Monday, December 7, 2009
Monday, November 23, 2009
Broken Bridge, Snowstorms, and the Flu
A couple of months ago, a friend of mine wrote a blog post on her experiences during a big Northern California storm several years ago. I also remember that storm, and, although we didn't work at the same company at that time, I also had previously figured out how to successfully work from home (although I really only did that on weekends and late nights). That day, I started out driving to work (from San Francisco to Mountain View). The storm was so awful and frightening, that I finally reached a point where I felt I was endangering my life by staying on the road. And I hadn't even reached the freeway! All I could picture was my dad sitting by my hospital bed, asking me why I thought it had been a good idea to drive in those conditions. In my imagination, I had no answer for him, so I realized how foolish I was being out on the roads that day. I turned around, and had a successful work day from home.
Not only did I find working from home worked just as well for me, I got in my usual full workday. I realized that any of my co-workers who might have made it into the office probably only worked a few hours, as their commutes were at least doubled, if not worse, and they were also worried about their experiences on the drive home.
I know many managers, and companies, are uncomfortable with their staff working from home. The common concern seems to be that, if workers can't be seen, they are probably goofing off. Personally, I think that people can goof off whether or not their boss can see them, so this may actually be a different problem.
But, even if your team works together in an office every day, there may still be times when your manager or company are really okay with people not coming into the office for the day, due to dangerous or unusual conditions. In fact, the manager probably can't or doesn't want to come in on those days, either! A few weeks ago, during the span of just a couple of days, I noticed three situations where workers were unable to drive into work. How many of those workers were able to just work from home? And how many companies just had to close, because no one was there, and not conduct business that day?
Here is a round-up of what happened on those days:
Transportation
http://www.infrastructurist.com/2009/09/08/the-daily-dig-cracked-eyebar-edition/
In the San Francisco Bay Area, a piece of the Bay Bridge broke and fell onto the roadway. The bridge had to be closed in both directions while the damage was first inspected, then repaired. This bridge is the busiest in the Bay Area, averaging 280,000 vehicles crossing it each day, including buses and carpools. What happened to all of those vehicles (and workers)? Were they able to fit onto the other bridges, or alternative mass transit? How many started out one way, but had to give up and try another? And how long did it take, assuming they eventually did make into the office?
Weather
(AP Photo/Ed Andrieski) 
(AP Photo/Ed Andrieski) The same week, Denver got several feet of snow in just a few hours. Dozens of roads were closed, and driving was certainly treacherous for those who ventured out onto the roads. Accidents in those conditions throughout the area also slowed commutes. Although snow storms in Colorado are certainly not uncommon, it's still not possible for most people to drive through several feet of snow. It's certainly dangerous to try to drive in those conditions. How many of your workers may decide they'd rather not risk driving on those days? And do you really want them to? Do you want to?
Health Emergencies
Another incident that week was different in that it was not transportation related. As the H1N1 flu pandemic works its way throughout the country, many schools and other public buildings decide to close when the risk becomes to great, rather than expose people to possible other contagious people. Your company may decide that is also the smart thing to do, if the flu is prevalent in your area. But, what do your workers with children do when suddenly the schools are closed for a week, or more? Bringing the children to work is definitely not an option, in this case! And, even if your workers have adequate sick leave to cover their absence, they very likely will need that leave later, when they or their family members are actually sick over the cold and flu season. What percentage of your workforce has children? How many people in your office would be affected by this? What would your office even look like, on a day when all the parents have to stay home with their children?
Even if the managers and company are unsure they are ready to handle a formal, regular, work from home program, it would be foolish to not come up with a plan to handle unexpected situations, such as these. While we all enjoy an unexpected day off (snow day!), most of us have too much work to do to close the business for even a couple of days.
To see my other blog posts on ways to work with a distributed workforce, click here (in reverse chronological order).
Thursday, November 19, 2009
Unicycle Basketball
Go, Cardinal!
The virtual body illusion and immersive Second Life avatars : Neurophilosophy
via scienceblogs.com
"the participants reported that the virtual arm felt like their own, and that the sensations they experienced were caused by the ball on the screen rather than by the wand"
I have experienced slight disorientation in-world, such as when I move my avatar and expect to see one thing but see something else. This is especially true when I am familiar with something in "real life" but am experiencing it in the virtual world. I agree that our brains can be fooled into thinking that we are someplace we are not really.
