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Contents ISSUE 302 • JUNE 2014

FROM THE EDITORS FEATURES 11 Has the life cycle reached end of life? The Elements of Success 11 The Federal Courts are trying to break software 12 SD Times on the Web NEWS 16 Agile + Big Data + the cloud 18 It’s cloud first, mobile first for Microsoft’s future 21 What to expect from Node.js 1.0 22 Tech giants try to stave off next Heartbleed page 32 24 The rise of the Citizen Developer 26 Dynamsoft targets .NET app development in latest release Microsoft How to get Git 29 Great apps begin with DevExpress controls lines up into the enterprise for agile COLUMNS

57 CODE WATCH by Larry O’Brien The inner game of programming

58 GUEST VIEW by Matt Badgley Has agile lost its innovation? page 38 page 46 61 ANALYST WATCH by Al Hilwa Is Microsoft starting to get it? Getting a handle on Hadoop 62 INDUSTRY WATCH by David Rubinstein The Big Boulder Initiative

page 50

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www.sdtimes.com June 2014 SD Times 11

FROM THE EDITORS

Has the life cycle reached end of life? he term “application life cycle” was for Continuous Integration, or used to Rubinstein sat down with Microsoft Tintroduced back in the early make sure the whole of the software corporate vice president of the devel- aughts, a time before Agile Develop- works even as the latest code is validat- oper division Brian Harry at last ment, before Web services and certain- ed during CI. Testing and QA? People month’s TechEd Conference in Hous- ly before the practice of continuous are still trying to figure out where test- ton to talk about Visual Studio Online software delivery. ing fits in this world of rapid releases. (including TFS), which Harry No, the term Application Lifecycle Not to mention, more open-source described as Microsoft’s ALM hub. In Management—ALM—implies a code than ever is being brought in to his next breath, though, Harry said his beginning an end. ALM closely fol- projects. That has to be vetted for team at Microsoft has been debating lows waterfall development practices, license issues, quality issues and the trying to come up with a new term for under which huge requirements docu- like. And today’s applications often rely ALM, which would encompass every- ments are created for months before on Web services, so maintenance thing involved in building and manag- coding even begins, then batch pro- becomes a larger issue. For example, ing an application. They came up with cessing and overnight builds occur what happens to your application if a Modern Application Lifecycle (MAL), alongside rigorous testing until the critical Web service you employ goes which might not play well in France, software is ready to be released, all to down, or is rewritten in such a way that where “mal” means bad or sick. circle back to the beginning again for it breaks your application? Our editors put our heads together the next iteration of the software. That Then there are the growing areas of and first came up with CALM: Contin- “cycle” of development could take a DevOps and application performance uous Application Lifecycle Manage- year, or 18 months. management. So, configuring your ment. But that included the term “life- But fast-forward to today, and things infrastructure and then monitoring the cycle,” so we shortened it to CAM: are dramatically different. In an Agile application to ensure optimal perform- Continuous Application Management. world, no longer are huge requirements ance become a part of the equation. How would you rename ALM? Let documents created. Builds are forsaken SD Times executive editor David us have your suggestions. z The federal courts are trying to break software e’ve been complaining about standardized interface? Java isn’t just a Microsoft, though, would never sue Wsoftware patents for years, typi- language, it’s a specification. But this anyone for replicating their APIs, even cally advocating for their elimination argument is missing the forest for the less so for just using them. If developers and replacement with copyright law trees. In one swift move, the circuit couldn’t replicate APIs, they couldn’t coverage. But the recent ruling in the court’s ruling has threatened the under- support legacy software. As the United case of Oracle and Google over patent pinnings of all of software. States court system and government as infringement—the court’s opinion After all, every single piece of soft- a whole are not blessed with the newest wielded copyright law like a chainsaw— ware ever written in any language other of equipment or the greatest of techni- threatens the very basis of all software than binary is building upon the work of cal savvy, perhaps they would suffer the interoperability. others. As that stack became more most if all legacy software suddenly At issue is the fact that the judges in advanced, developers delineated ways became useless due to legal risks associ- the case declared Oracle’s Java APIs for future developers to continue to use ated with modernizing their interfaces were infringed by Google’s replication their aging software and methods: or replicating them in new software. of their interfaces. While there was a through application programming All we can hope for now is that the very specific finding in one case where interfaces. Without open APIs, you previous court, which has been handed a few lines of Android code were actu- couldn’t write any software of any kind. back the case, does the right thing and ally identical to Oracle’s code, the rul- If Microsoft’s Windows APIs were pro- decides that all API usage is covered ing insinuated that more than 30 of tected by copyright in the manner under the fair use doctrine, which Google’s Android software packages desired by the circuit courts, no one in allows copying of copyrighted material were infringing Oracle’s copyrights. their right minds would ever write a for “transformative” purposes. But, we ask, how can you infringe a program for Windows for fear of being The consequences of not doing so copyright by replicating a documented, sued out of existence by Microsoft. could be catastrophic for the industry. z SDT302 page 12_Layout 1 5/22/14 1:25 PM Page 12

12 SD Times June 2014 www.sdtimes.com

Who are the realest The Top 5 GitHub fictional coders? projects from May Movies and TV love coders and hackers, and why The world’s largest project repository allows not? They get to work on fancy screens and be all you to see what the most popular projects are. sarcastic-like. But when it comes to depicting what Here’s what saw the most action in May: they do with computers, some are more reason- 1)Pop 3) GitHub Cheat Sheet able than others. We here at SD Times came up with a list of the best fictional 2) Atom 4) Quill coders to see which ones are more outlandish and which ones you can kinda 5) Velocity see actually working in your office. You can see the list at sdt.bz/70168. Linus: Linux’s security blanket Linus Torvalds has been called many things, but a security blanket? Can someone with a prickly reputation be easily embraced? According to Alex Handy, yes: “If Linus were a company, we’d all be doomed. But he’s not. He’s a benevolent dictator. A merit-based dictator. He is an evolutionarily selected gigantic throbbing brain at the center of the Linux community. About the only mean thing you can say of his rule is that he does not suffer fools glad- ly.” Read more at sdt.bz/70172. Inc. GitHub, © 2013 Octocat,

Is Bitcoin a worthy investment? Bitcoin doesn’t get much press around here, and the cryptocurrency has faced its share of setbacks. But people still believe in it, at least at MIT, where a pair of students are trying to build out an ecosystem for it. (You can read Rob Marvin’s story Have you been keeping up about it at sdt.bz/70138.) Not everyone thinks bit- with ‘Silicon Valley’? coins are a good investment, though, as Christina Mulligan writes at sdt.bz/71189. Do you think Bitcoin will ever really hit it HBO’s show about a startup and its crew of coders mainstream? Or will it live in perpetual distrust with the public at large? has already secured a second season. But what’s all the fuss about? Rob Marvin has kept track of the series since its first episode, watching the travails of Pied Piper and its quest to not Learn to be destroyed by its rivals. We’re not going to spoil what happens for you, but if you want to program, for fun see how the show developed over its first season, you can read all of Rob’s recaps, starting It turns out that many people are with sdt.bz/69031. trying to teach kids how to program, and there’s no better way to do that than make the experience as fun as possible. We’ve found 15 toys, tools and games that make programming more fun than it has any right to be, and hopefully will spur kids into the field. You can read about Bo and Yana, Hello Ruby, Robotiky, and more at sdt.bz/71233.

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16 SD Times June 2014 www.sdtimes.com Agile + Big Data + the BY ROB MARVIN ber of servers. It’s the only practical As Big Data has gotten bigger and way to do it. While there are many bigger, and businesses demand ways to do that, they all come down more and more out of their data, to sharding in one capacity or traditional database structures just another. don’t cut it anymore. The traditional Sharding comes from broken single static repository simply isn’t glass, a metaphor popularized by equipped to handle the industry’s Google with its BigTable architec- rapidly evolving needs. ture. The simple idea of sharding is Cory Isaacson, database technol- you’re going to use a key in the data ogy veteran and the CEO of agile to divvy it up. With a NoSQL data- Big Data technology provider Code- base, it’s a no-brainer. The database Futures, believes we need to rethink itself doesn’t know anything about the role of databases in a cloud and your content, it just knows about mobile-dominated landscape. He the key itself, so it’s very easy to do. has worked with database technolo- But when you have related data— gies for 25 years, from the early days which is true almost anywhere—as of Sybase to MySQL and SQL, in- soon as you shard one way, it works memory databases, and more well for one use case but not for recently open-source database proj- another. ects such as MapDB. An early start- Let’s say you have a multi-user up of Isaacson’s built some of the game with players competing first big client-server applications against each other. You want to for the entertainment industry in show players a list of all the games the early 1980s, and in the decades CodeFutures CEO Cory Isaacson they played and what their scores since he has started and sold several is rethinking how databases were. Every game will want that. consulting companies, and spent Let’s say you grow to millions and several years heading up Rogue and the cloud interact millions of players and shard by Wave before starting CodeFutures player. Then what happens is now in 2007. close as possible, but that’s almost the players say they would like to see a SD Times spoke with Isaacson always very impractical. list of who else played a given game ahead of his upcoming talk, “Scaling So what happens is you run into an they’ve clicked on. The data is parti- and Managing Big Data: Have We incredible number of performance tioned completely wrong for that, so Been Looking at Databases Wrong This problems and what I’d call application the only way you can get that answer is Whole Time?” about how databases integration difficulty. The requirements to search all the partitions, which is the have changed, scaling in the cloud, and fit less and less to that traditional model worst-performing thing you can do. why “agile Big Data” is the future. and need to expand more and more As Big Data needs evolve, people SD Times: How would you describe the tra- into completely different and new capa- need to scale, but typically they only ditional view of databases? bilities. Over time, it just gets messier pick one scaling mechanism, and as Isaacson: People look at databases as a and messier, it makes the application soon as they do that, everything else static repository. You develop a schema developer’s job harder and harder, and starts to break down. The data is also you think will fit your needs as best you it makes performance more and more getting much bigger. The rate of data is can, you start developing against it, and challenging as the application grows. growing much faster when you think invariably you write, read and start How has your view of databases and Big about the Internet of Things and the manipulating the data. You don’t really Data evolved over time? What do organiza- number of mobile devices and data think of it as a dynamic. Then what hap- tions need out of data now that they didn’t sources out there. We’re now talking pens is that, very quickly, application necessarily need in the past? about tens of thousands or millions of requirements change and evolve. You There’s quite a bit that has changed. I’ll transactions a second in these systems. have to start scaling the database and start with scaling, which is of big inter- So the data is getting much bigger and altering the schemas as best you can, est to everyone. The way you scale a faster, but people also need the ability usually sticking with what you have as database is to partition it across a num- to see on a real-time basis what’s hap- SDT302 page 16,17_Layout 1 5/22/14 12:56 PM Page 17

www.sdtimes.com June 2014 SD Times 17

mechanics, essentially water going characteristic of a given database for a through pipes. It makes the data more certain part of your application. fluid, dynamic and much easier to think Going back to the game example, let’s cloud with. say you want to add leaderboards to a What are some of the most prevalent chal- game. You’re not going to do a leader- pening with their businesses and cus- lenges in scaling databases for the cloud? board in the same database you use to tomers. It’s no longer good enough to There are a few challenges happening keep track of the gameplay itself. On top take all this data, put it in a data ware- in the cloud that you don’t see else- of that, game developers want to know house and get an answer in a week or where. Performance in the cloud is absolutely everything that goes on in a overnight. generally worse than it is in regular game. All the clicks a user has, what the To pose the question of your upcoming servers. You have to scale much sooner most popular features or paths through presentation back to you, have we been in the cloud than you do in other places. the application are, how long it takes looking at databases wrong this whole The second thing is that cloud environ- them to get from one level to the next, time? ments, particularly public cloud envi- all those questions have to be tracked, As embarrassing as it is for the whole ronments, are shared, so they’re not as and it generates an enormous amount of community—including myself—I think reliable and the performance is not as data. Imagine millions of daily active the answer is yes. If you look at databas- consistent. You will see failures in a users in a highly successful game, and in es as a static repository, where you can cloud environment because as you scale each game a user might be clicking 100- only make a limited amount of struc- you’re adding failure points, and you 200 times. To track all of those and trend ture changes and you can only partition have to be able to respond to those fail- that is a phenomenal challenge. one way, it’s far too static to be able to ure points without downtime, which is a One size will definitely not fit all. handle today’s fast-changing needs and very difficult challenge when it comes But how do you do that in a more seam- application requirements. It’s far too to database technology. less fashion than it’s done today? Right much work as well; that’s the real kick- er. It’s not like things can’t be done, it If you look at databases as a static repository, just takes much, much longer to do it’s far too static to be able to handle today’s than it should with current databases as a sort of graveyard for static data. fast-changing needs and application requirements. Describe what you see as the agile approach to Big Data, and explain how it How have your experiences over the past now there’s a lot of tedious, manual works in respect to upending that static two decades colored your beliefs and work on the part of developers that view of databases. expertise about how best to utilize Big makes for quite a brittle infrastructure. The best way to look at your data, as Data? What is your vision for the future of opposed to a static repository, is as a Certainly the whole industry has databases, this new paradigm for agile real-time flow. It’s just amazing if you learned a tremendous amount. There Big Data, cloud infrastructure and man- start to look at and process your data as has been more evolution and genera- agement? a flow into different structures, scaling tion of new database technologies in The ideal situation is where the applica- and partitioning schemas as you need, the last five or six years than in the 20 tion developer doesn’t have to worry the unbelievable amount of freedom years prior. Most databases prior to the about it, yet the data infrastructure can and simplicity you gain. past half-decade or so were pretty be tremendously intricate and involved Again, take that example about the much built along the same infrastruc- and support all the things the applica- game application. Now what you could ture. One thing I’ve learned is that you tion really needs. Making that easier to do is use stream-based processing to end up needing not just a more flexible do will have a huge impact on the way take all the transactions from your infrastructure, but you need to under- these applications are developed. game, put those into the list of games stand and probably use more than one Why this is so critical is because as big by player, but at the same time auto- database. Relying on say, Oracle, to do as data is today, we’ve only seen the tip mate that same list into all the players everything you need is just not going to of the iceberg. There’s going to be a total who played a single game. You can take work in today’s environment. data explosion, starting now but growing that work away from the application Especially in the open-source world, somewhere between 10 and 50 times developer so they can concentrate on you end up using lots and lots of differ- over the next 10 years. Everything will the game features, while a data archi- ent capabilities. That’s good, but it also have a CPU in it sending out something, tect looks at the data in-flow and organ- makes things much harder on the appli- connecting the world over the Internet. izes it by sequence. cation developer. But this agile combina- We have to be ready for that. We can’t I should’ve seen this sooner, to be tion of streams and databases solves the spend all our time hand-massaging code honest. The idea of software pipelines problems because now you can stream to try to fit arcane data structures. That’s was that software is very much like fluid to more than one database if you need a never going to cut it. z SDT302 page 18_Layout 1 5/22/14 3:51 PM Page 18

18 SD Times June 2014 www.sdtimes.com It’s cloud first, mobile first for Microsoft’s future Open-sourcing of ASP.NET announced at TechEd BY DAVID RUBINSTEIN This makes it lighter and optimized for Build to foster the .NET ecosystem of Microsoft announced support for the the cloud. Developers can bundle the open-source projects. Apache Cordova cross-device develop- application, a VM and other features Microsoft’s open-source roots date ment platform from within Visual Stu- into a “container,” and run those appli- all the way back to 2006 with the launch dio, along with a host of other cations on the same server even though of the CodePlex open-source hosting announcements at its TechEd 2014 they’re using different versions of .NET. site, and Microsoft Open Technologies conference in Houston last month. As for the infrastructure underneath has hosted open-source projects on The integration helps drive Microsoft’s message of “cloud first, mobile first” for customers, something it had already enabled with its Xamarin integration, but has now been made native to the Visual Studio development environment. The integration will allow Microsoft developers to create applications with either JavaScript or Microsoft’s new TypeScript language, according to the company.

