a word for it is a clear indicator that a new thing has happened.  it isn't an electronic book, it is a Kindle--that is the point.

You can buy books and periodicals, read them, search them, annotate them, bookmark them all from the Kindle.  It is constantly online using free cellular technology, so if you have a spare moment at the airport and no book to read, you can buy it right from your Kindle and it will download and install in a minute or so.  No intervention is necessary.

It is very personal to hold and use one, much like a book.  The display is very readable.  Rather than providing a depth-of-field view to the text, the Kindle display presents crisp 2-dimensional text which the eye can easily track.

It is a transparent technology in that you forget you are using it and disappear into the book you are reading, which is as it should be.

It isn't waterproof but a simple ziplock bag will fix that if you, like me, read in the hot tub.

It is also, by the way, able to take advantage of the current revolution in federated taxonomies.  So it could conceivably serve as a front end to corporate libraries and the like.  However, to my knowledge Amazon has not introduced such plans.

When I travel I like to bring a novel or two, my Bible, a few computer and business references.  All these now fit easily into my Kindle, which is about the same size as a thin paperback.

I highly recommend you give the Kindle a look.  This one is going to stick.

Five Rules of Thumb for Project Success

Would you like a magic formula for determining whether or not your project will succeed? Twenty-five years of project management experience have led me to firmly believe that a project will not be successful unless it has:

• A designated project manager - with Someone needs to lead and coordinate the project to make sure that its goals can be met.
• A powerful and supportive “Business Champion” - Technology projects should always focus on improving the business. If the project isn't able to find a powerful buiness champion, then it probably isn't worth the effort to actually do the project.
• Grassroots support - If the average person in the cubicle is against the project then it will likely be considered a failure even if it is technically successfull. Technology is just a means to improve the business, and the business is driven by its people. If the people are not in favor of the project, how can it succeed? This is where "organizational change" comes into play. You must find a way to get the project and the people on the same page, or the project will fail.
• Approved, funded budget - If it isn't important enough to fund then, at the end of the day, it will die from lack of support. If the business improvement isn't worth funding, then don't waste your time on the project.
• Clear, objective goals - Although this seems obvious, it is amazing how many projects fail to establish agreed-upon goals and measurable requirements. This is the number-one cause of project failure. How can anyone succeed if the goals are unknown?