Signetix Blog

PMP

Thu, 01 Sep 2011 23:17:00 +0000

Hi there,

if you work in a corporate environment, in a small business, as sole trader or even in a family, you will be a project manager at some sort. Our entire life can be broken down into projects. There is the education project, the getting the kids to survive adolescence project, the holiday trip, the wedding, the getting your company to the next level and last but not least the projects you might manage for your work place.

Now, how do we learn to manage projects? Well, a big part of PM (project management) is common sense. We think about the task and create work steps in our mind. We might formalize them, bring them onto paper, communicate them and control the processes and the outcome. All pretty obvious. Until this is, well until we have to project management together with others. That is a complete different ball game. Starting with the good old wedding. Planning this thing together can be a nightmare, simply because groom and bride seem to speak completely different languages.

And that is exactly the reason why it is so difficult to share PM. The terminology and language. Also the system. Each person has their own way of thinking. We all tick differently and that is usually not a problem since a lot of ways will get the aspired solution. In a team environment it is a bit of a problem, though.

This is where methods come in handy. There are countless definitions out there but IMO the world wide standard is PMP (Project Manager Practitioner) from PMI. This is a methodology and a rule set. It establishes a common language and breaks projects down into smaller entities which are easier to manage.

I am just doing my PMP accreditation and I am absolutely thrilled with the tool that is in my hands now. This thing is great. It allows me to communicate with PM's all over the world in the same (methodology) language. Everyone knows (more or less) the same. It is a bit like a party with lots of strangers who all are bar keepers by trade. Good communication and great drinks are a given.

I encourage you to have a look at this. It might just change the way you attack things for ever.

CU later
Mike

PS. Check out our improved website ... any comments are more than welcome.

certifications

Wed, 24 Aug 2011 23:17:00 +0000

Hi there,

Todays topic: What IT certifications hold the most value?

It is one of those topics. Some say, IT certifications aren'r worth the paper they are printed on because it is all about skill-sets and not about a snap shot of one particular skill at all. Other will tell you that the certifications they did accellerated their carrers and are a big boost for every CV.

I gues, this is both true. Sure, a snapshot wont show anyone the real skill lever but at least a certification proves that this person did something (most of the times proactive) to strengthen his/her skill set. Point is, we don't know what skills someone has before we see him in action. Certifications can only be an indicator but they also provide at least a foundation. A MS certificate has a certain standard and unless it is forged, it will provide some security that this person knows something about the topic on hand.

Now that leaves us with the question: What certifications will provide maximum career leverage? There are countless opinions and it obviously depends on what part of the IT industry they will be applied. Let's just say we are talking management area with 100k$+ wages. Obviously there are still countless niches, we can think about, but let's just stick with generall stuff like e.g. Prince2 (project management).

What do you guys think? I started a post about this in some LinkedIn groups as well and will post the results in my blog later on.

I am looking forward to hearing your thougts :)

Cheers
Mike

PS. Please also check out our improved website ... any comments are more than welcome.

SharePoint

Sun, 14 Aug 2011 23:17:00 +0000

Hi guys,

Here is the thing: I was wrong! I followed the wrong path for more than 12 years :(

Why am I saying that and why should you care? I tell you what: If you are not a developer of corporate systems and you are not working for a corporation and are not running your own business, you should probably just cary on surfing, this post won't mean much to you.

BUT IF YOU ARE... keep on reading - well, just a suggestion ;)

I start from the beginning: When I began working in the industry (IT that is) there was the good guys and the evil guys. The good ones where using Unix and as much open source as possible, the evil ones where all called Bill and lived behind big gates trying to take over the world!

Microsoft was trying to extend and extend and extend. They had sales people in every government organization, every school, every bigger corporation and they did a good job. They sold! This was something that us Linux geeks really pissed off. So we closed our eyes to everything MS and just focused on what we thought where better solutions. Fair enough.

Now, more than a decade later, it seems like (at least) I made a mistake there. Just recently I discovered MS SharePoint. This is a collaboration platform as well as an information base, as well as a CMS, a CRM, a business intelligence center and pretty much everything you tell it to be. It is fairly easy to use and quite inexpensive. It can do just about everything you need and is easy to extend to cover all the things you want.

Why did I spent all this years developing software which did the same thing (obviously not that comprehensive)? This encounter opened my eyes towards MS. I am about to turn around on my preconceptions. I still hate that MS website really only work in IE. I don't like the recklessness copy right violation is punished with but I can start to see the point. The MS business projects are really good products. There is a reason for the price tag and while I am not going so far to sanction everything the representative, owner and CEO of MS does, I must admit that Billy boy doesn't seem to be the devil. After all he is funding the worlds richest charity organization and sinks just about all his money and the money of his mega rich friends into it.

