All posts by Richard

Software Engineering Matters!

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I discovered this blog, Software Engineering Matters, via one of my Google Search Bots / Google Alerts. If your discipline is software engineering, it's definitely work a look and RSS subscription.  Here is how the blog author, Nicholas Chen, describes himself:

 

I am currently pursuing a Ph.D in software engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. I am a programming language fanatic and love learning new programming languages. At the moment, Ruby, Smalltalk, Haskell and Erlang are the most interesting languages to me.

I have added this blog to the "blogs and pods section" of the Engineering Learning Wiki. If you know of other serious engineering focused blogs which are authored by individuals (not companies), please let me know in the comments section.  I would like to expand this part of the Engineering Learning Wiki.

 

Optimizing Your Engineering Operations

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In this age of information, and rapid change, the ability to intelligently assimilate information and make correct product development decisions is imperative. Product life cycles are shortening year by year. The answer seems to be innovate or die. However, in this era of constant changes, it is also necessary to continously optimize your design / product development process.

Yesterday while conducting research, I stumbled upon an excellent resource, the Lean Advancement Institute at MIT. Although the root page seems to imply a membership is required, I was able to freely browse the portal and access / download valuable information and reports. Here is just one such example … a 61 page MIT case study on the Implementation of Lean at Rockwell Collins (pdf). This site from MIT will be added to the Technology Management Section of the Engineering Learning Wiki.

If the subject of lean interests you, link to my earlier post named: Moving Ahead, Or Are You Stuck in the Past?

Lean-Mit  

The Bad Example Software Clan

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Are you a member of this clan? Do you wear this Tartan?

Tartanbadge2

Is your technical documentation constructed like this?

  • Do not use this device in the extremely thermal, cold, dusty, and watery circumstances.. (see more)

Considering most users don't even read user manuals, it is imperative your examples (or training) are constructed crystal clear … and with the true user in mind. With those thoughts I invite you to listen to both of these excellent podcasts

The Next Generation of Engineers – VEXplorer

College Search

My son who will start Rose-Hulman next Fall was one of the 25 selected finalist for the VEXplorer Contest. The contest requirements were to build an interesting robot using the VEXplorer
system and post a video on YouTube demonstrating the end result.  The top prize is a $5k college scholarship.

In
Erik's case, he used SolidWorks for the initial design, and a black
tabby cat named Cyrus for the testing phase! His accompanying music
includes "White and Nerdy". Like father (aka the Northstar Nerd)… like son!

You should also be able to view other entries via the related videos link!

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Vex-3

Life’s Turns

Northern Life

I wasn't certain if I had this post in me. My two prior posts about Google Sites were a welcome, and needed diversion.

Last week I posted about my own 25th Wedding Anniversary. Given this is a technical blog, I felt it was time to refocus on hard content. God had other plans for me. Wednesday night, my Mom died. Perhaps I can pass along some learnings.

I have discovered that hospice care is truly a phenomenal service. My Mom and Dad, whose love dates back to 1950, made a promise to each other years ago that they would not let each other die in a hospital. Hospice care and Rosie allowed Dad to keep that promise. By the grace of God I had planned to be in Florida on Wednesday, and was present at my parent's Winter home when Mom died Wednesday night at 11:00 p.m. The hospice care nurse (thanks Sara) was with us within 30 minutes, and took care of everything. By 2:00 a.m. the funeral folks had come and gone. Early the next morning, both Pastor Mike and Nurse Gayle from the hospice group called to make certain we were okay (thanks to both of you during this difficult time). Pastor Mike also visited us later that day.

The service we used was Hospice of the Comforter. Their name rings true.

Finally, I give my thanks to God who allowed me to insure my Dad was not alone Wednesday night. We watched old home movies early Wednesday evening. These films dated back to the 1930's and showed my Mom as a young girl growing up in Sudbury, Ontario. Mom was still with us as we watched. (click upon any thumbnail image for an expanded view)

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