How to write a computer program

A new acquaintance from Hong Kong asked an interesting question:
"How do you write a computer program?"
Here is my email reply:

My first reaction was to simply Google the question: how to write a program. Nothing worthwhile came to the top of the list, which surprised me.

Let me try to answer the question...
First of all, I am not a very good programmer. Although I was taught the basics of programming in a short course while at IBM in the mid-sixties, and although I worked as a programmer in the Fortran IV language for a year in 68, and directed the work of COBOL and RPG II programmers for several years thereafter, and wrote the initial several years of the development of TeleMagic in the Dbase II, III, IV languages, and programmed other projects (PAL, etc), I really am humbled by those programmers who have much greater talent than I do.

Some great bulk of the programming I have done was with the excuse that I could not afford to hire someone else to do the work, or sometimes because I could not communicate to other programmers what I needed without actually programming it myself. It is not my preferred activity, although it is immensely gratifying when the program finally works properly. I much prefer to do the design and leave the coding to programmers.

All that being said, here's my typical approach, the way I learned it, the hard way, without any real training on the process: (it is very similar to the Think*Plan*Do*Repeat process)

1. Imagine (with the help of the users) the Outputs. What is the result you want to achieve. What does it look like.
2. Imagine (with the help of the users) the Inputs. In order to get the Outputs above, what Inputs to the system are needed?
3. Imagine (with the help of the users) the Process. What must be done to the Inputs to create the Outputs?
4. Document all of the above, using ordinary English. This is really the "meta-language" from which the actual code is created.
5. Get approval of the users of the document (the customer, the user who enters the Inputs, the user who gets the Outputs).
6. Make changes suggested by the users and loop back to step 1 until there are no more changes.
7. Give the whole mess over to the programmers, who will make it work on a computer.
8. Get user approval of the finished product.
9. Loop back to step 1 with the changes. Proceed with next step after approval.
10. Begin a period of trial runs with limited data.
11. Loop back to step 1 after learning how the system doesn't work the way it should.
12. Begin a period of trial runs with production data.
13. Loop back to step 1 with the changes..
14. Go live and hope for the best.

It is often said that the worst flaws of a program are not discovered until about 6 months after going Live. So it is then back to step 1.

It is also often said that software is ALWAYS late, and over budget.

Problem Solving

The greatest challenge to any thinker is

stating the problem in a way that will allow a solution.


Bertrand Russell

The Tyranny of the "Idea du jour"

As creative, hyperactive entrepreneurs
we will continually be attacked by brilliant ideas,
from our own heads, and from the heads of
our co-workers, customers, suppliers, etc.
In fact the quantity of these ideas
will almost certainly exceed our ability to execute them.

However, it will be extremely rare to have an idea which will
completely change your business model,
or will cause you to put it at the top of the list
of everything you need to do over
the next few days/weeks/months.

If we respond immediately to these ideas,
they will run us ragged...
Also, some of these ideas, brilliant as they are,
over some period of time,
will turn out to be not-so-brilliant, maybe even dumb,
when inspected more carefully in the light of
the overall plans and goals of the enterprise.

Such is the Tyranny of the Idea du jour.

The approach I have found to effectively
deal with these little gems
which assail us in the middle of the night,
or the middle of a meal, or whatever,
is to simply write it down immediately,
and then, later, to add it to the proper list
(website improvements, salesrep recruiting procedure,
marketing ideas, etc),
but be sure to assign a priority at a later time,
when it is the proper time to review priorities.
This may be once a month, or every 3 or 6 months.
It is essential to give our priorities enough time to be completed
so that we can learn from our experiences.

The review of such ideas and priority setting
would ideally be done in collaboration with others
who are involved in the overall planning.

So, when the next brilliant idea attacks,
take a deep breath, write it down,
and go on with your already existing plans.

Execution is king.
Follow through is essential.

Venture Capital Blog

Venture Hacks
An entrepreneur's guide to hacking venture capital.

I've never needed VC bucks
but if you do, then check out this blog!

Blogging 101, free for now

I'm evaluating a multi-media course on blogging from the folks at Simpleology. For a while, they're letting you snag it for free if you post about it on your blog.