Is Microsoft starting to get it? page 61 Microsoft’s Brad Anderson emphasized how intertwined cloud will be in future “A cloud without connected devices mobile products.

is nothing but untapped potential,” said Microsoft of courtesy Photo corporate vice president Brad Ander- this all—Azure—Microsoft has released GitHub for the past two years, with son in his keynote address. “And a preview of Azure Files, which is com- software such as the Azure SDK avail- devices without the cloud are nothing mon storage that VMs and applications able since 2012. At this year’s Build, but untapped potential.” can use in a shared manner. The compa- Microsoft announced the .NET Foun- Microsoft also announced open ny also announced a beta of Azure Redis dation, as well as its next-generation APIs for Visual Studio Online, which Cache to reduce response time and load Roslyn C# compiler, would be released uses REST, OAuth and service hooks to on the back end. as open source. enable developers to bring their exist- The move to open-source ASP.NET ing Windows applications to the cloud ASP.NET goes open source is about the future. The .NET Founda- to achieve the benefits of integration Changes are also coming to ASP.NET, tion, still in its initial stages of forma- and collaboration. This builds on which will follow the more modularized tion, will shepherd ASP.NET vNext, Microsoft’s Universal Windows Appli- lead of the .NET framework to enable Roslyn, and a host of other frameworks cations plan announced earlier this year developers to choose only those fea- and projects into the open-source com- at the Build conference, which lets tures and functions they need in the munity. According to the ASP.NET developers use 90% of the code they new version, ASP.NET vNext. Soon Open Source page, Microsoft is also write for an application across all after announcing ASP.NET vNext, backing the Open Web Interface for Microsoft platforms: desktops, tablets, Microsoft released the ASP.NET .NET standard for hosting ASP.NET phones and the Xbox. source code on GitHub, open-sourced outside of Internet Information Servic- Along with this came a preview of under the Apache 2.0 license. es or Microsoft System Center, and it is the next iteration of the .NET frame- The ASP.NET vNext framework will working with the open-source commu- work, designed to enable developers to be an open-source project under the nity to produce alternative MVC and use .NET features without having to banner of the .NET Foundation, a service frameworks. z run the entire underlying framework. foundation Microsoft announced at Rob Marvin contributed to this story. SDT302 Full Page Ads_Layout 1 5/21/14 3:39 PM Page 19 SDT302 page 20_Layout 1 5/22/14 3:14 PM Page 20

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www.sdtimes.com June 2014 SD Times 21 What to expect from Node.js 1.0 Improvements to layers and other features were previewed

BY ROB MARVIN in Node as a first-class feature for peo- in the fact that we don’t want it released In the lead-up to the stable release of ple who want to bind to native libraries as fast as they release it.” Node.js version 1.0, Joyent—the main with just JavaScript, and not have to The rest of the event consisted of developer behind the open-source write binary modules.” Node.js developers from a diverse group JavaScript implementation—is taking Fontaine also made a point of stating of New York-based companies telling Node.js on a road trip. that Node.js 0.12 is the first version their own Node.js stories. Web engi- At the “Node.js on the Road” event in where every platform is supported with neers from the “Pandora for fine art” New York City, Joyent developers and all tests passing on Linux and Windows, startup Artsy, as well as software engi- Node.js community members neers from ADP Innovation Labs talked about the new features in and Dow Jones, were among the forthcoming 0.12 release, and them. The impetus for Node.js shared experiences about imple- on the Road, which has held five menting and running the plat- events across the country thus far, form. The night’s featured speak- is a grassroots effort to find out er, Node.js project lead T.J. what feedback and features the Fontaine, laid out the biggest Node.js community is looking for changes “Noders” can expect from in future versions. The company version 0.12, including a stable C is also searching for active open- add-on layer, binary module iden- source contributors. tification, and dynamic tracing. “People who have a feature “0.12 will be released immi- they want added into Node, nently, and then beyond that we’re reaching out to them to we’re using this roadshow to see if that feature makes sense make sure we understand what for Node, and if they have the features need to be going into the resources to devote that per- [1.0] release,” Fontaine told SD son to work on it,” Fontaine Times before the event. “The said. “Node is totally free to go API we have is here, solid and out and operate as an open-

will work for you in 1.0 and Joyent of courtesy Photo source project, and to grow beyond. We’re going to add a sta- Node.js project lead T.J. Fontaine describes the state of Node.js. and flourish on its own speed. ble add-on layer, a stable C API Joyent just happens to be shep- layer...to compile binary add-ons once and that Node.js escaped the Heart- herding it.” without recompiling.” bleed bug due a recently revamped Emcee and Joyent CTO Bryan During his presentation, Fontaine TLS/cryptographic scheme with consis- Cantrill kicked off the evening by also talked about dynamic, user-defined tent error handling. explaining what makes Node unique. tracing that comes with the Node.js “With Node I saw a Java phenome- JavaScript API, along with an asynchro- V8 and the future of Node non,” he said. “By that I mean the tech- nous listener, a tracing interface, and V8 In the pre-event interview, Fontaine nology is in exactly the right place at engine probes. He also mentioned iden- also spoke about Joyent’s unique symbi- exactly right time. For kernel developers, tification features for particular binary otic relationship with the Google V8 I know it’s difficult to accept that you’ve modules in the Node.js community. team in the release and update process. fallen in love with JavaScript, the forbid- “We’re adding more features as far “Node’s release schedule hasn’t been den fruit of kernel development. Node is as identifying people who have binary as timely, so it’s difficult to stay up with JavaScript with a rippin’ VM in V8 modules out there in the ecosystem V8, which changes really fast,” [Google’s JavaScript engine] and a Unix that are really popular,” Fontaine said. Fontaine said. “They’re improving and philosophy around it. It’s a bunch of “If they fit the model for Node, we’ll getting some of those fixes back into the small tools that do well-defined things, bring them in so people don’t have to versions people have popularized. It’s stitched together into complex systems.” worry about compiling those extra not always possible to do, but they’ll As for when we can expect Node.js dependencies. Something like FFI [for- backport fixes to the stable release of 1.0, Fontaine gave his stock answer: “As eign function interface] might end up Node. So there’s some tension, mostly soon as humanly possible.” z SDT302 page 22.qxd-adTK_Layout 1 5/22/14 10:09 AM Page 22

22 SD Times June 2014 www.sdtimes.com Tech giants try to stave off next Heartbleed Core Infrastructure Initiative wants to bolster underfunded open-source projects BY CHRISTINA MULLIGAN The initiative, set up by the Linux tion,” said Steve Lipner, partner direc- The aftermath of OpenSSL’s Heart- Foundation, currently includes Ama- tor of software security at Microsoft. bleed bug raised some important issues zon Web Services, Dell, Facebook, “The Core Infrastructure Initiative about open-source software develop- Google, IBM, Intel, Microsoft, Qual- aligns with our participation in open ment. Many open-source projects are comm, Rackspace, and others. source and the advancement of secure underfunded and understaffed, leading “These companies recognize the development across all platforms, to unreliable code, according to a newly need for directed funds for highly criti- devices and services.” formed group, the Core Infrastructure cal open-source software projects they Currently, OpenSSL is the initiative’s Initiative, which aims to fund and sup- all consume and that run much of mod- first project under consideration to port projects in need of assistance. ern-day society,” said the Linux Foun- receive funds. Although the initiative “The computing industry has increas- dation. “They also value and invest in was created as a result of the Heartbleed ingly come to rely upon shared source developers and collaborative software crisis, the initiative said its efforts will code to foster innovation,” according to development and want to support this not be limited to security-related issues. the Linux Foundation’s website. “But as important work.” “Our global economy is built on top this shared code has become ever more A steering committee made up of the of many open-source projects,” said Jim critical to society and more complex to initiative’s members will be formed in Zemlin, executive director of the Linux build and maintain, there are certain order to identify, approve and oversee Foundation. “Just as The Linux Foun- projects that have not received the level projects and developers in need of sup- dation has funded Linus Torvalds to be of support commensurate with their port. An advisory board of open-source able to focus 100% on Linux develop- importance. As we just witnessed with developers and community members ment, we will now be able to support the Heartbleed crisis, too many critical will also guide the steering committee. additional developers and maintainers open-source software projects are under- “Security is an industry-wide con- to work full-time supporting other funded and under-resourced.” cern requiring industry-wide collabora- essential open-source projects.” z SDT302 Full Page Ads_Layout 1 5/21/14 3:54 PM Page 23

SO MUCH MORE THAN COMPONENTS

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24 SD Times June 2014 www.sdtimes.com

Expectations for Customizing Find Solutions Outside of IT Use of Personal Apps in Expected Promotions Work Computer and Laptop Workplace in Next 12 Months 73% of Citizen Developers 54% of non-Citizen Developers

Source: TrackVia Citizen Developer Survey, 2014 The rise of the Citizen Developer New report marks shift in enterprise attitude about business users building apps

BY ROB MARVIN know how to run my department better this more with their own devices and The Citizen Developers are taking over. than anyone else. Why can’t I just build apps, with the report revealing that A growing, highly motivated class of the technology to do it for me as well?’ ” 56% use personal apps to complete enterprise workers is using BYOD tech- workplace tasks, compared to 28% of nology to build homegrown software Where do they come from? non-Citizen Developers. that bypasses the traditional IT process, According to the report, 50% of Citizen “You have a generation of doers changing the way organizations operate. Developers aged 18-29—the millennial being promoted through the organiza- Research firm Gartner defined a generation—develop their own enter- tion,” Khanna said. “They don’t want to Citizen Developer as “a user who cre- prise apps, compared to 47% of Citizen rely on IT; they wanted to empower ates new business applications for Developers aged 30-44 and 43% aged themselves. They’re also the ones driv- consumption by [other employees 45-60. Khanna believed the permeation ing the initiative in their business; these within the company] by using devel- of technology in daily life has led to dra- are the folks leading this company.” opment and runtime environments matically higher software literacy than The mindset of a Citizen Developer sanctioned by corporate IT.” Also ever before. Combined with the pro- is based on a do-it-yourself attitude, know as a business user or a “power gression of development platforms and quickly reaching solutions, and flexibil- user,” Citizen Developers are making cloud-based PaaSes built by develop- ity, according to Khanna. They know use of advancements in development ers, the software-literate mindset has exactly what their department and busi- platforms and cloud computing servic- created opportunities for this wave of ness needs every month or quarter to es to broaden the end-user application Citizen Developers to advance within drive the business forward. development cycle. organizations. “We’ve advanced that platform and A new report from enterprise appli- “The thing about citizen developers that framework to encompass three lev- cation platform provider TrackVia is that they’ve been propelled forward els we think all applications need,” showed that this younger generation of by the software developers building Khanna said. “Record-level manage- Citizen Developers is reshaping busi- easy-to-use tools for them,” Khanna ment for your data, workflow capabili- ness software as they rise up company said. “The mentality may be the same ties so you can take action on that data, ranks on the strength of their cus- but there are far more of these people and then dashboard visibility so you can tomized enterprise solutions. The in organizations now.” actually interpret what’s going on over a report, “The next generation worker: As part of this shift, the role of IT is period of time. The mentality shift is The Citizen Developer,” anonymously transitioning from the driver of a busi- that I know the requirements, I can do surveyed 1,000 enterprise workers from ness’ technology efforts to a service it myself and I have business goals to various industries on factors such as age organization. Rather than building hit. range, confidence level, promotion business applications and going “Simplifying the workforce the same rate, and BYOD and communication through a back-and-forth of prototypes way Gmail did it and Google Apps has preferences. and tweaks, Citizen Developers are done it, that’s where the movement is “A Citizen Developer is someone streamlining the process. Sixty-three going in the software space. You don’t who has grown up with technology their percent of Citizen Developers find have to take forever to get Microsoft whole life,” said Pete Khanna, CEO of solutions outside of IT, compared to Exchange up and install Outlook on TrackVia. “These Citizen Developers 39% of non-citizen developers, accord- every device your users are using. Citi- are doers; they’re the ambitious type ing to the report. zen Developers are going to simplify within the organization that’ll say, ‘I Citizen Developers are also doing business applications.” z SDT302 Full Page Ads_Layout 1 5/21/14 3:39 PM Page 25 SDT302 page 26_Layout 1 5/22/14 10:10 AM Page 26