The reason for me to write this blog post (I guess) is to share my mistake and warn about being narrow minded. Avoiding a technology because of ignorance isn't the smartest move and I am looking forward to a future in which I will be able to offer much more comprehensive and complete services to my clients. I guess I needed a while to grow up. It cost me a lot of money and opportunities but I finally did and it feels quite good. I am looking forward to new, exciting projects in the LAMP AND the MS world from now on.

CU there!
Mike

PS. Check out our improved website ... any comments are more than welcome.

GIT vs SVN

Wed, 27 Jul 2011 23:17:00 +0000

Hi everybody,

Started a nice discussion about versioning systems which I would like to share with you. It boiled down to the biggest system, which is SVN and the "newcomer" GIT, which comes from Linus T. himself:

We also use sub-versioning mostly form a web development perspective.

SVN seemed to be the choice 4-5 years ago, and it was fine in a simple development environment (1-2 user on a project, not much branching). But recently we just noticed it wasn't optimal anymore - one mistake in merging could leave you with lost changes, merging took forever with a svn server on the internet.

Since our web server panel started to support GIT repositories (needed a bit of tweaking to get it running wiht smart http), we figured to give it a try. So far we love it! As with any software it's important to avoid certain traps, but my god is it fast and great in branching/merging! And the post commit hook works too in our web server environment for instance to update the staging instance of a project when pushing into the staging branch.

Also the Windows GUI (we use Tortoise GIT) doesn't seem as bad anymore either (even though it leaves me scratching my head some times :-) )...

The discussion will continue. Stay tuned or find me "Michael Zwiener" on linkedIn.

Check out our improved website ... any comments are more than welcome.

Cheers
Mike

QCubed

Sat, 23 Jul 2011 23:17:00 +0000

Your Website Partner

- Custom built websites
- Website packages
- Online shops
Get a free quote now

Flash vs HTML5

Fri, 22 Jul 2011 23:17:00 +0000

Hi everybody,

Flash vs HTML5

For many years Web Developers have been discussing the pros and cons of Flash and HTML5. Now even Adobe, Flash-creator, introduced a new tool in their product line, called Adobe Edge.

The tool is still in the first stages of its development but it is already possible to download a preview. The new Adobe tool entitles you to create animation and transitions using the capabilities of HTML5, Javascript and CSS3.

Adobe claims that the tool is going to be updated regularly, to provide best functionality and experience. I reckon it wont be just us who can´t wait for the launch of the new Adobe product, eh?!

Check out our improved website ... any comments are more than welcome.

Cheers
Mike

New partners

Sat, 16 Jul 2011 23:17:00 +0000

Hi everybody,

We have great news. We went into partnership with a local agency which will outsource a lot of their work to us. We love to work with other web professionals and I am looking forward to a great partnership. We are also working on our website. It can be hard to find time for improving the own website when there are so many clients projects but I took some time of my day and added a lot of content. The web site is much better structured now and we added some references. This is a work in progress, but the great thing is that we use our own CMS, created on basis of Silverstrype to do the website, which makes it very easy for me to change it around. We are also spending more time with typo3 and typo light (not as close to each other as the name would suggest) as alternatives to Silverstripe. Check out our improved website ... any comments are more than welcome.

Cheers
Mike

I am design blind! You too?

Tue, 12 Jul 2011 23:17:00 +0000

Hi everybody,

I am design blind! You too?

How is it that almost no real programmer seems to be able to make his stuff look good? Is it just a different mind set? Programmers tend to be analytical function focused people. Designers are creative and a bit "head in the clouds" kind of guys. I would bet that more signers wear hats and drive colorful golf cabriolets then software developers do. Is there a way around? Can I learn design skills?

Well, it would be really handy to do it all, but after years of trying to get better in it myself and pushing my own team into thinking about the user, thinking about making interfaces look good, I kind of gave up.

How about you? What are your experiences? Is it a skill that can (and should) be learned or should everyone just stay with his expertise and outsource the rest? I am looking forward to hear your opinion about it.

Cheers
Mike from www.signetix.co.nz

Hybrid Apps as an interface of HTML5 and native Apps?!

Wed, 29 Jun 2011 15:00:00 +0000

Hi guys,

App developers argue whether HTML or native apps are better for the user and for business. It both has its pros and cons.

With HTML it is, according to rumours of Facebook´s " Project Spartan" and Microsoft´s plan to create apps for Windows 8 in HTML5 and JavaScript, just a matter of time when,not if, companies will completely adopt HTML apps.

