Blog
3months now also supporting SilverStripe
In light of the Governments decision to use Silverstripe 3months have made the decision to include Silverstripe (and the underlying Sapphire framework) as one of the technologies that we develop in and support.
Outsourcing Agile and Contracts - can it be done?
Agile is a very different way of building stuff. We believe an Agile approach is crucial to the success of any web/mobile software development project that contains significant innovation or uniqueness. Agile is a big topic and means a lot of different things to different people but for us the most important aspects of Agile are:
The changing role of the IT Manager / CIO - a vendor perspective
I run a web development vendor company and part of my job is to decide whether to respond to tenders. Being in the capital, Wellington (the home of Government in New Zeland) this involves reading lots of very long RFI / RFP documents (not the fun bit of my job) and attending vendor briefings.
3months Christmas Presentations
This year we thought we would do something a little bit different for our annual end of year get together. We really wanted to create a fun environment which provoked engagement and conversation - and we’re pretty chuffed at the turnout from some of Wellington’s coolest people. The bubbles were flowing and there were fantastic networking opportunities for all.
3months selected for cross-government web panel
Last Friday the Department of Internal Affairs announced that 3months has been selected to be on the panel of suppliers to provide web development services for public sector organisations.
TEDxTeAro | 1.12.12 | Te Papa | Wellington, NZ
We had the pleasure of sponsoring TEDxTeAro which took place on Saturday at Te Papa. A great day was had by all, we thought we would showcase what the 3months culture is all about by taking down the ping pong table, beanbags and creating a mini 3months. Complete with our custom made TEDxTeAro Ping Pong Latter site which includes software developed in house by the 3months developers which worked by attendees scanning their QR code (on their lanyard) which then brought up all their info and photo. We couldn't forget the Parrot AR.Drone2.0 which is controlled by iPad or iPhone, it proved to be a hit on the day with Mark mastering flips and spins.
.net Magazine Profile on Mark Pascall
.Net magazine (www.netmagazine.com) is the UK's best selling magazine for web developers and designers. An edited version of the following article was published in the Summer 2012 edition (No 231).
Does an Agile Methodology work in a Government Environment? | TwinTechs
With the Govis Agile forum today in Wellington NZ, I found this post on TwinTechs to be an interesting yet disturbing read. The suggestion:
T-Shirt Sizing to Estimate Development Effort in a Software Project
T-shirt sizing is 'relative' sizing and less prone to errors than estimation of effort, in real days.
For instance, you can be guaranteed that two developers are like two watches. They never agree when it comes to how long it will take to develop a piece of functionality. One might say that it will take two weeks while the other smirks with an I-can-do-it-in-two-days attitude. That may be true as different developers come with varied skills and experience. Relative sizing is about comparing two different pieces of functionality and agreeing on which one is smaller (or larger) in size and by how much. Rarely do developers disagree on this. And if they do, you can be sure that the story is not clear enough or there are major unknowns.
Continuous Integration and Testing unconference
I've been out to a couple of unconferences (with varying values of "un") in the last month. Citconf (Continuous Integration and Testing conference) was well and truly in the unconference style with audience created topics and discussions covering mostly testing topics with a few extra things such as bee-keeping.