26 SD Times June 2014 www.sdtimes.com

COMPONENT WATCH

Dynamsoft targets .NET app In other component news… ■ Document, content and imaging solution provider Accusoft has development in latest release released the latest version of its document viewer, Prizm Content Connect New features also address capturing, v8.4. Prizm Content Connect allows users to view hundreds of different rasterizing and displaying images from PDFs document file formats on almost any system or device with only a browser. BY CHRISTINA MULLIGAN It supports CCITT G3/G4, JPEG, Features include a new API that allows Scanner programming library and FLATE, LZW, RLE, ZIP compressed developers to integrate the viewer JavaScript webcam plug-in developer files and PDF/A file formats. Images into Web apps and customize the Dynamsoft recently announced the lat- can also be saved into a variety of for- appearance, and improved processing est version of Dynamic .NET TWAIN, mats such as PNG, TIFF, BMP and a of medical DICOM images to enhance a .NET document imaging software byte array. apps for eDiscovery and medical development kit based on Direct- recordkeeping. Show and TWAIN. It provides ■ Qoppa Software, a provider of APIs for scanner and webcam Java-based PDF tools, announced software development, and it version 9 of PDF Studio, its PDF edit- allows developers to capture ing software for Linux, Mac OS and images and save or upload them to Windows. Version 9 adds an interac- their local machine, Web server, tive form designer, conversion to database or FTP site. PDF/A, an advanced redaction fea- The 5.2 release provides devel- ture, and numerous digital signature opers with PDF rasterizer and bar- and annotation improvements. PDF code generator add-ons to simplify Studio 9 also adds quick properties their control over documents and and alignment toolbars, as well as a image handling. user-friendly color picker. “As digital document workflows ■ The ability to import EMF content become more commonplace in Dynamic .NET TWAIN can detect multiple QR codes into apps, convert it to PDF, and save on pages, expanding how developers can use them. every work environment, develop- it with a new EMF import feature ers need tools to easily design and highlights the latest release of PDF deploy useful document-management The barcode generator allows devel- Xpansion SDK (version 10) from PDF and image capture applications,” said opers to generate a 1D or 2D barcode document-management solution Amy Gu, vice president of Dynamsoft. on images for document separation, provider soft Xpansion. New PDF and “Whether the need is for a desktop or categorization and indexing, and to add XPS content-editing features enable Web app, Dynamsoft remains commit- it to a specified area on an image loaded analysis and modification for both ted to providing SDKs that foster in Dynamic .NET TWAIN. Features PDF and XPS files. advanced document-management and include the ability to read multiple bar- ■ File-management component image capture capabilities to drive pro- codes in one image, and to detect QR provider Aspose has released ductivity across many industries, from barcodes at any orientation and rotation Aspose.Diagram for .NET 4.0.0. The healthcare to finance, and more.” angles. .NET release enables developers to The PDF rasterizer performs high- Other features of the release include manipulate diagrams and convert quality conversion from a PDF file to additional optical character recognition them into accepted formats. In the an image. Features include the ability methods and support for loading previous version, some shapes and to convert vector-based PDFs to raster encrypted PDF files. user-defined cell properties weren’t images and display them in the Dynamic .NET TWAIN is opti- retrieved properly; version 4.0.0 fixes Dynamic .NET TWAIN viewer; to mized for C# and Visual Basic .NET, those issues. The release also fixes customize the resolution when raster- and it features built-in support for Win- Windows regional setting issues and izing a PDF; and high-speed viewing Forms and Windows Presentation increases layout perfections when of PDF documents in WinForms apps. Foundation. z rendering to other formats. z SDT302 Full Page Ads_Layout 1 5/21/14 3:40 PM Page 27

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www.sdtimes.com June 2014 SD Times 29

USER EXPERIENCE DEVELOPMENT Great apps begin with DevExpress controls Universal 14.1 adds controls, ASP.NET report designer, and much more

BY LISA MORGAN tainer for module-specific functionality. throw in infinite scrolling and paged Developers rely on DevExpress to pro- HTML 5 Client-Side Data Grid. data binding.” vide the controls they need to build Developers using the DevExtreme Unlike ASP.NET grids, it is a pure stunning desktop, Web and mobile HTML5 JavaScript mobile framework client-side grid. apps. The newly released DevExpress to create phone apps have been asking “People are no longer afraid of Universal 14.1 adds an HTML5 client- for an HTML5 JavaScript Data Grid, client-side stuff,” said Bucknall. “While side data grid control, new Windows Forms (WinForms) Outlook-style controls, new chart types, and the beta version of an ASP.NET report designer. There are also new demos showing developers how to use the new controls and how to build apps with the same look and feel whether they’re using WinForms, ASP.NET or Windows Presen- tation Foundation (WPF). “No matter which platform you choose, we have controls for it and we show you how to use them,” said DevExpress CTO Julian Bucknall. “If you’re using two or more platforms and you have to create the same application with the same UI on all, we can help New WinForms Token Edit control replicates Outlook functionality. you do that as well.” which DevExpress Universal 14.1 people still like and use the ASP.NET New Controls and Control Enhancements delivers. DataGridJS is easy to use and ASPxGridView control, it requires a lot As always, DevExpress continues to customize, works on traditional desktop of server code to be written and execut- add functionality to the control sets for and touch-enabled devices, and is light- ed for the grid to work. If you’re not each platform, giving developers even weight to deliver the best possible per- using ASP.NET, that’s a problem, so more ways to build fluid and responsive formance. this opens up a whole new market for applications that deliver exceptional “Since we’ve been known for our people who don’t need .NET or even user experiences. data grids since the very beginning, we have .NET on the server. All our WinForms Outlook-Style Naviga- decided it was time to build a pure JavaScript widgets are completely serv- tion Controls. DevExpress extended client-side grid,” said Bucknall. “In other code agnostic.” the capabilities of its WinForms Naviga- er words, a data grid widget that is stan- New WinForms Token Edit Con- tion components to fully support the dard HTML5, lots of JavaScript, and trol. This new WinForms control repli- Outlook 2013 user experience. The nav- includes all of the functionality you’d cates the functionality associated with igation links can be displayed at the bot- expect in a grid, such as moving Outlook’s Email To, Cc, and Bcc fields. tom of the page so developers can use columns around or sorting by column, Like Outlook, the control minimizes the space within the primary app con- grouping, and things like that. And then continued on page 30 >

This article is sponsored by DevExpress, a leader the software development tool space. SDT302 page 29,30_Layout 1 5/22/14 3:13 PM Page 30

30 SD Times June 2014 www.sdtimes.com

< continued from page 29 Navigation processes can be managed WinForms Chart Range Control. key strokes and minimizes typing errors using the SelectElementChanging The WinForms Chart Range control by replacing text with tokens. event. makes it easy to visualize trends. “The Token Edit Control is a very WinForms and WPF TileBar WPF and Silverlight Enhance- interesting control. It’s a neat way of Control. Developers who like the idea ments. WPF and Silverlight charts now encapsulating data with a piece of text,” of using the TileNav control but don’t include data aggregation and Funnel said Bucknall. require hierarchy levels or bread- Series view which are already available WinForms and WPF Tile Naviga- crumbs can take advantage the Tile- in DevExpress’ WinForms and tion Control. Developers who are Bar, which is also new to DevExpress ASP.NET suites. familiar with Microsoft Dynamics CRM v14.1. The TileBar displays a set of Data aggregation allows a chart to understand its innovative navigation tiles within its container, allowing automatically aggregate its data, menu and breadcrumbs with three developers to introduce simple, although developers can manually spec- hierarchy levels. DevExpress v14.1 straightforward navigation experiences ify a Scale Mode and Measure Unit to allows developers to include the same to their WinForms and WPF applica- control how data is aggregated. When UI in WinForms and WPF applications tions. With the control, drop-downs combined with zooming and scrolling, with ease. can be displayed for each individual users can quickly visualize localized “We’ve done a lot with touch and Tile and any control can be placed trends. It is also possible to turn series have been enhancing the touch behav- within the Tile’s drop-down region. on and off using checkboxes for interac- tive chart views. ‘People are no longer afraid of The Funnel view is commonly associated with the popular sales and mar- client-side stuff.’ keting “conversion funnel” that shows how numbers decrease as prospects or —Julian Bucknall customers move through the various stages of a sales process. ior since we introduced the first touch- The TileBar can be positioned any- enabled control for WinForms nearly where within an app (top, bottom, left ASP.NET Report Designer two years ago,” said Bucknall. “This is a or right), and the appearance of indi- Developers have been asking for a full- natural enhancement.” vidual Tile items is fully customizable. featured Report Designer for the Web, The TileNavPane can be positioned The control also includes built-in and soon they’ll have it. DevExpress at the top of an application like a Rib- glyph skinning, enabling developers to already has a thick-client Windows bon. It’s a touch-friendly version of provide a monochrome glyph for the Report Designer for end users. With traditional navigation elements used Tile, which the TileBar colorizes to a the ASP.NET Report Designer, devel- within Windows desktop apps. End complimentary color. The TileBar opers will have a pure client-side con- users can navigate the app’s structure ships with a Visual Studio designer so trol based on CSS3, HTML5, and similar to DevExpress’ Outlook- developers can create user experiences JavaScript that targets modern browsers inspired Navigation Bar, while devel- that align with business needs. such as IE9+. It also includes a data opers can introduce animations within connection wizard that makes connect- the NavPane using DevExpress’ new New Chart Types and Enhancements ing to data providers virtually effortless. Transition Manager control. TileNav- DevExpress continues to add new chart “Customers wanted something their Pane makes it easy to determine where types so developers can keep pace with users could just access on a Web page,” the user is within the application’s end user demands for effective data said Bucknall. “That way, they can run navigation hierarchy and to display visualizations. reports without having to install an and activate a drop-down menu with Nested Donut Series View. The application.” sub nodes for each Tile. Tiles and their Nested Donut Series View is good for associated drop-down menus can be comparing data sets such as the per- Check It Out fully customized, from height and centage of men and women living in a DevExpress Universal 14.1 is available appearance to the way the group head- certain country who fall into specified now from www.devexpress.com. Dis- er looks and feels. Developers also age ranges. The new series view is avail- cover what’s new, or try it free for 30 have the option of using custom Tile able for WinForms, ASP.NET, WPF, days and experience DevExpress’ com- buttons and custom category buttons. and Silverlight. prehensive technical support. z SDT302 Full Page Ads_Layout 1 5/21/14 3:41 PM Page 31 SDT302 page 32-36_Layout 1 5/23/14 9:33 AM Page 32

32 SD Times June 2014 www.sdtimes.com SDT302 page 32-36_Layout 1 5/23/14 9:33 AM Page 33

The editors of SD Times again find the right mix for their 12th annual recognition of the software development industry’s leaders and innovators

BY DAVID RUBINSTEIN

t’s that time of year again, when the editors of SD Times emerge from their lab to reveal their latest discovery: The I2014 SD Times 100. A number of elements need to react in precise ways for an organization to attain its place atop the charts, each carrying a certain weight. First is innovation. To earn a seat at the (periodic) table, companies must demonstrate that their work advances the state of the art of software development. Hand in hand with that is leadership. Did the company show it was an industry leader through a lion’s share of its market, or by contributing more to an open-source project than anyone else? Did it establish leadership through the open exchange of its ideas with others? And finally there is the buzz factor. Was the work widely discussed in the industry? Was the technology considered must-have by those in the know? In short, did the organization have the right chemistry? Displaying each of these elements in just the right proportions can be the difference between a winning formula or a dud. To determine that, the editors carefully consider each nomination in a process that involves debate, research and, ultimately, selection. In the periodic table, elements are divided by their properties: Noble gases are with noble gases, metals are with metals, and so on. In the SD Times 100, those properties are ALM & Development Tools; APIs, Libraries and Frameworks; Big Data and Business Intelligence; the Cloud, Database and Database Management; DevOps & SCM; Mobile; Quality Assur- ance & Security; User Experience; and Influencers. What do you think of the 2014 SD Times 100 solution? Did we overlook any organizations that you feel are worthy of inclusion? Did we miss a leader or innovator? Join and follow the conversation on Twitter at #sdtimes100. z SDT302 page 32-36_Layout 1 5/22/14 1:22 PM Page 34

34 SD Times June 2014 www.sdtimes.com

85 At ALM & Development Tools ALM & Development Tools 299.9871 Application life-cycle management, Altova Microsoft Stackify which now covers agile, product-line management and performance Codenvy Rally TechExcel tracking, needs sound methods cou- CollabNet Rommana VersionOne pled with up-to-date tools and platforms. These companies helped IBM Seapine XebiaLabs developers stick to the plan and Kovair Serena ZeroTurnaround avoid falling behind. Sparx Systems

Big Data & Business Intelligence 5 Big Data has hit it big. Every company that has reams of data is looking for ways to effectively store, retrieve and interpret it B all. Fortunately these vendors are working Big Data & on handling this otherwise daunting task, 13 Business Intelligence 10.811 making the mountain of Big Data look like a much more manageable molehill. Al APIs, Libraries APIs, Libraries Apache Hadoop & Frameworks Cloudera & Frameworks 195.084 Concurrent Frameworks help you build your applications DataStax well, but a well-built application means nothing if it can’t connect to and exchange information Hortonworks with other systems. These companies help you MongoDB (10gen) create and share applications that your customers are looking for. Pentaho Splunk Accusoft Isomorphic Talend Amazon JNBridge Zettaset Amyuni Moovweb Aspose /n software Atalasoft Node.js Digia Red Hat Google SpreadsheetGear SDT302 page 32-36_Layout 1 5/22/14 1:12 PM Page 35

The Cloud Amazon Citrix With the cloud firmly established, the focus has shifted on CloudBees making sure users’ data is both Engine Yard secure and accessible. These companies are continuing to pro- GitHub vide solutions that keep data Gizmox DevOps & SCM online and available. Google With cycles seemingly getting shorter and shorter, developers need tools OpenStack that help them hit release dates with- 17 Skytap out compromising. With speed in mind, these companies keep develop- Cl VMware ers on track, no matter how fast they The Cloud need to go.