Still, there are many HTML coded apps which can not access features like your phones camera, microphone or address book.

Native apps which use direct images of the provider and can show off with game-quality graphics, are not believed to survive on the long run.

Hybrid apps, however, function as a link of HTML or JavaScript coded pages and native coded pages. It enables you to use the advantages of the coding language in question and smooth away the respective disadvantages. However, the main benefit is that when creating a hybrid app and deciding to swith to a completely HTML coded app, wou do not have to rewrite the app from the scratch.

You can keep the HTML coded pages and edit the rest while the user will not see a difference to a native app.

Stay tuned or find me "Michael Zwiener" on linkedIn.

Check out our improved website ... any comments are more than welcome.

Cheers
Mike

Project Sportportalonline.com

Mon, 20 Jun 2011 00:00:00 +0000

Hello again,

the hardworking guys of Signetix were also working on a new sporty project called Sportportalonline.com. The cooperation with Results!-Athletic Centre in Nelson is a project which has received a big deal of our attention during the last months. This Website does not just feature the opportunity to set up a membership for the Results! - Athletic Centre. Its main right to exist is a forum where everyone who is interested in Sports can chat and exchange latest news, dates, experiences and insights. It will also be possible to use the websites own shop for fitness gear in all kinds and colors and to receive latest official perceptions of the world of sports. We are still working on this project but we are keen to present a fully working and exploratory website very soon.

Signetix is very thankful for this great assignment and is looking forward to a long lasting relationship with the world of sports and fitness.

Cheers
Lisa

Blueprint CSS Framework for design-blind programmers

Sun, 19 Jun 2011 14:00:00 +0000

Hi everybody,

As I already have mentioned earlier in our Blog - there are programmers and designer. Sometimes you are lucky anough to meet someone who can claim membership to both but to be honest - that doesn´t happen very often, eh?!

Most people I know tried to be equally gifted but to be honest again - most of them failed.

Unfortunately even for designated programmers, there is no way around it, you have to face at least a few design issues in order to work closely to the clients ideas.

One specific tool is of great help when it comes to designing programmers: Blueprint CSS and open source CSS Frameworks.

It helps the design-blind programmer among other things to remover stylization problems when using different Browsers, it supplies typographic defaults and defines typographic baselines, and many more.

A Solution for our blindness?! What do you think?!

The discussion will continue. Stay tuned or find me "Michael Zwiener" on linkedIn.

Check out our improved website ... any comments are more than welcome.

Cheers
Mike

Project Freightme

Fri, 17 Jun 2011 23:17:00 +0000

Hey everyone,

a long time no hear does not mean that nothing happened. We are currently working on a website called freightme.co.nz. It arouse from a coorperation between Signetix, Karl and Darrell, who both have heaps of experience in the business of transportation.This project is not just a great opportunity and challenge for us but also a project we put our whole heart into.

Freightme offers an easy way to ship your belongings to the address or depot which is most convenient for you. You just enter your details of your shipping and chose a destination and freightme comes up with the cheapest way to ship it. You have also the choice between four different possiblities to send your belonging. You can either choose to send it from a depot to depot or private address to address or even from a depot to a private address and the other way around.

We are still working on the details because we use most modern technologies and want to create a top class website which is easy to use and maintain.

Thanks to everyone who is supporting us and special thank to Karl and Darrell.

Cheers
Lisa

Recycling the World Wide Web

Sun, 12 Jun 2011 16:00:00 +0000

Hi,

The whole world is recycling in order to safe itself. But have you ever consideres recycling your work in order to safe yourself time and money?

Web developers are famous foe being " lazy". Not lazy in the common way, bute they are specialized on finding the most efficient way to work and to solve problems. This is not always easy and takes quite a time but it´s worth it, isn´t it?!

But in this case being "lazy" really means "coding just as often as you really have to". Good developers know that and don´t write just project related codes. they try to write codes which they will be able to use on a longterm. Codes they can diversify if needed or which can be used in other projects as well.

The big question is indeed: What is better? Start working straight away and write project related codes which are easier to design?

Or better put a lot of effort in the process in order to create codes which can be rcycled.

The discussion will continue. Stay tuned or find "Michael Zwiener" on linkedIn.

Check out our improved website ... any comments are more than welcome.

Cheers
Lisa

Project Real Estate ID card

Sun, 01 May 2011 23:17:00 +0000

Hello again,

Signetix just finished a new exciting project. Check out our website to learn more about other projects we are doing. We created a big web system for a German bank. The website is about real estate agent ID cards. The intention is to create trust using a identity card that the real estate agent can show to his clients. He needs to be certified to get one of those cards. Our system handles the complete work-flow from an agent being employed by a credited agency to issuing the ID down to the government organizations doing the audit and keeping everyone honest. It is a great system and will be used by thousands of real estate agents in Austria and Germany.

