Meet Ami Flubug and friends

Allow me to introduce a friend of mine: Here's A. Flubug. (I say 'friend', but mean more of a nuisance.) He's a wonderful traveller, doesn't even need a ticket to accompany me on the plane. He can cross the EU border without so much of a blink from the customs officers. If there is somebody I'd like to get caught in customs, that's A. Flubug. Now that I brought him home, he's invited a few million of his best friends (I say 'friends', but mean more like clones of himself.) I had to introduce Ami to my wife also and he's spending much too much time with her to be honest. Let's see if Virpi can even get herself to her birthday party on Friday.

I'm slowly noticing that Ami is getting bored with me, but there are still a few hundred thousand of himselves enjoying themselves in me. They seem to like the nose, throat and lung parts of me best, although I'm sure they spread through my hands and like to fly around as I sneeze or cough. As a matter of fact, it is no coincidence that they meet so many people, they make me cough on purpose so they'd get introduced to other people. The globetrotting little socialites!

PNSQC successfully over

The PNSQC 2007 Conference is now over. It was a very well organized conference and there were some interesting talks. I got to deliver my own presentation on "Tick-the-Code Inspection: Empirical Evidence (on Effectiveness)", which was well received. Unfortunately, there weren't too many people there as three other sessions were running at the same time, but even so most of the listeners gave me the green light afterwards. Note to self: Give your papers a more selling title. You can't use Tick-the-Code until it is very well known. On the other hand, if you don't use it, it won't ever get familiar.

I had brought some rule cards to give away after the presentation and almost all went to interested people. The presentation was yesterday and even today a couple of people thanked me for it and asked for more information. That felt good. Before the presentation somebody told me that they had read my article in the Better Software magazine and he had found it interesting enough to join my presentation in the conference. That was nice.

I truly believe I am onto something big.

And when there were comments about the future, like "we have to take care of complexity of software, that's the main thing" in the "Open Mic" session at the end of the conference, that makes it even more clearly so. The complexity of software will inevitably grow in the future, and I have a practical answer to it! It might be a partial answer, but it is a good one, nonetheless.

I hope that the interest and enthusiasm of my listeners holds long enough and they are convincing enough towards their bosses, so that I can come back soon and organize some training sessions on this side of the Atlantic.

To drop some names: I met Hugh Thompson, finally talked with Dorothy Graham, Karl Wiegers very generously bought me a glass of wine, I saw Johanna Rothman speak many times, there was Dale Emery who seems to have similar interests to mine. There were some people from Europe too, like Andreas Schliep and Niels Malotaux. I also had an interesting talk with Sandeep Bhatia from Intuit and we even found a common acquaintance! How small the world is!

As my prediction of where the software industry is going in the next 25 years, I offered the following words: "In 25 years' time I will be retiring, and only good quality software will be produced in America, Germany, Finland, as it is so much cheaper to produce bad software elsewhere." What I meant was that because software is becoming more and more global, you can't compete with location, the only trump card you have is quality. Either the software production in more labour-costly countries learns to be better quality or it will die. Basic evolutionary theory. The companies surviving in America, Germany, Finland in 25 years' time have only survived because they learned to produce good quality software quickly enough. The quality must overcompensate for the higher labour costs, otherwise it makes no sense to produce it there.

I have caught a slight cold and am dreading the long flight tomorrow. I hope my ears won't block, that can hurt in an airplane.

Adjusting...

..today was all about adjusting to the time difference. I woke up at a normal time, had breakfast, made some plans and walked out of the hotel to realize them. After visiting the Saturday Marketplace I almost arrived late for the Omnimax presentation "The Human Body". The short film proved to be really interesting and well done. It used different techniques like magnification (up 50.000 times), heat-sensitive cameras, x-rays, time speed-ups and morphing to create visually superb effects on the larger than life screen that is so Imax.

After walking a bit too much, and nobody else is walking here. If you see people moving about without cars they are either jogging or cycling. A walker is unseen, although I saw a small group of women preparing to practice Nordic Walking by the Willamette river. The river name is pronounced something like 'wal-lamet' and is probably of Indian origin.

Now I'm back at the hotel and still fighting against falling asleep although it is starting to be the right time. So I think I'll watch some TV and sleep tight!

In Portland, Oregon

Touched down a few hours ago and have now settled in my hotel room. My computer tells me it is midnight, but the sunshine outside points out the fact that it is actually 3 o'clock in the afternoon. I'll go and check out the city, the train is free all day in the center! Unbelievable!

The unloading of the aircraft was one of the slowest ones I've experienced. It was excrutiating, especially as my bag arrived as the absolute last one! Somebody's bag has to...

Now I need to stay up until the evening to more quickly adapt to this timezone. My presentation in the conference is not until Tuesday so I should be fine by then. It is after all Friday, ... or is it Saturday?

Reconnaissance

The ever more popular DayTick training session takes place tomorrow morning in a new location here in Jyväskylä. The sensible thing was to do a little bit of reconnaissance so I wouldn't have to search for the place tomorrow morning. I walked in the dark evening over a bridge and found a strange-looking wedge-shaped house. It was mostly glass and seemed extremely tall. I counted 16 floors.

I am prepared.

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Syksyinen ilta oli jo pimennyt eikä katuvalojen hämyssä erottanut enää ruskankeltaisia vaahteranlehtiä kuin siellä täällä. Enää ei satanut, mutta jalkakäytävä kiilsi päivän kosteudesta. Matkakeskuskin oli hiljennyt, junia ei ollut saapumassa asemalla. Laiturit olivat autioita, kun kapusin betoniportaita ylimenosillalle. Katettu kaarisilta kaikui askeleistani, vastaani tuli nuoripari iltakävelyllä. Kosteat lankut tuoksuivat huumaavasti. Sillan päässä oli kolme vaihtoehtoa: portaat vasemmalle, hissi keskellä ja pyöräilyluiska oikealle. Pian huomasin, miksi portaista varoitettiin erityisesti. Ne olivat todella leveät ja matalat, juuri niin leveät, että askel ei oikein osunut niihin. Jokaisella askeleella sama jalka osui alemmalle portaalle ja meno tuntui linkuttavalta. Jokainen porras vaati kaksi askelta ja aleni vain muutaman sentin. Alhaalla huomasin lasisen rakennuksen, jonka firmaluettelokyltti oli nälkävuoden mittainen. Ainakin kolmekymmentä eri yritystä pitää joukkojaan tuossa Innova-nimisessä talossa.
Päästä katsottuna talo oli kuin kiila, vain alimmassa kerroksessa oli leveyttä ovelle, jonka numero 11 kertoi osoitteen olevan oikean. Wilhelm Schaumannin patsas katseli kuin torsoton Lenin ihan toiseen suuntaan läheisellä aukiolla.
- Tänne minun pitäisi siis aamulla tulla, ajattelin.
- Eihän matkaan mene varttiakaan, edes matkalaukun kanssa.
Tehdäkseni pidemmän lenkin valitsin toisen sillan paluumatkalle, mutta sen betonipohja ei haissut millekään.

Olen valmis.

(Edit 4.10.07 erään rakennusalan ammattilaisen vuodatuksen pohjalta: 'sementti' muutettu oikeammaksi 'betoniksi'. 'Kaksikymmentä' -> 'kolmekymmentä'.)