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
How an Economist's Cry for Ethical Capitalism was Heard | Fast Company
via fastcompany.com
"Her concept of "co-op capitalism" -- an idea she plans to develop further over the next year -- calls for businesses, governments, NGOs, and the public to experiment together to design new, more-adaptive business models and financial structures that take both profit and larger social goals into account. Companies should be financially motivated to behave in ways that benefit everyone. "
I also like where she points out how "messy" the world is, and how hard it is to reduce it to mathematical equations.
Thursday, November 5, 2009
Good Dog, Smart Dog
via nytimes.com
"Their apparent ability to tune in to the needs of psychiatric patients, turning on lights for trauma victims afraid of the dark, reminding their owners to take medication and interrupting behaviors like suicide attempts and self-mutilation, for example, has lately attracted the attention of researchers."
Very cool, and I think dogs do think differently than humans...
Monday, November 2, 2009
MPK16 in the Virtual World: Even More Enhancements!
In previous blogs (see MPK16 in the Virtual World: Enhancements! and MPK16 in the Virtual World: More Enhancements!), I discussed the various configurations of the MPK16 Break Area and Multi-Purpose Room. Now, I'll demonstrate the last two areas in the workspace that have multiple configurations.
Also, we'll now be conducting the Guided Tours of our virtual workspace on the first Tuesday of each month, including tomorrow, November 3. If you’d like to join us, meet at the Sun Employee Island (slurl:http://slurl.com/secondlife/Sun%20Microsystems%206/117/110/26) at 10am SLT (PT). (Note: your Second Life avatar must be registered as a Sun Employee; register or get an avatar here.)
Collaborative Studio Configurations
The Collaborative Studios are used by a team, or possibly more than one, to work together. Each desk is self-contained, and only has one connection to the raised floor, for power. It may also have a LAN drop, but that is optional in our Wi-Fi-enabled space. Since each desk is movable, and shaped to allow various configurations of the desks, there are many arrangements possible. Two configurations are illustrated below in screenshots, as well as a video:
1-Studio Row Configuration
2-Studio Pod Configuration
(see video below; also at https://slx.sun.com/1179275739)
Team Room Configurations
Team Rooms are used by the groups in the adjacent Collaborative Studios. It can be used for "tiger team meetings," team brainstorming or other collaborations, meeting room, or even as a temporary overflow space for one of the teams in the studio. While it doesn't have all of the A/V equipment that a conference room might have, it has at least one wall as a whiteboard (that is usually only erased by the occupants). The rectangular adjustable desks in this space can be arranged as desks, or with a conference table instead.
1-Team Room Desks Configuration
2-Team Room Conference Room Configuration
(see video below; also at https://slx.sun.com/1179275759)
If you'd like to read any of my previous blog entries on the Second Life version of MPK16, you can see all entries here (reverse chronological). The other reconfigurable spaces are described in these two entries: MPK16 in the Virtual World: Enhancements! and MPK16 in the Virtual World: More Enhancements! You can read the rest of my posts, on collaboration and distributed teams, here.
Sunday, November 1, 2009
Disney Cruise Line: Ride the AquaDuck « Disney Parks Blog
this looks great, although it seems almost a little too scary to swoop out "13 feet over the side of the ship... with the ocean 150 feet below." Still, great fun to do virtually, just make the video full screen.
Friday, October 30, 2009
Second Life Helps Save, Improve Lives -- InformationWeek
(click image for gallery)
Judi Smith heads up training in Second Life for Children's Memorial Hospital in Chicago. Here she is with her Second Life avatar, "Judi Carver."
Great uses of a virtual world!
"In Chicago, Children's Memorial Hospital uses Second Life, with its three-dimensional software representations of landscapes, buildings, and vehicles, for disaster preparedness training, to show employees how to evacuate patients in an emergency. Meanwhile, disabled people use Second Life for peer support, helping one another with the emotional, social, and other problems they encounter in the real world."
Monday, October 26, 2009
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Saturday, October 24, 2009
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
Formal Collaboration with Distributed Teams
The most common method of formal collaboration is through a scheduled meeting. Have you ever been the only person to call in to a meeting, where everyone else is physically in the room, and everyone (including you) forgets that you are even on the phone? Even when you have something to contribute, good luck getting anyone to hear you. Next time you have a scheduled meeting, especially if one or more of your participants will be remote, try to incorporate one or more collaborative tools. Since you have to schedule your meeting in advance, you usually have time to do a little set-up. That gives you a lot of options in your choice for collaborative tools for your meeting. Some examples of tools and practices are explained here.