35.4527 Atlassian LeanKit Docker LLVM Electric Cloud Opscode Git Perforce Database & Database Management IBM Puppet Labs Data is still the most important part of software projects, and managing Intel data structures is just as important. These companies are creating the Jenkins 110 integrations that best receive and utilize that data. 105 Azul Systems Microsoft Ds DevOps and SCM Couchbase Neo Technology Db 269 Database & Database Management Embarcadero Oracle 262 FatCloud PostgreSQL IBM Progress InterSystems ScaleOut Melissa Data

Mobile Mobile is still ubiquitous, and 42 every company seemingly Apple Sencha needs a presence on devices. These companies help appMobi Telerik Mo developers port their apps Mobile to mobile without sacrificing Google Xamarin 95.94 quality. SDT302 page 32-36_Layout 1 5/22/14 1:23 PM Page 36

36 SD Times June 2014 www.sdtimes.com

Mobile Testing, Quality Assurance & Security 109 Security remains a hot-button issue, and Black Duck Perfecto Mobile nobody wants to be the subject of the next sorry headline about a breach or a Compuware SOASTA Mt hack. Even under constant threat, these Coverity uTest Mobile Testing, Quality companies continue to work on security Assurance & Security Neotys Veracode 268 products to stay ahead of the bugs, exploits and malware that lurk. New Relic Zephyr Parasoft

User Experience

What good is an app if a user doesn’t want to interact with it, or even look at it? An underrated 92 quality in software development, user experience is where a well-built application can fail in the eyes U of the market. These companies, though, can help User Experience

prevent that from happening to your app, with 238.0289 tools and technologies that can win a user’s attention (and appreciation). Adobe Systems Magic Software ComponentOne Software FX DevExpress Syncfusion Dundas Data Telerik InfoSoft Global TX Text Control Infragistics Xceed LEAD Technologies

Influencers Amazon Apache Software Foundation It’s one thing to come through on an Apple established technology, technique or service. It’s another to create them yourself. Google These are the companies Hortonworks 53 and organizations that determine what we consider IBM important every year for the I SD Times 100. Microsoft Influencers Oracle 126.90447 World Wide Web Consortium SDT302 Full Page Ads_Layout 1 5/21/14 3:41 PM Page 37

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38 SD Times June 2014 www.sdtimes.com Microsoft lines up for agile

BY PATRICK HYNDS gile development is now well Between Visual Studio, entrenched, and most think they understand what agile means. As with just about Team Foundation Server and Aeverything, the definition varies depending upon whom you ask. Most developers who are doing agile methodologies, the company’s are using Scrum methodologies, but that is not the only path available. agile messaging and tools are Today, agile development in the Microsoft world involves both processes and, despite its being de-emphasized falling into place in the Agile Manifesto, tooling. Microsoft offers a broad set of project- management and developer tools in its opment. The development world is losophy rather than providing a detailed Team Foundation Service, and other filled with horror stories of projects instruction guide. At its core are four software providers extend that platform gone wrong and fortunes lost on dead- statements about important things, with plug-ins that help organizations end systems that never make it into such as “Individuals and interactions become agile in a more efficient, effec- production. I even testified as an expert over processes and tools” and “Working tive way. This report looks at both sides witness a few years ago in a dispute aris- software over comprehensive docu- of the equation. ing from one of these less-than-success- mentation,” along with “Customer col- ful endeavors. laboration over contract negotiation” What agile means The root causes are often a lack of and finally “Responding to change over Back in 2001, a group of very experi- transparency, failure to communicate following a plan.” enced software developers put forth the (or outright miscommunications), Notice that methodologies are not Agile Manifesto, which states a series of and—perhaps the deadliest of sins in included in any of this, even though the priorities and objectives that are meant this space—wishful thinking. These founding fathers of Scrum are among to guide developers and development were the factors that affected the afore- the signees of the Manifesto. At its teams through the shark-infested mentioned doomed application as well. heart, agile just is a developer-style waters of professional software devel- The Agile Manifesto espouses a phi- rehash of the age old Army motto of SDT302 page 38-40,42,44_Layout 1 5/22/14 3:16 PM Page 39

www.sdtimes.com June 2014 SD Times 39

“Lead, follow or get out of the way!” ogy, even if they did not use TFS. At the desire to maintain control as the defin- The goal is to achieve something, to get end of 2012, Microsoft launched an ing reason for sticking with on-premises to producing value and moving away online version of TFS that is sometimes implementations. from assigning blame or making excus- referred to as Team Foundation Service. To better understand how DevOps es. All great rules to live by, but mere However, Microsoft seems to always fits into the picture, Joel Semeniuk, mortals are left to ask how, and that is have a naming mishap that ends up cofounder of Imaginet and longtime where the methodologies and the tools clouding the message around any major proponent of ALM, talked about this in become critically important. product. In the case of the Software-as- the context of how his company helps a-Service version of TFS, this came its customers manage projects from The evolution of Team Foundation Server with the URL and associated name inception to end of life with TFS and a For years Microsoft offered Visual (visualstudioonline.com) coming into few other tools. One unique thing SourceSafe (VSS) as its sole solution to use for Team Foundation Service. In about his company’s process and experi- managing code in a project. Eventually, fact, Visual Studio Online includes ence is that it sticks around the applica- Team Foundation Server (TFS) Team Foundation Service, but also tion over the long term. evolved to replace VSS and greatly folds into that Visual Studio subscrip- This means that DevOps is a big part expanded features such that, rather tions and other extras. It makes sense if of its process. “DevOps is all about bring- than just protecting and versioning you already know that this URL is what ing agility to the process of releasing and TFS is using for the online version, and operating software,” said Semeniuk. that it has added the Visual Studio sub- “Traditionally, development and opera- scriptions at the Pro level and above. tions have been two separate worlds: Otherwise it looks like it’s supposed to developers using one methodology and be about Visual Studio as a product set of tools, and IT using an entirely dif- rather than Team Foundation Service. ferent set of processes and tools.” The online nature of Visual Studio He added, “DevOps is about bringing Online has helped accelerate the both worlds together from a process and DevOps trend as the lines between tooling perspective. DevOps not only developer and admin are blurred. Some better facilitates the build and release organizations are resistant to moving cycle, but also provides critical insight from hosting their own TFS to using back to the development team, creating a Visual Studio Online due to a desire to tight feedback loop that can dramatically maintain control, or because they need impact the underlying software.” something that is not possible yet with the online offering. Often there is fear Methodologies as a way of life that the network team will become Among Microsoft development shops, obsolete if the cloud gets too much of a Scrum is definitely the dominant agile foothold, and objections flow from methodology, and it might be the domi- there. The CTO usually pushes for the nant methodology overall. Rather than cloud while the CIO sees a loss of influ- talk about agile, however, most diehard ence if the data centers shrink. Scrum practitioners in the Microsoft There are still a number of valid rea- space talk about Application Lifecycle sons to choose on-premises TFS over Management (ALM). This is possibly the cloud-based version, but those dif- because that is how Microsoft talks about ferences are disappearing with each the features of Team Foundation Server new iteration. Currently the main items and Team Foundation Service, but also missing from the online offering are the because ALM is more encompassing. ability to do customizations or exten- This is an example of how Microsoft sions, as well as CodeLens, SharePoint has embraced agile without forsaking source code, allowed for the whole integration, SQL Reporting, and busi- the tools; instead, it makes the tools application life cycle to be managed. ness intelligence features. that enable agile to work with its own Over a number of versions, TFS The greatest disappointment is the technology. SSW is a consultancy based added features that have made it indis- absence of CodeLens support, but this in Sydney, Australia, that specializes in pensable to organizations that have is likely to be added since there does software development projects using come to rely on it. With the popularity of not appear to be anything that would Microsoft technology. Adam Cogan, TFS, the concept of a Work Item block this except time to implementa- chief architect at SSW, Microsoft entered into the vocabulary of all devel- tion. Eventually we can expect all of Regional Director and Microsoft MVP opers who work with Microsoft technol- these disparities to disappear, leaving a continued on page 40 > SDT302 page 38-40,42,44_Layout 1 5/22/14 3:17 PM Page 40

40 SD Times June 2014 www.sdtimes.com

actually welcomes it. Waterfall projects are not nimble, but they Where agile fits are predictable (or at least they should be) and that makes them Agile development has many fans—for good reason—but the really handy if you require a fixed price for the development or first thing to understand is that it is not necessarily for everyone even just a reasonable estimate. A project that does not define and is not a fit for every project under the sun. There are many all requirements at the outset must be undertaken using a Spiral ways to characterize a project, development model in which but the primary differentiator the product owner states a for any development project is vision, and then the coders always whether the details of mock up or develop to that the final result are known in vision such that the owner advance or not. can see a demo and decide When a project is started with where it should go from an exact blueprint already there. Then that process is defined, then a competent con- iterated until the project is sultancy could quote a fixed bid deemed usable or good proposal. But if there are any enough. After that, more unanswered questions, it is not iterations can be used to ready for a waterfall develop- evolve the system or to com- ment process. This is the kind of plete it depending on development project that is whether it has a perpetual planned from the start, and also life or a definable end state. the kind that runs according to a The closer the original project manager’s Gantt chart vision is to the ultimate end rather than according to a Scrum Master’s cadence of sprints. goal, the less of the early work will be wasted. Sometimes people These kinds of projects are still out there, but they are fewer and who have been burned by Spiral development will refer to them as farther between since entrepreneurs, website owners and even “Death Spirals” since a great deal of effort can be wasted before department heads are increasingly compelled to get coding useable results are achieved. Almost all startups that are founded before the idea or requirements are fully fleshed out. by developers use a Spiral since the developer does not have to That is the beauty of agile: It not only tolerates change, it pay out of pocket to get coding started. z —Patrick Hynds

< continued from page 39 in Visual Studio ALM; and Adam Stephensen, solution architect at SSW and one of its FireBootCamp Mentors, were enthusiastic about discussing how SSW uses both Scrum and TFS to deliver success to their customers. Cogan is constantly open to talk about Scrum and the tools that make it work for him and his teams, and he famously posts rules for various endeavors on the SSW website. There is even a page for Rules to Better Scrum Using TFS. When asked about whether SSW uses agile methodologies other than Scrum, and what tools it values for agile Figure 1: Kanban cards laying out the amount of work left in a backlog. development, Cogan said, “At SSW we run all projects with Scrum. It’s one of are weak are dealing with e-mails and from Toyota and is applied to manufac- the important reasons we haven’t had a deploying.” (More on how SSW handles turing as well as development. project fail in six years.” When asked these perceived shortcomings a bit later.) In Kanban cards, tasks are the focus what defines a lack of project failures, he Scrum is not the only game in town of the system, and the cards move said that all of the company’s projects for teams in search of an agile method- through states of completion. The card have “gone into production.” ology. Kanban appears to be the second concept overlays well with the Work Cogan also said, “I think TFS is most popular, and Visual Studio Online Items of TFS, making TFS well-suited almost the complete ALM solution... supports it by providing a view of work to organizations following Kanban as Backlogs, source control, build, items in the backlog as Kanban cards well as Scrum. testing...it’s all great. The only areas that (see Figure 1). Kanban came to us continued on page 42 > SDT302 Full Page Ads_Layout 1 5/21/14 3:41 PM Page 41

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42 SD Times June 2014 www.sdtimes.com

< continued from page 40 The primary goal of Scrum, Kanban and most other methodologies (when done well) is to expose issues and force the team to run toward problems rather than sweeping them under the rug. The techniques focus attention on the tasks at hand so that even teams with less experience can accomplish steady progress. SSW has a program it runs called FireBootCamps, which teach develop- Figure 2: Work items in a Scrum backlog, which are waiting assignment. ment in a crash course environment with Scrum. Stephensen said, “I have the ultimate torture test for develop- typically augment TFS with the tradi- just spent nine weeks living and breath- ment tools and methodologies. tional whiteboard and sticky notes, ing the Microsoft technology stack run- which are really critically used in sprint ning FireBootCamp.com. We took a Agile tools of TFS planning. We also use the Imaginet bunch of guys, and in a few weeks went Organizations that have adopted Scrum TimeSheet for TFS to track our work from specs to release on two enterprise will often create their own tools, but against work items to be used in cus- projects using the latest technologies among Microsoft development shops tomer billing and effort analysis.” and best practices. This wouldn’t have Team Foundation Server and selected This is a product that Imaginet built been possible a few years ago. The add-on packages are the preferred tool- for its own use and has turned into a combination of Team Foundation Serv- ing for keeping teams on track. product for others to use. The bit about ice on VisualStudio.com, Scrum, Win- While Team Foundation Service may whiteboard and sticky notes recalls the dows Azure and continuous deploy- be fairly common among Microsoft emphasis in the Agile Manifesto on ment makes it possible for awesome development shops that are doing agile human interaction, though with widely developers to efficiently gather require- development, some of the features that dispersed teams that more often must ments, add value, easily ship to staging the experts feel require supplemental be worked around with collaboration and production, gather feedback, and tools are telling. When asked about tools tools when not available. delight the customer.” This seems like used beyond TFS, Semeniuk said, “We continued on page 44 >

innovation for Microsoft in the ALM space. Tools that support agile Telerik offers a product named TeamPulse, which allows you What are the must-have tools to support agile development? to create custom boards and view multiple projects at the same For most, Team Foundation Server or Team Foundation Service time. According to the TeamPulse page the product allows you provide a complete solution, with one being hosted on your own to “put customers at the center of your projects with a central- servers and the other being the online version done in a Soft- ized and transparent feedback management system.” It goes on ware-as-a-Service model. to assert, “With TeamPulse Ideas and For some, TFS is just a baseline, and additional tools are Feedback Portal, you can effectively added to support weaknesses. As we have seen, TFS does quite capture and prioritize feedback from a lot, but not everything. Adam Cogan, chief architect at consul- your customers, partners and internal tancy firm SSW, called out e-mail management and continuous stakeholders and keep them up to date deployment as areas that required some extra help. When asked on the status of their requests.” about what they use specifically, he said, “We use Team Com- Joel Semeniuk, cofounder of Imag- panion for e-mail management, and Octopus Deploy to simplify inet, worked with Telerik to bring Team- There are many third- and automate our continuous deployment.” Continuous deploy- Pulse to market, but now Telerik has ment allows the project to be constantly up to date with all party tools for TFS, says assumed sole development of the prod- working code that has been checked in. Imaginet’s Semeniuk. uct. “There are a plethora of third-party Cogan added, “Brian Harry’s ALM vision for Microsoft devel- tools that fit well with TFS, including opers is pretty awesome, and I know our customers would back TeamCompanion (an Outlook add-in for TFS) and other products us up.” such as SmartOffice4TFS that has very comprehensive Microsoft Harry is a Microsoft Technical Fellow who joined the compa- Office (Word, Excel, Visio) integrations with TFS that impact how ny when Microsoft acquired his product, which became Visual you work with and represent requirements in TFS,” he said. Source Safe. Just as Scott Guthrie has been serving as the per- Echoing Semeniuk on the benefits of TeamCompanion, son most identified with the technical leadership of Azure, Harry Cogan said, “We use Team Companion for e-mail management, serves that role for TFS. Today he is the Product Unit Manager and Octopus Deploy to simplify and automate our continuous for Team Foundation Server, and he drives a great deal of the deployment.” z —Patrick Hynds SDT302 Full Page Ads_Layout 1 5/21/14 3:41 PM Page 43 SDT302 page 38-40,42,44_Layout 1 5/22/14 3:17 PM Page 44

