I work with what is now a fairly mature and highly functional scrum team.     Back when we started, we were working with a consultant on a set of technical issues, and along the way he suggested we allow anyone in the team to serve as scrum master.

I initially had some concerns about this.  In my CSM training a few years back we talked about the development of the team – the forming, storming, norming, performing thing –  and how changes of any kind (additions to the team, removing people, etc) would impact the team dynamic and potentially push the team back into an earlier stage of development.  I also had past experience as scrum master for a couple of years, and we never even considered rotating at that point, so I just never really thought about it.

So when we started, we named a scrum master and proceeded.   Along the way, that scrum master started getting the itch to do ‘real’ work again, so we had someone else try it.   18 months later, almost everyone has rotated through the position, and it’s worked out very well.

Pros:

• The scrum master doesn’t get bored.
• Everyone gets a chance to try something new.
• The team is reminded what it’s like to be the scrum master.
• The scrum master is reminded what it’s like to be a delivery team member.
• Rotating the role tends to create some good team bonding opportunities.

Cons:

• The only real con I saw was some of the less tenured people didn’t really know who to go to – how to remove obstacles, so they needed some help.   For the most part though the team helped them with that, and it ended up providing good learning opportunities all around, so it was a good investment overall.

If you’re thinking about it, give it a try.  I wish I had tried it earlier.

From my day job.  Credit to the artists (on my team). 

Nobody told me PhotoWham was up for an editor’s review on CNet’s Download.com, but that happened last week!   Here’s an out of context summary:

“It works in the latest versions of Windows, including Windows 7. It’s one of the simplest but most efficient digital photo resizers we’ve tried.”

I’m very excited, as that’s exactly what I was going for with this product!    Apparently others are excited as well; the number of downloads/week is skyrocketing.

Here’s the page: http://download.cnet.com/PhotoWham/3000-12511_4-10603272.html

Manatee Software, LLC has signed a lease for a 700 sf office space at the Atrium at 1780 E. Ridge Rd.    It’s an odd L shape, but comes with lots of windows, I think it’ll have a great feel when it’s done.    Now the hard work though, in the coming weeks, we’ll be clearing out what’s there, and doing some remodeling.  Stay tuned, I’ll post pictures as we progress!

I’ve been working w/ the LiquidCrystal library (which rocks), and the MaxSonar EZ4 (MB1040).  Same LCD as I used in previous posts.

Only reading one range finder so far, but this is a start. 

The LCD is set up in 4 bit mode – digital pins 12, 11, 5, 4, 3 and 2. 

PWM pin from the EZ4 is in digital 7.

Enough of that, here’s the code!

#include <LiquidCrystal.h>

 // these constants won't change.  But you can change the size of
 // your LCD using them:
 const int numRows = 2;
 const int numCols = 16;
 
 // initialize the library with the numbers of the interface pins
 LiquidCrystal lcd(12, 11, 5, 4, 3, 2);
 
 // pin hooked up to PWM from the ez4
 const int pwPin = 7;

 //variables needed to store values
 long pulse, inches, cm;

void setup() {
  
  // set up the LCD's number of rows and columns: 
  lcd.begin(numRows, numCols);
  
  // throw up a shameless banner
  writeLcd("Manatee Software", 0, 0, true);
  writeLcd("www.manasoft.com", 1, 0, false);
  delay(200);
}

// Main loop
void loop() {
   updateDisplay();
   delay(100);
}

// update display
// the main process that loops
void updateDisplay()
{
    pinMode(pwPin, INPUT);

    //Used to read in the pulse that is being sent by the MaxSonar device.
  //Pulse Width representation with a scale factor of 147 uS per Inch.
  pulse = pulseIn(pwPin, HIGH);

  //147uS per inch
  inches = pulse/147;

// put in the label.  doesn't seem to hurt anything to clear here, but it's
// counter-intuitive.  Probably bad practice...
  writeLcd("Inches: ", 0, 0, true);

// set and print the inches from the calculation  
  lcd.setCursor(9, 0);
  lcd.print(inches);
}

// write to the LCD at a defined position
void writeLcd(char data[], int line, int pos, bool clear)
{
  // clear if desired
  if(clear == true)
  {
    lcd.clear();
  }

  lcd.setCursor(pos, line);
  lcd.print(data);
}

The big new feature is the most requested feature in the history of this product: copying EXIF information from the source image to the target (resized) image.

This feature will only be available in the licensed versions.

V1.6 is in final testing and will be released within the next few days.  Keep an eye on the PhotoWham page!

In my day job, I work as a software architect and scrum master for a large corporation. Today, a group of managers asked me this question. I say what’s the difference?  In Scrum we try to focus on business value.    Let’s say there are two potential changes on the table:

1. A bug the delivery team introduced with this release. An additional character is displaying in a drop down box text value. All users will see the bug.

2. A new feature/requirements change that we learned from the first people to actually use the latest release in production. Making this change will reduce the potential for error and save each user some time.

All of our users work for the company, so ‘soft’ benefits like avoiding embarrassment caused by #1 don’t matter a whole lot. We don’t have time to do both. In this hypothetical scenario, the effort to fix them is identical.

The waterfall organization, focusing on the ‘contract’ between development, PMO, and the customer, would tend to fix #1, as #2 is out of scope.

The Scrum team would ask which item delivers the most business value. Business value can be tough to determine in a large company. When the user group numbers in the thousands, saving each user some time, even if only 5 seconds/day would be a flag to me, though. Even at 1000 users, 5000 seconds/day x 200 work days/year = 278 hours/year in potential savings. While that’s not going to make or break a large company, it’s clearly more value than the 0 seconds/day the bug fix would save users.

One thing I like about Scrum is the fact that it exposes everyone on the delivery team to patterns of thinking that in many large waterfall organizations are only known to senior managers. Scrum is helping our team members behave like business people, which is something sorely needed in a Dilbertian world.

Lately, we’ve had several requests for new features/updates to applications, which is great! Upcoming releases:

OmniPing 3.0

This is a complete rewrite on the latest technologies. New features will include:
1. A more responsive user interface thanks to some happy background threads to do the pinging.
2. Ability to ping/scan a larger set of addresses (larger than a class c range).
3. More detail in the result, including dns names and, if available, mac addresses.
4. Updated reporting and data analysis.

GPS Dashboard

Numerous enhancements are coming to this application, mostly centered around a richer and more flexible user interface.

PhotoWham

Planning to copy the EXIF information from the source image to the destination image. This is surprisingly challenging, but that’s the plan.

The OmniPing work is scheduled to be completed first, hopefully by June. PhotoWham and GPS Dashboard will follow shortly thereafter.

Thanks for your continued interest in these products! If you have any other requests, please don’t hesitate to drop us a note.

I have been working on this moving ‘cockpit’ for MS Flight Sim.  It’s not done, but is starting to become real. 

It’s based on the Joyrider, but made out of aluminum as I was looking for a tig welding project.

The original Joyrider design uses a mechanical link between the seat, the frame, and a control stick to move the whole seat.  Then you attach a PC joystick to the seat, and have the joystick control the game.   My plan is to go a little bit fancier and add motors to both axes of the device, so that the PC (FSX) actually tells the seat how to move.   This kind of thing is partly what interested me about Arduino.  A physical computing platform is key to a project like this.

If you’re interested in this sort of thing, there are a lot of sites that go into more detail.  Two of my favorites:

http://www.x-simulator.de/forum/
http://buggies.builtforfun.co.uk/Sim/index.html

Early photos attached.  Don’t mind the mess.