Group Scheduling
The first collaborative thing to do for your scheduled meeting is to use a collaborative tool to schedule it! I hate the ~17 emails that sometimes happens when someone sends a note out to all of the attendees asking when is a good time to meet (e.g., "I'm open Thurs pm and Fri am;" "I'm open Fri 11-1, but not on Thursday," etc.) Just schedule it for Tuesday at 3pm and be done with it! Get everyone to use a group calendar (and keep it up to date). Here is a sample using our group calendar:
Using the group calendar, you can look for an open time, as shown above. Just add all participants, and look for the opening. Once you find it, you can add it to everyone's calendar automatically, as well (once they accept it). Some group calendar applications can automatically go out and find the next open spot in each person's schedules. Not only is everyone saved the aggravation and rapidly filling Inbox of the back-and-forth emails, they also get the meeting itself, with all its details, added right into their schedule. In addition, you can make changes and additions to it (e.g., dial-in number, agenda), and everyone will always see the current information.
Meeting Collaboration SuiteOnce you have your meeting scheduled, you need to decide which collaboration application you are going to use. Some good choices are Vyew (below) and WebEx. Our team likes to use video (more on that later), so we usually use an application with the following features (some applications have even more features than those listed below, but these are the ones we use all the time):
* upload of documents
* list of attendees (who is currently in the room/ meeting)
* in-room chat, separate from our usual IM-based chat
* video (webcam displays from all participants)
* shared whiteboard
* ability to add comments, highlights, etc., to uploaded documents
* asynchronous support, to allow comments prior to the meeting, as well as for the session to "live on" from meeting to meeting
However, because audio support in web-based applications can be spotty, our team still tends to open a bridge line to handle the audio. I expect that audio capabilities will continue to improve, so we will keep trying to use the integrated audio features. It does seem that, as you add more people (more than three), the audio can degrade too much.
We use this application even if we are all in the same room, and of course it is perfect for a distributed team.
Video Only
If for some reason, we don't need the document collaboration features, we may decide to meet with just audio and video.
If it's a small group (four or fewer), and they all have Macs, we can meet using iChat and our IM server (below) , and we will use the built-in audio. We also get some nice additional features like desktop and document sharing:
If it's for a bigger group, we'll use something like MegaMeeting (below) or MeBeam, but we still usually need to open a bridge line to handle the audio:
High-Definition Video
We have high-definition video systems available for some of our locations. If you are going to hold a meeting where the remote people have access to an HD video system, use that! The quality of both video and audio are just excellent, and people both in the room, and out of it, are full participants in the meeting. This probably has a maximum of 4–5 locations, as otherwise the images just get really small.
In addition to the video connection methods listed above, you can still use a collaborative suite to handle your document collaboration. Also, we are currently experimenting with using a meeting room in a virtual world (Second Life),with either the built-in audio support, or a bridge line. Although not as rich as high-definition video, it can support an almost unlimited number of locations, as each virtual person in the "room" can be connecting in from a separate location. More on this as we work with it more, but here is a screenshot of a meeting we held recently in our virtual meeting room:
Preparation
When you are planning a meeting, think about some good ways to use collaborative technologies, and make sure you have enabled all of your attendees to fully participate in your meeting. After all, isn't that why you invited them?
Monday, October 19, 2009
MPK16 in the Virtual World: More Enhancements!
In a previous blog (see MPK16 in the Virtual World: Enhancements!), I discussed the various configurations of the MPK16 Break Area. In this entry, I'll demonstrate one of the other areas in the workspace that has multiple configurations. First, though, just a reminder that tomorrow, as well as for the next several Tuesdays, we'll be conducting Guided Tours of our virtual workspace. If you’d like to join us, meet at the Sun Employee Island (slurl:http://slurl.com/secondlife/Sun%20Microsystems%206/117/110/26) Tuesday morning at 10am SLT (PT). (Note: your Second Life avatar must be registered as a Sun Employee; register or get an avatar here.)
Multi-Purpose Room Configurations
There are two conference rooms in the MPK16 Pilot Space: a small room used for video collaboration, and a large multi-purpose room. The multi-purpose room contains a large LifeSize video panel, a big projected digital whiteboard (networked collaborative white board), projectors, and whiteboards on all remaining wall space. You can read more about these features on this Open Work Services Group wiki page (Sun employees only, log-in required).
1-Standard Conference Table
2-Classroom-Style, with a table for the presenter
(see video below; also at https://slx.sun.com/1179275755)
If you'd like to read any of my previous blog entries on the Second Life version of MPK16, you can see all entries here (reverse chronological). We have more reconfigurable spaces, and I'll show those in the next entry.