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< continued from page 42 In TFS, the focus is on the Work Items and the various views of them that shed light on how things are progressing on a project. The philosophy is very util- itarian; do you want a product with 10 features all of which are 80% complete, or would you prefer a product with 10 features with eight of them complete? Work Items are atomic, which makes them achievable inside a sprint duration. There are a number of interfaces that present the Work Item data in revealing ways. According to Seme- niuk, “Perhaps the most critical component of TFS that we use on our agile Figure 3: Another way of looking at the progress of Work Items. project is the agile boards. Visualization of flow is absolutely one of the biggest progress). With each of these iterations, innovate in ways you didn’t have in aspects of agility, and TFS agile boards the project moves toward completion or more traditional methods of developing are an information radiator of this flow to higher states of functionality. The software. AppAnalytics give you the that the team can use to gauge the rate Work Item charting is a more graphical ability to create a quantifiable feedback that they are producing value and get view (see Figure 3) and shows how var- loop on your requirements and allow early warning signals if expectations ied the views into the data can be. you to more incrementally experiment may not be met.” There is a great deal to TFS and on requirements to rapidly fine-tune Another interface in TFS is the back- many features are important, but as your ability to deliver real value to cus- log (see Figure 2), which is a list of Semeniuk explained, “My must-have tomers.” things to do in the project. The items feature of TFS is absolutely AppAnalyt- The consensus appears to be that that make up the backlog are Work ics. Some would argue that source code tools are critical to getting the job done Items that are not currently assigned to control, automated builds or work item in agile development, and the de- a sprint, and they can represent features tracking are more important; however, emphasis of tooling in the Agile Mani- or bug fixes that are ready to be assigned I find that deeply understanding how festo is not meant to say that tools are to sprints (a sprint is a set period of time your software is being used by your cus- not important. It is meant to ensure the in which the project is meant to make tomers can give you opportunities to tools support the process rather than subordinating it. Semeniuk agreed by saying, “The tools should be there to Teams, not heroes facilitate and support that way of think- Many marketing campaigns aimed at developers promise to make them a “Super Hero” ing and not get in the way.” with promises that they can save the day. This pitch has a solid basis in the conventional Staying out of the way means not lim- wisdom that a single top-tier developer is worth a whole team of average developers in iting access, and that is where Team terms of productivity. But this also flies in the face of a central tenant of agile in general. Explorer Everywhere comes in. It pro- Scrum and other agile methodologies require self-organizing teams to share tasks. vides a client for the TFS data that is Recently I was able to discuss this conflict with Stuart Celarier, principal consultant at Neudesic. He takes exception to these kinds of campaigns and views them as send- accessible from non-Microsoft clients in ing the wrong message. recognition that even Microsoft shops “Software developers should be like Peter Parker and Clark Kent, not Spidey and will use resources that use different plat- the Man of Steel,” he said. “Not only are superpowers not required, they are detrimen- forms. By providing the TFS plug-in for tal to teams and sustained, repeatable delivery of product to the customer.” Eclipse, Microsoft has lowered barriers Celarier dislikes the dark side that the developer-as-superhero tends to engender. that have traditionally meant that TFS It is not unheard of to have some would-be hero developer gallantly step in to solve a was only realistically usable by pure problem that other, less visible team members realize was caused by the problem- Microsoft shops. Eclipse has made great solver in the first place. This does not mean that strong performers and even excep- progress as a development interface, and tional performers need not apply; it simply means that with agile, our progress no the attitudes so preva- Read this story on longer depends solely on their prowess. To be of use in the modern age, they have to lent in the moves seen sdtimes.com be able to work as a team. Think Avengers or Justice League rather than lone wolf. by the Azure group at It seems that this change in attitude is the surest sign that agile is working and the Microsoft are being tools are helping us win the war so that the average project can succeed and the aver- replicated by the TFS age developer can take the place of the superhero. z —Patrick Hynds group. z SDT302 Full Page Ads_Layout 1 5/21/14 3:42 PM Page 45 SDT302 page 46-48_Layout 1 5/22/14 11:49 AM Page 46

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How to get Git into the enterprise Developers love it, but companies may be turned off by its complexity. Here’s how to convince them to adopt it

evelopers love Git. But as Git team needs, what the business needs, adoption grows in the enter- and what the preferences are. There are Dprise, the complexity can lots of free and open-source tools, some become overwhelming, and in retro- commercial tools, and lots of plug-ins to spect, some say more thought should BY LISA MORGAN ease migration and integration. Popular have been given to things like access IDEs support Git, including Visual Stu- control. more distributed development model is dio 2013, as do popular ALM tools from While centralized version control incredibly important.” behemoths like IBM, HP, and systems remain popular, Git is gaining Git’s flexible branching and merging Microsoft, as well as Rally, VersionOne, traction fast, especially among agile capabilities are attractive because more Parasoft, Inflectra, and Telerik. teams. Since more enterprise tool ven- work can be done in parallel with less There are a number of open-source dors are integrating their IDEs, ALM risk, whether it’s using local branches to tools for connecting Git and other revi- suites and SCM products with Git, and build new features or experimenting sion-control systems such as Bazaar, open-source innovation never stops, it with new ideas. Developers love it ClearCase, CVS, Darcs, Mercurial, is now easier for teams to integrate Git because it’s fast, as all operations are Monotone, Perforce, SVN and Quilt, to into their daily workflows. performed locally. name a few. In addition, there are As always, what suits individual John Riordan, CTO of business merge tools, hooks, bug and issue track- developers doesn’t always suit enter- phone service OnSip, said his organiza- ers, backup tools, access control, and prise teams, at least without some tion migrated from Subversion (SVN) hosting options. The choices can be adjustments. But in today’s agile world to Git based on its comparative per- confusing, especially when considering where speed matters, there is less toler- formance and simplicity. enterprise priorities. ance for things like broken builds and “Git is a tremendous time-saver Atlassian’s Wittman said that an indi- central repository failures that delay from a programmer standpoint,” he vidual developer on a team typically commits and other things that negative- said. “And branching and merging are experiments with Git and then intro- ly impact team productivity. really easy.” duces it to his or her teammates. Some “Git almost eliminates some of the Of course, Git adoption involves of those developers, as well as small previous issues [with centralized ver- more than just Git itself. teams and teams developing cloud sion control systems], and it encourages applications, are using Atlassian’s Bit- collaboration,” said Eric Wittman, gen- Migrating to, integrating with, bucket for Git code hosting. eral manager of development tools at and managing Git When Git grows in an enterprise, Atlassian. “Since modern development There’s no one right way to adopt Git. It the team often migrates to Atlassian teams are highly distributed, having a depends on what’s in place, what the Stash for repository management SDT302 page 46-48_Layout 1 5/22/14 11:49 AM Page 47

www.sdtimes.com June 2014 SD Times 47 Git smart about tools These open-source projects can make migrating to, integrating with and managing Git easier.

n AccuRev: GitCentric allows devel- and build and test automation. It opers to use Git and take advantage of includes an undo button for Git code AccuRev’s enterprise-class SCM plat- comments, enables the safe rollback of form. Developers can augment the updates, intercepts history rewrite power and flexibility of Git with securi- attempts, and more. ty, auditability and development- process visualization. n Critic: A Web-based code review tool based on Git. It allows reviews to be auto- n Atlassian: Bitbucket is a hosted matically created and updated by push- source-code-management tool for Git. ing changes to a Git repository main- It allows users to have as many public tained by Critic. Reviewers can be and private repositories as they want assigned automatically based on users’ and manage their projects with preferences. It is written in Python. confidence. It has built-in issue track- ers, wikis, code comments, and pull n EGit: An Eclipse plugin that allows requests. Developers can browse and developers to use Git. search their repository over the Web, n filter source by branches or tags, and git-commit-notifier: Sends HTML e- mail commit messages, splitting com- behind the firewall. The new Stash 3.0 navigate through a commit history. mits that were pushed in one step. includes an interface that is substantial- Bitbucket integrates with popular tools Changes are highlighted per word. ly similar to Bitbucket, which makes like JIRA, Crucible, Bamboo and Jenkins. such transitions even easier. Both prod- n git-flow: A set of extensions that ucts are integrated with JIRA and Bam- n Atlassian: Stash is an on-premis- provide high-level repository opera- boo (Atlassian’s continuous integration, es source-code management tool for tions for creator Vincent Driessen’s continuous deployment, and release- Git that’s secure, fast, and enterprise- branching model. management tool). grade. Developers use it to manage n git-multimail: A post-receive hook for “Our customers love the fact their repositories, set up fine-grained per- sending e-mail notifications of pushes. It developers can stay in Stash or Bitbuck- missions, and collaborate on code is a plug-in replacement for the post- et, and the Scrum Masters or product using their own servers. Stash’s inter- receive-e-mail script available from Git’s managers who use JIRA can get real- face makes administration and man- contrib directory that includes bug fixes, time visibility into the progress devel- agement fast and easy. additional configuration options, and opers are making such as making a pull many new features, including a one-e- request or a commit,” said Wittman. n Branchable: git-annex allow users to manage files with Git without check- mail-per-commit mode that threads “You can also see the status of builds. commit e-mails by branch. It is easily Enterprise customers value the tight ing the file contents into Git. It is useful for files larger than Git can currently extensible in Python. integration of workflows and visibility.” handle due to limitations in memory, n Gitolite: An access control layer on time or disk space. Growing with Git top of Git. It allows developers to set up The approach to Git is worth consider- n CollabNet: TeamForge allows enter- Git hosting on a central server with ing regardless of how it is adopted in an prise teams to gain control of their Git fine-grained access control such as enterprise. Quite often developers repositories. With TeamForge, teams controlled read access at the repo level, think in terms of tools, but from a team can integrate SVN and Git code proj- as well as controlled write access at the or enterprise standpoint, there are ects and benefit from com- branch, tag, file, or directory level, including who can create, rewind, and more things that need to be con- mon code governance, delete branches or tags. sidered. In retrospect, visibility, security and workflows. As an enterprise-grade ALM security and compliance may not n GitLab: Software for code collabora- tool, TeamForge extends have been considered to the degree tion. It provides a wide range of fea- they should have been initially. Git workflows with defect management, code reviews, continued on page 48 > For example, when OnSip was a continued on page 48 > SDT302 page 46-48_Layout 1 5/22/14 11:49 AM Page 48