It covers:

• The best blogging techniques.
• How to get traffic to your blog.
• How to turn your blog into money.

I'll let you know what I think once I've had a chance to check it out. Meanwhile, go grab yours while it's still free.

Best Marketing Websites

From Larry Chase's Web Digest for Marketers lists 11 of the best websites for marketers. Check it out at http://wdfm.com/current.html

Quote of the day

If everything seems under control,
you're just not going fast enough.

Mario Andretti

Venture Capital - Good, Bad, and Ugly

Check out this website: TheFunded.com

I've never taken any VC money, although I have talked to a few VCs about getting some investment capital. But the experience was so time consuming that it was just not worth the effort. My business was moving too fast to be slowed down by endless VC shenanigans. After all the work of dealing with VCs, I decided to go it alone, focus on profits to raise the money I needed to grow, and of course it worked. The best part is that I didn't "let the camel's nose into the tent", and would up owning the business 100%.

I figured my experience was unique; after all, there have been a LOT of companies where VCs have made a big contribution to startup success.

Today, I discovered the real truth: and it's not all you've been lead to believe. Now, with the "wisdom of crowds" approach that comes with the internet, you can check out real-world feedback from people just like you who have gone through the VC's fire-drills to get the money they need.

Read the full story in this Wired Magazine article.

Free Rice

Check out Free Rice.
It's a most excellent example of viral, extremely rapid growth.
A spectacularly simple, win-win, business model.

Richard Branson Interview

In his school years,
Richard Branson was dyslexic, and a terrible student.
But nothing can stop the motivated entrepreneur.
Check out this excellent video interview.

Invincible

It is defeat that turns bone to flint;
it is defeat that turns gristle to muscle;
it is defeat that makes men invincible.

Henry Ward Beecher

Made to Stick

Made to Stick
Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die
by
Chip Heath & Dan Heath
If your ideas could use some help
getting adopted
this is a book for you.

Who Are You Now?

At any given time,
we are becoming the average of the 5 people
with whom we are most closely associated.

from The One Minute Entrepreneur by Ken Blanchard

The Billion Dollar Payday

The value of shares in Amazon.com soared almost 25% today on news of much improved earnings. This would probably have been a billion dollar payday for the founder, Jeff Bezos.

Quite the mind-bending concept.
A billion dollar day.

I'll bet the Google boys have had a couple of those.

So, if it has happened, even if by wild improbability or unexpectedness, then it can happen by design, according to a plan. If it can happen for others, it can happen for you. But only if you have a Billion Dollar Payday Plan.

I like that idea.

If I fell a bit short, and, after taxes it was only a few hundred million, it wouldn't be so bad. Heck, I'm still young and good lookin' with energy and time to spare...
I can tweak my plan and jump back in. A Billion Dollar Payday could put a smile on anyone's face!

I'll start with The System, it hasn't failed yet.

Caution

The entrepreneur's job, possibly more than any other, is communication.
Consider this well.
And while you are at it, consider these timeless words:

The greatest danger in communication is the illusion it has been achieved.

George Bernard Shaw

The System - Quick Start Guide

Now available:

the first edition of the Quick Start Guide
for The System for Achieving Goals.

Click here to download the Quick Start Guide.

Free.

Quotes

Man in the Arena

"It is not the critic who counts:
not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles
or where the doer of deeds could have done better.

The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena,
whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood,
who strives valiantly,
who errs and comes up short again and again,
because there is no effort without error or shortcoming,
but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions,
who spends himself for a worthy cause;
who, at the best, knows, in the end,
the triumph of high achievement,
and who, at the worst, if he fails,
at least he fails while daring greatly,
so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls
who knew neither victory nor defeat."

Theodore Roosevelt,
"Citizenship in a Republic,"
Speech at the Sorbonne, Paris, April 23, 1910

TED's Secrets of Success

In Search of Entrepreneurial Flow

In considering the topic of Flow, and how it applies to my pool game, I did some research and came across an entry in Wikipedia which is summarized herein.

Flow is the mental state of operation in which the person is fully immersed in what he or she is doing, characterized by a feeling of energized focus, full involvement, and success in the process of the activity.