Sunday, October 18, 2009
Remembering the 1989 Earthquake
okay, everyone sharing their memories of the Loma Prieta quake, here's mine: I was on the 20th floor of my office building, downtown San Francisco, listening to the World Series on the radio. When it started, I looked out my window, and saw the windows of the Schwab building "rippling." I suddenly realized that the windows I was looking out from, must be doing the same thing! I shoved my chair as fast away from the window as I could. The power went out soon after, so those of us on that floor of the building gathered to go down the stairs together. As soon as we opened the door to the stairwell, smoke poured out! We slammed the door back shut. But it wasn't smoke, it was dust from the plaster walls inside the stairwell. When we realized that, we covered our noses and went down the twenty floors.
When we came out onto Fremont Street, the first thing I noticed was the smell: it smelled like alcohol! The bar across the street had lost most of their bottles off the wall, but, because they had no refrigeration, they were giving away free beer! (as in, "free beer"). The second thing I noticed was the sound... it was a loud, crunching sound, coming from everywhere. I realized it was the sound of people walking, on all of the broken glass and fallen brick. Fortunately, most people who work in downtown San Francisco have comfortable, sturdy, shoes to wear when commuting.
A few of us headed up to Market Street, although we could already tell that no buses or undergrounds were running. Someone pointed out the Ferry Building: the flagpole was askew, and the clock was stopped at 5:04. It would stay like that for awhile, as I recall. As we separated to try to find our various ways home before dark, we started hearing a rumor that the Bay Bridge had collapsed. We were right at the western entrance; we turned to look, and as far as we could see, the suspension side looked completely intact (it was, the collapsed section was on the cantilever side).
I hope my friends from then can just look back on it all now as just a memory, and life is good again. It was a scary time for all, and just catastrophic for some, but I hope all are doing well today. I'm thinking of you now (Carole).
Saturday, October 17, 2009
Disney Museum at the Presidio
Friday, October 16, 2009
NASCAR Cancels Remainder Of Season Following David Foster Wallace's Death
via theonion.com
Okay, I know this article (and news) is old, but I just finished the book! (Infinite Jest, as part of the Infinite Summer project.) This article just seemed to sum it all up. It was great, I wonder when I'll be able to read it again... [ IJ/ 1079/ 388 ]
Thursday, October 15, 2009
Essay - The Collider, the Particle and a Theory About Fate
via nytimes.com
"the hypothesized Higgs boson, which physicists hope to produce with the collider, might be so abhorrent to nature that its creation would ripple backward through time and stop the collider before it could make one, like a time traveler who goes back in time to kill his grandfather"
Scott McNealy names Sun's top 10 tech innovations
“Top 10 Innovations from Sun.” Here is the list, copied verbatim from Scott McNealy’s slides:
- NFS/PC-NFS Technology
- SPARC (first 7-10 MIPS workstation under $10K)
- Open Source Software
- BSD + UNIX System 5 = Solaris
- Java (Java card, Java SE/ME/EE and Java FX)
- E10K (64-way Solaris)
- ZFS/Open Storage/Flash (Exadata)
- Project Blackbox, world’s first modular datacenter
- SunRay
- Chip Multi-threading “CoolThreads”
via blogs.zdnet.com
McNealy said, “I think Larry’s going to like his new toy”
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
MPK16 Launches in Second Life!
We had an excellent turnout in our first official tour of our virtual MPK16 in Second Life earlier today. About forty people (really, avatars I guess) came to look around, hear our descriptions of the replication of MPK16 in the physical world, and try out some of the functionality for themselves. Our friends from the Digital Libraries & Research team even decorated for us!
I didn't know Greylin was such a chef, but she whipped up some dim sum, and a fabulous fruit and cheese platter for our guests. I also saw many folks sampling the punch!
As always, people hung out by the food table, as they waited for the next tour to start. We used Second Life's Voice Chat system, which worked very well, as well as Text Chat. There were a lot of good questions, too, especially from folks wondering how they can get the high-definition video at their location for their distributed team.
I also saw several people trying out the desks with the multiple displays, the height adjustments, and the different media walls with their video playbacks. Watching the rooms reconfigure themselves at a push of a button seemed very popular, too!
We will be offering tours for Sun Employees over the next several Tuesdays, at 10am SLT (Pacific Time). If you'd like to join us, just meet us at the Sun Employee Island (slurl:http://slurl.com/secondlife/Sun%20Microsystems%206/117/110/26). If you'd like to try a self-guided tour, come by anytime, and use the Notecards to learn about all of the features in our space (the Notecards are explained in this entry). (Note: Sun employees only - your Second Life avatar must be registered as a Sun Employee; register or get an avatar here.)
Thanks to everyone who stopped by for our official opening and tour, and especially thanks to all of the people who helped us get everything ready, helped out at the tours, and got us looking so festive for the day!
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