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< continued from page 47 startup, little consideration was given to security, according to Riordan. Early on, there were about a dozen developers, all Git smart about tools of whom had a copy of the Git repository. < continued from page 47 tory. Now, users can commit their Later, OnSip adopted Gitolite, an open- changes locally, do file comparisons, source authorization layer on top of Git, tures, including Git repository manage- create branches, merge code, and so it could control individual developer ment, code reviews, issue tracking, more. When developers are ready to activity feeds, and wikis. Enterprises access to repositories and which develop- share their changes with the rest of the install it on-premises and connect it ers could push code to which branches. team, they can push their changes to with LDAP and Active Directory servers Geospatial software service compa- the centralized Git repository con- for secure authentication and authori- ny HumanGeo has been using Git from tained in the TFS Server. TFS’s Git the start, like OnSip. As it grew, zation. A single GitLab server can implementation is based on MSysGit so HumanGeo replaced Gitolite with a handle more than 25,000 users, and it developers familiar with Git can use the subscription-based access control solu- is also possible to create a high-avail- same commands as other Git imple- tion that also has code review, issue ability setup with multiple active mentations. tracking, activity feed, and wiki fea- servers. n tures. It is also using Puppet, an open- Microsoft: Visual Studio 2013 n git-svn: A built-in tool for migrating source configuration-management tool includes support for Git version control. between Git and Subversion. Similar Developers can now perform Git net- to track the status of code. tools are available for migrating from work operations from inside Visual Stu- “Gitolite was perceived as being pret- CVS (git-cvsexportcommit and git- dio, such as cloning a repository, or ty sparse in terms of features, and it had cvsserver), Perforce (git-p4), and Quilt performing a fetch, push or pull opera- a bare-bones interface,” said (git-quiltimport). tion on an existing repository. Aaron Gussman, a senior technologist at HumanGeo. n Google: Gerrit Code Review is n Perforce: Git Fusion is a compre- “We liked what we saw on a Web-based code-review system hensive solution for managing Git GitHub but we didn’t want to that facilitates online code environments. It helps teams bring pay for it. We also have a lot reviews for projects using Git. It order to repository chaos, enabling of clients in the Federal space simplifies reviews by showing them to gain visibility across all proj- who get cold feel when we changes in a side-by-side display, ects and teams, enforce uniform access talk about hosting our source and allows any viewer to add in-line control, and achieve scale without a lot code in the cloud.” comments. Gerrit permits any author- of manual effort. Git Fusion provides HumanGeo is using the access con- ized user to submit changes to the mas- detailed version history and auditing, ter Git repository rather than requiring makes repository reorganization easy, trol solution in tandem with Gitflow, a all approved changes to be merged and interoperates with existing Per- collection of extensions that provides a manually by the project maintainer. force environments. branching model for Git. Together, the tools are aiding peer reviews and work- n Ikiwiki: A wiki compiler. It converts n SCM-Manager: A Java Web applica- flow, Gussman said. From an enterprise wiki pages into HTML pages suitable for tion for creating and managing Git, perspective, it is not yet clear whether publishing on a website. Ikiwiki stores Mercurial and Subversion repositories. all teams should be forced to use the pages and history in Git or other ver- It provides easy access to the reposito- tools or whether project teams should sion-control systems. It includes sup- ries over HTTP or HTTPS; has central- be able to operate independently. port for blogging, podcasting, and a ized user, group and permission “Things like permissions and securi- wide array of plug-ins. management; and is completely config- ty can be really confusing,” said Atlass- urable from within its Web interface. ian’s Wittman. n Meld: A visual diff and merge tool n SourceForge: Diffuse is a small and Atlassian Stash supports branch-lev- that helps developers compare files, simple graphical tool for merging and el permissions, which are important to directories and version-controlled proj- comparing text files. Developers use Orbitz. The company has many differ- ects. It provides two- and three-way Diffuse to merge, edit and review code ent developers working on many differ- comparison of files and directories, and supports many popular version- changes. Diffuse can compare an arbi- ent projects, so it control systems. Meld helps developers trary number of files side by side. Users wants to ensure that Read this story on sdtimes.com review code changes and understand also have the ability to manually adjust each developer has patches. line-matching and directly edit files. access to the right fea- Diffuse can also retrieve revisions of ture branch so he or n Microsoft: TFS 2013 includes the files from Git and other repositories for she can work on or addition of Git as a source-code reposi- comparison and merging. z review the code. z SDT302 Full Page Ads_Layout 1 5/21/14 3:42 PM Page 49 Less process. More coding.

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Getting a handle on Hadoop

BY ALEX HANDY Hadoop cluster, after all. Even if you Hadoop ideas. As an enterprise execu- haven’t integrated the system into your tive, there is one thing that will always ou can think of it as an ever- day-to-day activities, Hadoop is nothing make you look good and get you pro- inflating pink elephant. It’s if not a data lake. It’s a cheap place to moted: cost savings. Yeither got its own space in which put the data. And that, said Mike Because Hadoop offers cost savings to grow, or it’ll just end up sucking all Tuchen, CEO of Talend, is the single that are an order of magnitude cheaper the air out of the room. It’s always easi- most important thing to remember than systems from traditional ETL and er to talk about the elephant in the zoo about Hadoop: its value. data-warehousing vendors, bringing a than the elephant in the room, and cluster online and replacing existing Hadoop is definitely a zoo-full of com- TIP Get someone else to systems can turn you into a rock star, pay for your cluster plex moving parts that can cause just as # said Tuchen. much damage as an enraged bull ele- 1 This should be quite easy to “Why care about Hadoop? It’s dra- phant, provided we drag this metaphor do, said Tuchen. In fact, he advocated matically cheaper,” he said. “You can into the realm of data. that you should run, not walk, to your take a subset of your data warehouse All that data is why you have a CIO/CEO’s office with all of your work and offload it for a dramatically SDT302 page 50-52,54_Layout 1 5/21/14 4:26 PM Page 51

www.sdtimes.com June 2014 SD Times 51

in 2009 to encompass 0.2% of all jobs on the site. The term has grown 225,000% since 2009. By contrast, the term “Java” is included in around 2% of all jobs posted on the site. With that many other jobs out there, and such a shallow pool of Hadoop developers and administrators in the market to begin with, it’s going to be difficult for you and your team to find the Hadoop knowledge base you need. So don’t expect to hire into Hadoop. You may find one or two Hadoop-expe- rienced persons, but your team as a whole is going to have to learn this stuff the hard way: by hand, with manuals and online documentation. Just be sure you keep them happy, or else they’ll find Tip No. 3 useful.

TIP Hadoop knowledge From training to tools, # means value 3 If you do train up your in-house employees on Hadoop, understand that these instructions will they will then be worth at least six figures on the open market, especially if they are willing to relocate. If you’re training up help you corral and your staff to run Hadoop, and you’ve just saved your department millions of dollars on EMC, NetApp or Teradata licenses, use some of that money to compensate cluster your Big Data your new Hadoop workers. This is not an issue that you can ignore until later, either. With the job market for Hadoop expertise on fire, even Wall Street firms are hiring developers with as little as six months of Hadoop experience. Unless you want to waste your training budget on people who just walk out the door, you’ll likely need to “enhance” some salaries around cheaper price. A lot of customers are hire for. That’s why Tip No. 2 is so this new cluster project. phrasing it as data process offload and important. And speaking of clusters, Tip No. 4 data warehousing. And when you look has a lot to do with what you put on at it with that lens... if you add up hard- TIP Train, don’t hire those clusters. ware plus software from EMC, # If you can hire Hadoop devel- NetApp, IBM and you compare it to 2 opers and administrators, get TIP Tune and monitor the Hadoop, you’re talking about some- out there and do it. If you think you # cluster thing that was US$30,000 or $40,000 a know a team you can bring in-house, or 4 A single bad stick of RAM in terabyte, to $1,000 a terabyte.” if you happen to have an internal one machine can make an entire cluster Saving that kind of money for your expert, put them into your Hadoop sluggish. When you’re building your company could just get you that VP project exclusively. applications and your Hadoop cluster position you wanted. But don’t expect Why? Because it is quite difficult to itself, you’ll want to be sure you’re able this to be an overnight change. Hadoop find Hadoop people. Popular job site to monitor your jobs all the way through is still a difficult system to own and Indeed.com shows that Hadoop has the process. Chris Wensel, CTO and operate, and it’s particularly difficult to grown from a non-existent job market continued on page 52 > SDT302 page 50-52,54_Layout 1 5/21/14 4:27 PM Page 52

52 SD Times June 2014 www.sdtimes.com

< continued from page 51 operation. It makes a lot of sense to Falcon. Tuchen said Falcon “does the founder of Concurrent, said that you periodically check your cluster and data capture replication to give you dis- and your team have some important check your computers. There are great aster recovery. If you have two clusters, decisions to make as you’re designing monitoring tools for that. Be on the safe you put it in one and replicate to the your processes and your cluster. side and make sure the hardware com- distant one for disaster recovery.” Wensel said that, overall, “reducing ponent are in good shape, because oth- But moving backup duties to Hadoop latency is your ultimate goal, but also erwise you’ll run into strange issues.” isn’t just a flashy way to save some mon- reducing the likelihood of failure. The ey; it’s also a game changer for your way these technologies were built, they TIP Replace existing archivist. “The neat thing about that is if weren’t intended for operational sys- # infrastructure you choose to use Hadoop for archiving, tems.” As such, it is only recently that 5 Once your team is running now suddenly what you’ve done is you’ve Hadoop and its many sub-projects have Hadoop and able to reliably use the clus- paid for your entire Hadoop installation even added high-availability support for ter for storage and analysis, it’s time to go because of this other use case,” said the underlying file system. hunting. Hunt down the most expensive Tuchen. “But now you’ve got all your That means Hadoop can still be batch-operation or storage systems in data on spinning disks. It’s all analyzable somewhat brittle. Wensel said teams your company and figure out what it and all the analysis you do with Hadoop must first “decide if your application is would take to bring them into Hadoop. now comes for free. That’s pretty cool. something with an SLA. Is it something You should be looking at your ETL Now instead of having a couple quarters’ that has to complete in two hours every systems, your data-warehousing systems, or a year’s worth of data on spinning disk, day, or every 10 minutes? Is it some- and even your live backup systems. Tal- and everything else inaccessible on tape, thing you don’t want to think about at end’s Tuchen said that these systems can now you have all your data back for years, 10 p.m. when the pager goes off? If it’s all be replaced by a well-run Hadoop for the same cost.” an application that’s driving revenue, cluster, or even two or three clusters. you need to really think about that. If “What all of the Hadoop distribu- TIP Monitor your cluster you decide it has an SLA, you need to tions will recommend you do is do the # Hadoop brings your team back adopt some structural integrity in the ETL scenario,” he said. “You load your 6 to the bad old days of the main- application itself.” data into HDFS [Hadoop Distributed frame. You’re all building huge, impor- Zoltan Prekopcsak, cofounder and File System] and transform in place. tant projects, but there’s only one central CEO of Radoop, said that being able to Now you’ve got all your data in the place to run those applications, and there monitor an application end to end native format sitting in HDFS, so you isn’t enough time for everyone to diddle through the Hadoop cluster is key to want to think about that to solve your around on the cluster to see what they’ve not jamming up the pipeline. archive use case. What it turns out is done correctly. “It’s hard to find the problems,” he that when you do the math economical- For this reason, said Walter said. “If you’re a larger cluster, then it’s ly, it costs the same as or less as archiv- Maguire, chief field technologist at HP very common that one of the nodes has ing with something like Iron Mountain.” Vertica, being agile in the traditional some issues or some problems. When While Hadoop isn’t completely sense might not work for you in a you are submitting jobs to this cluster, ready for full-time backup duty, it’s get- Hadoop workflow. this node can slow down the whole ting there thanks to a new project called “The notion of changing quickly, trying something new, learning from it, and Apache Tez the idea that I can very quickly adapt my infrastructure, is appealing,” he said. Tez is a project aimed at making life easier for developers who have to use YARN. The “We see a lot of customers today seeing project is led by Hortonworks and is currently in the Apache Incubator. From the pro- that approach to Big Data. Obviously a ject’s site: free-for-all won’t work, otherwise you’re The Apache Tez project is aimed at building an application framework which allows subject to whichever process is consum- for a complex directed acyclic graph of tasks for processing data. It is currently built atop Apache Hadoop YARN. ing the most resources.” The support for third-party application masters is the crucial aspect to flexibility To that end, your job scheduling and in YARN. It permits new job runtimes in addition to classical Map/Reduce, while still access management should be a big keeping M/R available and allowing both the old and new to coexist on a single cluster. part of your cluster design decisions. As Apache Tez is one such job runtime that provides richer capabilities than traditional your cluster grows and adopts new map-reduce. The motivation is to provide a better runtime for scenarios such as rela- technologies like Spark, YARN and Tez, tional querying that do not have a strong affinity for the Map/Reduce primitive. This how will you control jobs that run need arises because the Map/Reduce primitive mandates a very particular shape to simultaneously, or at short intervals? every job and although this mandatory shape is very general and can be used to Each distribution has its own way to implement essentially any batch-oriented data processing job, it conflates too many manage this layer of the cluster, and thus details and provides too little flexibility. —Alex Handy continued on page 54 > SDT302 page 53_Layout 1 5/21/14 3:31 PM Page 1

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< continued from page 52 this should be an important part of your cluster distribution selection process.

TIP Optimize the data, not # the application 7 Radoop’s Prekopcsak said that most developers will instinctively want to tweak their applications in order to get better performance out of them once they hit the Hadoop cluster. He said this instinct is incorrect. “When people start writing their own first programs, then sooner or later they want to optimize it or try to improve it,” said Prekopcsak. “But in many cases optimizations do not neces- cation changes. It is a challenge to build fairly well-defined pattern around sarily come from rewriting the code an application and have it grow to larger Map/Reduce to much more dynamic itself, but mostly from refactoring the data sets. Be very conscious of the fact type use cases. With rapid ingestion of data upon which the job is run. that things are changing.” data with Storm, more rapid querying “Using compression and partitioning But on the macro scale, also be aware with Spark with up to 100x times can really speed up operations. Some- that the Hadoop ecosystem is changing improvement, and with things like times that’s up to a 100x speed- Impala from Cloudera that up. If the data is organized the ‘It is a challenge to build an are also creating more real- right way, all your processing will application and have it grow time application frame- be more effective. At first, it to larger data sets. Be very works on top... These are makes more sense to get the data conscious of the fact that probably just the beginning into good shape, rather than opti- of what YARN opens up. mizing your code. Transforming things are changing.‘ “We’re seeing the rapid the data will give you much more —Chris Wensel, Concurrent evolution of what that performance gains.” Hadoop programming model looks like, and the rapid TIP Be ready for almost every day. While Hadoop 2.0 evolution of applications, each written # change brought in many structural changes and on this cluster, each of which will be 8 This is a two-sided tip, as it per- features to the platform, there are still designed and built and driving a line-of- tains to your cluster, and to Hadoop as a aspects of the project that are still wind- business need across the organization.” whole. On the micro scale, know that ing their way into enterprise workloads. Masterson continued: “We are start- your application is going to change once Michael Masterson, director of ing to see customers realizing work- it goes live. Said Concurrent’s Wensel: strategic business development at loads are changing. There have been “The other side of the problem is that as Compuware, said, “There’s a whole new some best practices around. For exam- you’re developing an application, as you class of applications being targeted and ple, if you build a cluster and don’t get larger and larger data sets, your appli- built for this cluster. It’s moving from a know what to do, there’s a sizing guide from HP. One of the rules is that the Apache Falcon number of spindles on disk shouldn’t exceed the number of cores. That’s just The Apache Falcon project is an effort to more explicitly and granularly control the a general suggestion, but I think it’s get- data you’re storing in your cluster. As such, it allows you to choose how many times ting harder and harder to use a general data is replicated, coordinate multiple clusters, and enforce policies across the vari- practice like that.” ous endpoints data might flow through. From the Apache Incubator page: To that end, be prepared to grow your Apache Falcon is a feed-processing and feed-management system aimed at making it easier for end consumers to onboard their feed processing and feed manage- cluster, build purpose-driven and specific ment on Hadoop clusters. Hadoop clusters, and Read this story on Data Management on Hadoop encompasses data motion, process orchestration, above all, be sure to sdtimes.com life-cycle management, data discovery, etc., among other concerns. Falcon is a new keep abreast of the data-processing and management platform for Hadoop that solves this problem and work being done in creates additional opportunities by building on existing components within the projects relevant to Hadoop ecosystem without reinventing the wheel. —Alex Handy your team and job. z SDT302_Layout 1 5/22/14 12:23 PM Page 55