We used the most modern technologies, as we always do and created a web system that is cutting edge while still being easy to maintain.

Thanks to everyone who believed in the project and thanks for the Raifeisen Bank to give us the opportunity to shine.

Cheers
Mike

Project Real Estate ID card - update

Wed, 27 Apr 2011 23:17:00 +0000

Hello again,

Exciting news about the immobiliencard project. What started as an Austrian prototype will now be expanding to Germany and most likely the rest of Europe. This is great and we will put a lot of programming and web design work into additional functionality. There will be sophisticated process management systems capable of handling the internal processes of potentially hundreds of thousands users. We will have to create a hosting environment and develop all kind of interfaces using SOAP XML and other protocols. Loads of software design and programming to do for this great project. Check out our website to see more about other projects we are doing.

Cheers
Mike

Tendering Service

Thu, 21 Apr 2011 23:17:00 +0000

Hi there,

I would like to talk about a typical problem of small or even medium web development companies and would love to get feedback. Tell me how you deal with tenders and/or if you are interested in partnerships to be able to get big projects via open tenders to collaborate.

I don't know about you but we focus on the development of clients projects and we don't really take part in tenders (like GETS new zealand), because it would take developers too much time to deal with all the paperwork. We can't really afford to put days of work into a project which in most cases goes to someone else.

We are also not very good in promoting ourselves and the main part of our clients come through word of mouth. Sounds familiar? Let's tackle the problem. We would love to partner with other agencies to share the workload, make a "bigger" impression and then also share the project.

There must be some of you who are not so much developers but more into marketing. Would it be interesting for you to help us getting the jobs and earning a good cut, or sharing the workload and do the project together? Please let me know and let's build a network.

Why should only the "big cats" get the great projects? Together we are strong ;)

Check out our improved website ... any comments are more than welcome.

Cheers
Mike

Project Nature Coast

Sat, 16 Apr 2011 23:17:00 +0000

Good day everyone,

We are proud and happy to introduce our newest client: NZ Nature Coast. This tourism infrastructure and business development provider does a lot of work and changes the industry in Wellington.

We are taking over a very sophisticated system in typo light, which is a version of typo3. The web development will happen in stages and we are confident we can provide this high end client with great service for many years to come. Wen design and web development are part of the service as well as newsletter maintenance and graphic design. We will program and develop functionality extensions for the typo3 system and work on existing ones. Software development as it's best :)

Have a look at out our website to see what else we offer. This client is a great step for us. We are looking to serve more Wellington customers for some time now and this one is as good as it gets. Thanks to everyone for giving us the chance to develop this outstanding software and web design project further. We promise to do our best and bring it to the next level.

Cheers
Mike

LinkedIn summary

Thu, 07 Apr 2011 23:17:00 +0000

Hi everybody,

Here is our new LinkedIn summary:

Michael Zwiener's Summary

Headline:
Corporate IT Solutions
* Portals (B2B and B2C)
* Intranet applications
* Websites

Skill Tags:
QCodo PHP, Flash, Frameworks, CSS, Ajax

Details:
We bring more than 12 years of project-related experience to the table, including the development of powerful portals and Internet solutions with extremely complex functions such as communication and cooperation systems, CRM software, project management, Internet communities and much, much more.

Extra Skills:
Website Development using QCubed, ZEND, PHP, MySQL, CSS, Ajax, Flex, AdobeAIR, WebORB, Frameworks, Java, typo3, typo light, silverstripe, subcontracting, project management

Cheers
Mike

Project The Prow

Mon, 04 Apr 2011 23:17:00 +0000

Hi everybody, I was just looking through our records for an interesting system we did and came across http://www.theprow.org.nz - This is a website we did for the Nelson library a couple of years ago. It combines a wiki system with a complex user right matrix to offer a great community website for the Nelson Tasman region and the entire Top of the South. This website is packed with features and great articles as well as wiki like information. See the showroom page of our website to see more projects we are doing. We are always full of innovation and creative solutions and we leave a trail of interesting projects. It is still a lot of fun and we work with great people.

Cheers

Mike

Project MyPages

Sun, 27 Mar 2011 23:17:00 +0000

After a lot of up and down, the local directory website is in the final stages. MyPages found a new investor and will be able to continue business in 2011. This is great news since signetix and it's web design gurus put a lot of effort into the great IT infrastructure which will enable MyPages to roll out nation wide as soon as they are ready. We are very proud of the directory website and the internal systems and we hope, we will enjoy a long lasting relationship with this great company.