(Think Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods, etc.)

How can Entrepreneurs find Flow in their daily activities in building a business? It seems that there could be no greater goal than this!

As Csikszentmihalyi (the psychologist and originator of the term "Flow") sees it, components of an experience of flow can be specifically enumerated; he presents the following:

1. Clear goals (expectations and rules are discernible and goals are attainable and align appropriately with one's skill set and abilities).
2. Concentrating and focusing, a high degree of concentration on a limited field of attention (a person engaged in the activity will have the opportunity to focus and to delve deeply into it).
3. A loss of the feeling of self-consciousness, the merging of action and awareness.
4. Distorted sense of time - one's subjective experience of time is altered.
5. Direct and immediate feedback (successes and failures in the course of the activity are apparent, so that behavior can be adjusted as needed).
6. Balance between ability level and challenge (the activity is neither too easy nor too difficult).
7. A sense of personal control over the situation or activity.
8. The activity is intrinsically rewarding, so there is an effortlessness of action.
9. When in the flow state, people become absorbed in their activity, and focus of awareness is narrowed down to the activity itself, action awareness merging.

Not all are needed for flow to be experienced.

Further considering Flow in an Entrepreneurial setting, think how magical an organization would become if all of the people within it could experience Flow!

Csikszentmihalyi suggests several ways in which a group could work together so that each individual member could achieve flow. The characteristics of such a group include:

• Creative spatial arrangements: Chairs, pin walls, charts, however no tables, therefore primarily work in standing and moving.
• Playground design : Charts for information inputs, flow graphs, project summary, craziness (here also craziness has a place), safe place (here all may say what is otherwise only thought), result wall, open topics
• Parallel, organized working
• Target group focus
• Advancement of existing one (prototyping)
• Increase in efficiency through visualization
• Existence of differences among participants represents an opportunity, rather than an obstacle.

I'm not sure I understand all of the above points, but that may just be going against some of the principles of Flow, specifically: applying too much intellect to the endeavor instead of allowing the experience to happen. However, from my personal experiences of Flow in an Entrepreneurial setting, I recognize these things as being important in supporting effective and free communication. And isn't this the true job of the Entrepreneur?

Are you a real or wanna-be entrepreneur?

Perry Marshall, internet marketing guru, just released his list of the differences between a real and a wanna-be entrepreneur:

Twelve differences between those who dream and those who act:


1-Wanna-be's obsess about ideas. Entrepreneurs obsess about implementation.

2-Wanna-be's want more web traffic. Enrepreneurs focus on sales conversion.

3-Wanna-be's focus on positive thinking. Entrepreneurs plan for multiple contingencies.

4-Wanna-be's want to get on TV and get "famous." Entrepreneurs build their list.

5-Wanna-be's seek a perfect plan. Entrepreneurs execute and adjust the plan later.

6-Wanna-be's wait for their lucky break. Entrepreneurs engineer four, five, six plans and execute them in tandem, wagering that at least one plan will get traction.

7-Wanna-be's fear looking stupid in front of their friends. Entrepreneurs willingly risk making fools of themselves, knowing that long-term success is a good trade for short-term loss of dignity.

8-Wanna-be's shield their precious ideas from harsh reality, postponing the verdict of success or failure until 'someday.' Entrepreneurs expose their ideas to cold reality as soon as reasonably possible.

9-Wanna-be's put off practicing basketball until they've got Air Jordans. Entrepreneurs practice barefoot behind the garage.

10-Wanna-be's believe what they're told, believe their own assumptions. Entrepreneurs do original research and determine what paths have been already trod.

11-Wanna-be's believe they can do anything. Entrepreneurs do what they're gifted for and delegate the rest.

12-Wanna-be's think about the world in terms of COULD and SHOULD. Entrepreneurs think in terms of IS and CAN BE.

The New Truth about Marketing

Watch this video:

Seth Godin:

Sliced bread and

other marketing delights

In a world of too many options and too little time, our obvious choice is to ignore the ordinary stuff. Marketing guru Seth Godin spells out why, when it comes getting our attention, bad or bizarre ideas are more successful than boring ones. And early adopters, not the mainstream's bell curve, are the new sweet spot of the market.