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www.sdtimes.com June 2014 SD Times 57 Code Watch BY LARRY O’BRIEN The inner game of programming

“ very game is composed of two parts, an outer the side of the screen to the same effect? For peo- Larry O’Brien, former Egame and an inner game. The outer game is ple like me, used to working from a home office, Editor of Software played against an external opponent to overcome the noise and activity of a coffee shop is irritating, Development and Computer Language external obstacles, and to reach an external goal... and the chaos of an “open plan” office strikes me as magazines, is a software [The inner game] takes place in the mind of the a small step down from the third act of “Godzilla.” developer living in player, and it is played against such obstacles as But who needs to debate external interruptions Hawaii. lapses in concentration, nervousness, self-doubt, when we are so good at creating our own? Once and self-condemnation.” — W. Timothy Gallwey, upon a time, being distracted required you to put “The Inner Game of Tennis” down your pencil and pick up a magazine, or to These words came into my life sometime in my wander over to the water-cooler to find someone to tween years, not all that long after I had learned to chat with. Now, it’s difficult to not have distractions move from “You’re ahead 3 points to 2” to the more in the same browser in which you’re researching refined “40-30” of competitive tennis. There were your work. courts near my house, but I wasn’t very good. On In an article published in 1997, Csikszentmiha- realizing this, I tackled the problem as I did all oth- lyi quotes studies showing people spent 4x as much ers: by going to the public library. I can tell you that time consuming passive entertainment rather than reading books is not the surest route to Wimbledon. engaging in flow-based hobbies. He asked, “Why But Gallwey’s book introduced me to the con- would we spend four times more of our free time cepts that Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi later labeled doing something that has less “flow” or “flow state”: the time-erasing hyperfocus than half the chance of making If the conditions for flow are where challenges are perceived to be—not in bal- us feel good? Each of the flow- increased, managers get more ance with ability—but as just-achievable goals. producing activities requires an Being a developer is being wrong 200 times per initial investment of attention productivity, and developers day, but when you’re in flow, those 200 mistakes before it begins to be enjoyable. are part of 400 mind-stretching triumphs. Your If a person is too tired, anxious, get more satisfaction. day, no matter what the clock or sun says, is barely or lacks the discipline to over- started before it’s over. come that initial obstacle, he or she will have to Over the years, I’ve come to believe that flow, settle for something that, although less enjoyable, more than any other factor, determines productiv- is more accessible.” ity. What’s the difference in productivity between a As with Gallwey’s “nervousness, self-doubt and good day and a bad day? There are the obvious self-condemnation,” Csikszentmihalyi’s tiredness, time-sinks: meetings, bureaucratic paperwork and anxiety and lack of discipline are inevitable, no mat- the like. But while some of those things may simply ter the talent level or experience. In programming, consume raw hours, for me, “bad days” are more as with sports, flow is not achieved by routine; it often those that are characterized by frequent doesn’t come from playing another game of perfect interruptions. I get frustrated by days when I’m tic-tac-toe or writing a “sum” function. This is one of stuck in meetings, but it’s the days when I can nev- the great difficulties of managing excellent developer “settle in” that drive me crazy. ers: Their hunger for new challenges is not merely a In their classic book “Peopleware,” Timothy preference; it’s necessary for them to be excellent. Lister and Tom DeMarco held that flow was Flow, and the resultant high productivity, can- important enough to merit ranking a workspace on not be sustained indefinitely, hour after hour, day its “E-Factor,” calculated as Uninterrupted after day (much less month after month). The Hours/Body Present Hours. That’s right: a single downside of this is that today’s 4x-er might be Read this story on interruption per hour counts as a failure. It may be tomorrow’s median developer. The upside, though, sdtimes.com difficult to specify what counts as an interruption: is that if the conditions for flow can be increased, a phone call, sure, but what about a phone ringing? not only do managers get higher productivity, but An e-mail conversation, of course, but what about developers get greater satisfaction. the chime of e-mail arriving or toast popping up on Now don’t even get me started on golf. z SDT302 page 58_Layout 1 5/21/14 3:30 PM Page 58

58 SD Times June 2014 www.sdtimes.com Guest View BY MATT BADGLEY Has agile lost its innovation?

Matt Badgley is the ou might have noticed a heightened level of dis- innovation discontinuity. In 2006, Diana Larson lean/agile coach and Ycourse in the agile software development com- wrote that agile has crossed “the Chasm” that exists product consultant at munity recently. There is always a healthy amount of in the Early Adopters phase of Everett Rogers’ VersionOne. naysayer banter about agile coming from those who Technology Adoption Lifecycle. I agree that we are have tried and failed, or those who have been forced on the downward side of the Late Majority curve. to “be agile” and failed. Then there are those who If someone simply looked at the Technology Adop- use the phrase “We’re agile” but don’t know what it tion Lifecycle, they might assume this means agile means. Over the last several months, you may have will die off and yield to the next best thing. noticed harsh words about the state of agile coming I believe agile falls into the category of a core from the pioneers and visionaries (and early technological innovation. When a core technologi- adopters) of agile software development. cal innovation reaches the Late Majority Curve, we Dave Thomas’ recent blog post, “Agile is Dead see a new round of ideas that improve and change (Long Live Agility),” is a perfect example of this the original innovation, thus extending the life general discomfort, as is Tim Ottinger’s “I Want cycle. At this point in the curve, a bubble of sorts Agile Back.” These posts, however, are not all neg- develops called innovation discontinuity. In this ative; I actually find them inspiring. Dave and Tim bubble, the original innovators demonstrate dissat- provided constructive ideas to move forward. But isfaction to alterations of what they created, while the fact that we are having this discussion shines the new innovators morph the technology to meet light on the state of agile today. the current (and hopefully future) needs. Was agile development The biggest cause of intense So the big debate is, have larger organizations already in a bubble, with the mudslinging arguments seems to adopting agile processes and practices pushed us be enterprise agile or scaling into this round of innovation and subsequent dis- ideas of enterprise agile agile. Organizations are address- continuity? Or was agile software development ing the need for business agility already in the bubble, with the ideas of enterprise exacerbating it? by adopting agile processes with- agile exacerbating it? In any case, the agile com- in software development and munity has grown substantially, and we need to other departments. As a result, frameworks and base ourselves in the values and principles of the approaches have emerged in support of enterprise Agile Manifesto that have served us well over the agile and, with them, a “consultancy economy” has past 13 years. formed to ease the implementation. In this period of innovation, we need to focus This makes many in the agile community our learning and energy on several fronts. We need uncomfortable. The fear is that the consultancies to renew the emphasis on good agile engineering and frameworks are providing management and practices and embrace the ideas of craftsmanship. process police what they always wanted: a heavy- Without this, agility does not happen. weight, control-oriented, certified process that has We must practice relentless transparency; trust the word “agile” in it. This is exactly what the orig- does not exist without it. We must get our execu- inal anarchists who penned the Agile Manifesto tive and management ranks engaged. We must were trying to address. always put people first, as it is the people who get things done, not the processes. Finally, as Dave Agile crosses ‘the Chasm’ Thomas points out, we have to get back to agility. As a coach in the field, I’ve seen reasons to be con- Assess where you are, take a small step toward your cerned. Software development teams scoff at the goal, adjust based on learning, and repeat. Read this story on ideas of craftsmanship. The inspect-and-adapt loop Agile software development is not doomed. sdtimes.com is used as a management tool to force their views of Some discourse is valuable; however, we need to improvement upon the teams. Even with this con- ensure the resulting conversations create innova- cern, I don’t view the frameworks or consultancies tion, not decay. At the end of the day, all we want to as the core challenge around the state of agile. do is make better software that customers value and Instead, the concepts of agile are at a stage of that we enjoy creating. z SDT302 Full Page Ads_Layout 1 5/22/14 3:25 PM Page 59

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www.sdtimes.com June 2014 SD Times 61 Analyst View BY AL HILWA Is Microsoft starting to get it? Upping the ante in open source fter a much-hyped CEO search following Al Hilwa is program ASteve Ballmer’s retirement announcement, One surprise made at Build was the open-sourcing director of application Microsoft picked a long-time insider, Satya Nadella, of the latest version of the .NET compiler, code- development software paired with cofounder Bill Gates to lend assistance. named Roslyn, along with 23 other developer tech- at IDC. The rationale for the pick made a lot of sense, with nologies. Microsoft is creating a foundation to man- Microsoft being a difficult culture to penetrate, a age the projects, and it has invited contributors such complex multi-part business, and one that is still as long-time partner Xamarin. While Microsoft has financially performing well, despite intensifying been engaged in open source for a variety of interop- challenges on all fronts. erability technologies, this is by far the most signifi- The selection of an insider after a prolonged cant body of code ever released by it in open source. search reminded me of the Pina Colada song Microsoft appears to be on a progressive path to (“Escape,” by Rupert Holmes). Its happy ending broaden its development tools and runtimes to of rediscovery might resemble more optimistic appeal to developers across multiple ecosystems. Its times to come for Microsoft, if the trajectory set work to integrate Web technologies like JavaScript as by Mr. Nadella’s first few months on the job con- first-class citizens in the Windows Store app model, tinues. its integration of TFS with Git, and its work with Xamarin to ease multi-platform application develop- Office for iPad ment are evidence that support a broader realign- It was rumored that Microsoft Office for iPad was ment narrative that is accelerating ready more than a year before it actually shipped. under Nadella’s leadership. Windows 8 harmed the It only shipped after Nadella took the helm, and in adoption of PCs, and Office a couple of short months it has been downloaded The Microsoft Azure cloud over 27 million times. The product has truly met The vision for Azure was always as for iPad will help users pent-up demand from both businesses and con- an OS in the cloud, and so finding sumers who also use PCs in serious ways. ways to run all the workloads that re-invest in PCs. Office is not without its competitors, and leav- Windows ran was a natural R&D ing iPad users to habituate to the competition has agenda. But until early 2013, Microsoft’s vision was not been wise. Microsoft likely calculated that sup- to recruit new application development workloads porting the iPad would have harmed Windows 8 and not to compete full-bore on the IaaS side. tablet adoption. The reality is that Windows 8 As CEO, Nadella has the opportunity to reap harmed the adoption of PCs, and now that Office the fruits of this strategy, and the incredible pace for iPad is selling in big volumes, it will help users of development has only accelerated with the re-invest in PCs. recent TechEd announcements. Two indicators of this broadening shift are dropping “Windows” and Desktop back in business promoting developer-beloved executive Scott At Build, Microsoft announced significant updates, Guthrie to head Azure. Guthrie has been one of that amount to a restoration of the strategic status the most pragmatic and positive communicators of the desktop to Microsoft. While never declared for Microsoft technologies to the broader develop- dead or “legacy,” the environment suffered from er world. A new world where multi-platform no significant under-investment as Microsoft longer means multiple versions of Windows is launched its tablet interface. upon Microsoft. The reaction of the user base was decisive, lead- The saying goes that perception is reality, and ing to a new vision that essentially acknowledges the Microsoft is trying hard to change the perception Read this story on strategic longevity of the desktop by allowing PCs to of the company. As it succeeds in changing this sdtimes.com be configured and sold as primarily desktop perception, it is potentially creating progressively machines. The desktop becomes a superset machine more ambitious internal goals for true change. that more effectively hybridizes the two interface Microsoft’s customers and its ecosystem will be the realms. biggest beneficiaries of this change. z SDT302 page 62_Layout 1 5/22/14 12:24 PM Page 62

62 SD Times June 2014 www.sdtimes.com Industry Watch BY DAVID RUBINSTEIN The Big Boulder Initiative

David Rubinstein is hile people talk about the explosion of data and now pulls data from Facebook, Twitter, Yahoo, editor-in-chief of SD Times. Win the enterprise, perhaps the information Tumblr, Instagram and WordPress, among others, that’s growing the most quickly is what the industry and filters the data for its customers, who are look- has decided to label “social data.” ing for meaning out of that social data stream. To Social data is all the non-structured Twitter be clear, Gnip serves up raw data; it’s up to cus- tweets, Facebook posts, WordPress blog comments tomers to build or license analytics software on top and more that organizations can capture and then of that. digest to gain insight into what they’re doing right But raw data’s apparently a big business; in an or wrong. article on the CNNMoney website, it was reported But a number of questions face those who col- that “The company has been able to detect where lect and those who want to use social data as part earthquakes have occurred faster than seismic of their business intelligence. Who owns the social radars, glean insights on how cholera has spread data collected by Facebook? How is it being com- through Haiti, track interesting patterns in how moditized and reused? How Iranian politicians communicate, and predict stock Should businesses be able to much regulation should govern movements for hedge funds.” How big a business? the sharing of this information? Well, in January, the same article reported Twitter collect data from people who To help companies navigate made US$23 million in the prior quarter alone by aren’t aware their data is those waters, something called licensing its data. That’s big. The Big Boulder Initiative was Of course, the capturing of this very personal being captured and sold? formed to bring together those data is where privacy issues are raised. Should companies to face the issues. (It businesses be able to collect this data from people is called The Big Boulder Initiative because it who aren’t aware their data is being captured and began in Boulder, Colo., and because at its launch sold? What if that data falls into the wrong hands? in June 2013, the goal was to identify the “big boul- That’s where the fear of regulation comes in, and ders” that needed to be moved to allow the indus- that’s why Shulman said the group is looking to set try to grow.) their own standards, to keep the data spigot open Stu Shulman, founder and CEO of Texifter (a so long as it is used responsibly. text analytics startup), is the only academic (he is But already, moves have been made to keep an assistant professor of political science at the social data protected. Recent revisions to the 1998 University of Massachusetts-Amherst) and small- Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) business owner on the initiative’s board of direc- require that companies looking to collect social tors. “We’re looking to create standards, a code of data from children under 12 must first obtain per- ethics and governmental mechanisms to prevent mission from parents. Of course, there are ways for the (social data) industry from suffering the cata- children to lie about their age so they’re not sub- strophic consequences of over-regulation,” he ject to COPPA, which forbids the use of cookies to said. track children across the Internet and serve them Social data can be a lot more compelling to ads based on their behavior. businesses than the usual profile data of name, Conversely, Shulman said there are those try- address, job, and company. Social data enables ing to build a marketplace for people to sell their businesses to see what interests users, where they Facebook and Twitter profiles and data to the like to go, what gets them talking, provides feed- companies looking to leverage that data. “It’s back after purchases are made, and even pro- totally disruptive of the publishing model,” he Read this story on vides entrée to others in their circle of family and said. sdtimes.com friends. Now, if folks could monetize their OWN data, The initiative was started by Chris Moody, for- instead of giving it to Facebook and Twitter to mer CEO of Gnip, a social data-warehousing com- monetize, and decide if they DON’T want those pany that recently entered into an agreement to be companies to have their data, then we’d really be acquired by Twitter. Gnip was launched in 2008 on to something. z SDT302 Full Page Ads_Layout 1 5/21/14 3:43 PM Page 63 SDT302 Full Page Ads_Layout 1 5/21/14 3:43 PM Page 64 Conference Catalog The Best SharePoint Training in the World returns to Boston! Choose from more than 80 classes and tutorials!

