The first book I ever wrote was the Oracle Designer 2000 Handbook (1999, Oracle Press) Peter Koletzke was my co-author. Probably the biggest “ah ha!” moment for me was the realization that the tools you use have a HUGE impact…
Business Rules Based SDLC – High Level View
Tagged with: Business rules approach, Project Management, requirements, web application development
Posted in BLOG, Business Rules
Posted in BLOG, Business Rules
What is the role of a Requirements Document?
I have heard a lot of different opinions over the years about what makes up a good requirements document. What is its value at different points in the process? How does it fit in with more modern Agile thinking? Allow…
Preparing for User Acceptance Testing
One of the things that can make user acceptance testing go horribly wrong is that the users have no idea what they are supposed to be doing. They do not know how to use the system. They do not know…
Tagged with: Project Management, template, testing, user acceptance testing, User interface, web application development
Posted in BLOG, Clients, Consulting, Development
Posted in BLOG, Clients, Consulting, Development
Writing a Good Project Status Report
I think that weekly status reports for IT projects are a great idea. They inform the client what is going on and (just as important) keep the project manager honest about the true status of the project. Having a simple…
Blow it Up, Throw it Out, and Start Over
One of the hardest things to do in a systems project is to act on the knowledge that you are on a sub-optimal path. Notice that I am not even calling it a “mistake.” This just means that somewhere along…
Three More Reasons Why Software Projects Fail
Thirteen years ago I wrote a paper entitled “Top 10 Reasons Why Systems Projects Fail”. This has been my most requested paper. It was used at Harvard which eventually led to my company building the budget and finance system for…
The BEST IT Project Management Book Ever is: “If Disney Ran Your Hospital”
If Disney Ran Your Hospital: 9 1/2 Things you Would Do Differently (Fred Lee, 2004, Second River Healthcare) is not even an IT book. As the title suggests, it is about hospital administration. But no book has influenced my thinking about project…
Tagged with: customer satisfaction, Oracle, Project Management, Web service
Posted in About Dulcian, BLOG, Consulting, Other
Posted in About Dulcian, BLOG, Consulting, Other
Where Has the Application Development World Gone Wrong?
I am frustrated with the evolution of software development over the last 20 years. When I started in the industry, I played around with Paradox as a development environment. Then Oracle released Forms 4.0 and Reports 2.0. These were first generation…
What is the essence of project management? — “Be Prepared”
A number of years ago, a Masters Degree student sent me an email asking what project methodology was best. Should we use an iterative Agile approach, or was a waterfall better in some cases? What about RUP and all of its variants?…
Surviving Major Database Architecture Changes – ODTUG Journal 2012
Michael Rosenblum published this article in the ODTUG Journal in 2012. The Introduction is below: Changes are inevitable in any information system. Even with the best possible requirements analysis, it is extremely hard to anticipate all of the potential changes…