September 16 -19, 2014 The Boston Park Plaza Hotel & Towers

Bolster your career by becoming a SharePoint Master!

• Learn from SharePoint experts, including dozens of SharePoint MVPs and Certified SharePoint Professionals ter Regis • Master document management ly Ear • Study SharePoint governance SAVE! and • Find out about SharePoint 2013 age ee last p S ls for detai • Learn how to create applications for SharePoint that solve real business problems • Exchange SharePoint tips and tricks with colleagues • Test-drive SharePoint solutions in the Exhibit Hall

A BZ Media Event www.sptechcon.com SPTechCon ™ is a trademark of BZ Media LLC. SharePoint ® is a registered trademark of Microsoft. Come to SPTechCon for technical classes and tutorials for Microsoft SharePoint 2010 and SharePoint 2013 administrators, IT professionals, business users and developers.

To My Colleagues in SharePoint: “SPTechCon is a great option for very informative training courses. I wish I could Microsoft’s collaboration and content management platform, SharePoint, is now so have attended concurrent sessions. It was much more than that. It’s got line-of-business integrations. It’s got social tools. It’s great networking opportunity.” moved into the cloud, either as a third-party hosted SharePoint solution, or Microsoft’s Ray BouKnight, IT Analyst, City of Roseville Office 365 offering.

So, as a worker that uses SharePoint, or as a company that deploys SharePoint to its employees, the question must be asked: Where are you with SharePoint, and where to you need to be?

This September’s SPTechCon in downtown Boston, has been creat - ed to help you deal with these issues. Are you strictly on-premises with SharePoint, and nothing Microsoft can say or do will move you to the cloud? Are you beginning to experiment with some content “Attend SPTechCon and take back David Rubinstein in the cloud, to ease the burden on your IT staff and perhaps technology advances that can be Conference Chairman begin to look to eliminate some servers in your closet? Or, have implemented in the real world.” you decided you want to be all-in with Office 365, and need help Navneet Pisharodi, Senior Software Engineer, planning a migration and figuring out governance, security and management once you PDS Americas LLC make the move?

Regardless of where you are, SPTechCon has the classes and instructors to help you sort it out, and advance your SharePoint skills over four intensive days of training.

SPTechCon is a veritable “Who’s Who” of SharePoint, attracting Microsoft MVPs and other experts in the technology. In fact, more than 30 top presenters will be on hand to deliver more than 80 workshops and technical classes over the course of four days.

If you work with SharePoint in just about any capacity – information worker, developer, IT pro, architect, or ‘other’ – there’s something at SPTechCon for you. Aside from attending classes, you’ll have the opportunity to meet fellow SharePointers happy to share what they’ve learned with you, to network with our expert faculty, and learn PRODUCED BY about all the third-party add-ons that enhance SharePoint with a visit to our exhibit hall. More than 50 exhibitors have committed to bringing you the latest and greatest tools BZ Media and solutions to extend SharePoint even further!

Among the special events we’ve planned are the women’s networking luncheon, featur - Sponsored By ing the peer networking group Women in SharePoint, and of course, we’ll have our popular “Lightning Talks,” our “Ice Cream Social” and much more.

If you’re involved with SharePoint, you need to be involved with the community. SPTechCon is one of the biggest gatherings of the SharePoint community you’ll find. You’ll leave with a ton of valuable information to bring back to your jobs, so you can build out your SharePoint implementations right away.

We look forward to seeing you there!

David Rubinstein Chairman, SPTechCon

September 16-19, 2014 • BOSTON Learn from these SharePoint experts and many more!

Marc Christian Liam Andrew Ben Randy Anderson Buckley Cleary Connell Curry Drisgill

Susan Scott Todd Jennifer Benjamin Asif Hanley Jamison Klindt Mason Niaulian Rehmani

Laura John Scott Heather Christina Shane Rogers Ross Shearer Solomon Wheeler Young

For an up-to-date list of speakers, go to www.sptechcon.com/speakers

“It was my first time attending, so I was super “Make the most out of having experts at “SPTechCon is very well interested. I found the content valuable and your fingertips. Document favorite resources organized with great it was nice to make connections.” and get involved in the online community. ” presenters.” Adriana Prodan, It Support Analyst, Emerson Alina Bell, Business Analyst, Informatics Systems, Novartis Prestine Parten, Instructional Technology Specialist, Deming Public Schools

September 16-19, 2014 • BOSTON Just a sample of the great classes offered!

! Anatomy of a Display Template Most Deep Dive into the Content Query Web Part NE W Popular! MARC D. ANDERSON CHRISTINA WHEELER

“Bootstrap” Responsive SharePoint Designing Change—Triggering Cultural W! NE the RIGHT Way Metamorphosis DUSTIN MILLER and HEATHER SOLOMON MICHELLE CALDWELL

Breaking Down Barriers in the Land of the Document Management and Records Management W! NE Dinosaurs: Developing a Strategic Social in SharePoint 2013 Collaboration Strategy in the Real World SCOTT JAMISON SUSAN HANLEY Most Gaining Total Control of Your Sites BreezeJS Makes Client-Side SharePoint 2013 Popular! with Data View Web Parts W! NE REST Development a BREEZE! DUSTIN MILLER ANDREW CONNELL Is Access Services 2013 In Your No-Code W! Building SharePoint Single Page Apps NE Solutions Toolbox? W! NE with AngularJS SCOTT SHEARER ANDREW CONNELL No-Code Solution Creation Options for Cool Dashboards, Charts and Visualizations Non-Developers in SharePoint 2013 W! NE for Power Users ASIF REHMANI BENJAMIN NIAULIN Most Search Tips and Tricks with SharePoint 2013: Content Search Web Part — Get it All in One Popular! Maximizing Findability W! NE Place and Style It! SCOTT JAMISON BENJAMIN NIAULIN SharePoint Solutions with SPServices Create Powerful No-Code SharePoint MARC D. ANDERSON W! NE Designer 2013 Workflows in Office 365 and On-Premise Shifting the Paradigm of Requirements Gathering ASIF REHMANI MICHELLE CALDWELL

Most Creating a Great User Experience in Survival Skills for the SCA and Site Owner Popular! SharePoint SCOTT SHEARER MARC D. ANDERSON Most Taxonomies, Content Types and Metadata, Popular! Custom SharePoint 2013 Workflows that Use Oh My! W! NE the SharePoint 2013 REST API RUVEN GOTZ ANDREW CONNELL For the most current list of classes, go to www.sptechcon.com/classes Special Events Wednesday, September 17 10:00 am – 10:45 am Keynote

5:15 pm – 6:30 pm Lightning Talks Learn something new in a handful of short, targeted talks PLUS names will be drawn for free giveaways.

Thursday, September 18 11:00 am – 7:30 pm SPTechCon Exhibit Hall Open Come visit the growing and evolving network of technical experts in our Exhibit Hall.

10:00 am – 12:00 pm Meetup with SharePoint Experts

12:00 pm – 1:00 pm Women In SharePoint Luncheon with Cathy Dew Come join our group and gain meaningful insight on professional development from our panel of women in SharePoint speakers. As always, we will enjoy a wonderful lunch and time to socialize with other women in SharePoint. We look forward to seeing you at the luncheon!

2:15 pm – 3:30 pm Book Signings, Coffee & Ice Cream in Exhibit Hall

5:00 pm – 6:00 pm Microsoft Keynote

6:00 pm – 7:30 pm Networking Reception in the Exhibit Hall The Offical SPTechCon Attendee Reception is a great opportunity to network with colleagues. Enjoy drinks, tasty hor d'oeuvres, and have a great time.

Friday, September 19 10:00 am – 4:00 pm SPTechCon Exhibit Hall Open Come visit the growing and evolving network of technical experts in our Exhibit Hall.

3:00 pm – 4:00 pm Winner's Circle prizes announced in the Exhibit Hall

September 16-19, 2014 • BOSTON Why you should attend SPTechCon Boston!

“I really enjoyed it. I can hardly wait to get back to work and start using what I learned. I will encourage employees and co-workers to attend future SPTechCons. The conference had great speakers with relevant subjects, and the whole thing was well organized.” —Greg Long, Infrastructure Development Manager, ITG, Inc.

“I prefer SPTechCon over Microsoft’s SharePoint Conference in Vegas. I’m definitely going to tell others to go.” —Ray Ranson, Senior Architect, RSUI

“The classes were fantastic, I really learned a lot. The classes What’s it really like? were better than any I've ever taken. I got a lot of great ideas.” Brian Susol, Application Manager, Goulston + Storrs

“Go. It's excellent for Watch the videos at business people.” www.SPTechCon.com/videos Paul Saldanha, SharePoint Administrator, Blount

“This is my second year attending SPTechCon and I got even more out of it this time. It's a great opportunity to build a network. Also, you get a great view of how others are implementing business solutions.” Devon Hicks, IT Administrative Specialist, Great Plains Technology Center

“SPTechCon gives you great exposure to the SharePoint community and the experts within it.” Jurgen Prergschas, Application Support Engineer, Comm-Works

“Everything ran smoothly. The staff was great. The focus was “There is a big variety of sessions and something on learning and not promoting products. The speakers were for everyone. Go!” accessible and friendly. The cost of the conference is compa - Sandra Noel, Accredidation & Planning Coordinator, rable to a five-day tech course, but the content is so much Great Plains Technology Center better. A great variety of info packed into three days. I will be back next year and hope to get others to join me.” Carol Demuth, Programmer Analyst, Spokane Regional Helath District September 16-19, 2014 • BOSTON Registration & Hotel Information

Conference Pricing Register By Register By Register By Register on or June 27 August 1 August 29 after August 29

Three-Day Conference $1,145 $1,195 $1,295 $1,595 PLUS Pre-Conference Tutorials SAVE $450 SAVE $400 SAVE $300

Three-Day Conference Only $995 $1,045 $1,095 $1,395

Pre-Conference Tutorials Only $645 $695 $745 $795

Exhibit Hall Only Free Free Free Free All prices are in US$.

Registration Inclusions Save Big with these Great Discounts! Three-Day Conference PLUS Pre-Conference Tutorials • Admission to pre-conference tutorials on September 16 You may combine one of these special discounts with the • Admission to sessions and technical classes on September 17,18,19 Early Registration pricing to save even more! • Admission to keynotes Group: Group discounts will be given automatically if you register • Admission to Exhibit Hall three or more people at once. You can also contact Stacy Burris at • Admission to all special events, including the Networking Reception [email protected] to receive the $100/person discount if your • Coffee breaks and lunch where indicated group is unable to register at the same time. Also, contact her for special discounts for groups of 10 or more. Three-Day Conference Only • Admission to sessions and technical classes on September 17,18,19 User Groups: Contact Stacy Burris at [email protected] to see if • Admission to keynotes your group is eligible for a discount. • Admission to Exhibit Hall Educational Institutions: Personnel employed by or attending • Admission to all special events, including the Networking Reception educational institutions can get a $100 discount off the Three-Day • Coffee breaks and lunch where indicated Conference price by using the code EDU.

Pre-Conference Tutorials Only Non-Profit Organizations: Personnel employed by non-profit organi - • Admission to pre-conference tutorials on September 16 zations can get a $100 discount off the Three-Day Conference price • Coffee breaks and lunch where indicated by using the code NONPROFIT.

Exhibit Hall Only • Admission to Exhibit Hall Great Discounts for Government Employees! • Admission to Networking Reception CLICK HERE Government, Federal, State and Local Govern - for ment employees can receive an additional $100 off the price, plus other government-emplyee-only offers. CCR registered indicates that we are listed in the primary supplier database for the Federal Government.

SPTechCon Boston 2014 will be held at the Boston Park Plaza Hotel

50 Park Plaza Special Discounted Rates at Arlington Street Room rates for SPTechCon attendees are US$209 per night Boston, MA 02116 for single/double occupancy. This rate is available from Phone: +1-800-225-2008 September 14, 2014 (check-in) through September 21, 2014 www.bostonparkplaza.com (check-out). Rooms for the reduced rate are limited – Book Now for the best rate!

September 16-19, 2014 • BOSTON