Process & Procedures

'A process is a systematic series of actions directed towards the achievement of a goal'(Joseph Juran). Processes are one of the 'Three P's' of quality in business, People, Products and Processes, where products are what is done, and processes are about how it is done. Thus people use processes to produce products. The word 'products' here includes the end goal of all actions, which is often an intangible service rather than a more tangible product. Thus statements about quality often talk about 'products or services' rather than plain 'products'. A way of contrasting quality in product and process activities is by viewing production of quality products as doing the right thing and quality processes are about doing the thing right, as in the diagram below.

Reference:

Consumerism and Product Quality", Quality Progress (New York, New York: American Society for Quality Control), July, 1970

Thinking Software Quality

Some Definitions:

1. "Software Quality is the fitness for use of the software product" [1]
2. Kitchenham states quality is "Hard to define, impossible to measure, easy to recognize" [2].
3. Gilles states, "Quality is generally transparent when present, but easily recognized in its absence" [3].

While quality in theory can be defined, in practice and use, an absolute definition is elusive. This is part of the knowledge that needs to be captured - how to apply these abstract SQA concepts to real projects. Here are some lessons:

1. Project Managers and Software Developers need to understand what "Software Quality Assurance" is and how their project can benefit by its application. 
2. Software Quality Assurance implementation is a balancing activity that must be tailored as project appropriate. 
3. Software Quality Assurance must evaluate the process as well as the products. 
4. There must be a Software Assurance Plan.
5. Software Quality Assurance must span the entire Software Development Life Cycle.
6. Requirements, the birthplace of successful projects.
7. Software Quality Assurance does NOT Equal Testing.
8. Metrics are a necessity.
9. Safety and Reliability are critical aspects of SQA.
10. Independent Verification and Validation (IV&V) is an important tool within SQA.
11. Hardware Does NOT Equal Software!
12. Risk Management is NOT Optional.

References
[1] Schulmeyer, G. Gordon and McManus, James I., Handbook of Software Quality Assurance, 3rd Edition, Prentice Hall PRT, 1998
[2] Kitchenham, Barbara, Pfleeger, Shari Lawrence, "Software Quality: The Elusive Target", IEEE Software, Vol 13, No 1 (January 1996) 12-21
[3] Gillies, Alan C., Software Quality, Theory and Management, International Thomson Computer Press, 1997

Excel 2010

The new features in Excel 2010—sparklines, slicers, PowerPivot— are really cool. There are some great posts out there. Follow the hyperlinks and enjoy those new features

10 things that successful teachers do intuitively

Schools can do plenty to keep students engaged in learning. Students who are deeply engaged in learning are not simply spending 'time on task', but are intellectually involved with curriculum topics and mentally involved in 'minds-on learning.' Making that happen, not surprisingly, starts with the teacher. Here are the 10 things that successful teachers do intuitively -

1. keep students highly engaged throughout an entire lesson and 
2. encourage students to contribute their ideas and insights as a way of enhancing their own and other students' learning
3. represent curriculum content appropriately; 
4. expect students to help define topics and determine how they can be studied; 
5. link content to students' prior knowledge and experiences; 
6. ensure that students are mentally engaged in all activities and assignments; 
7. allow students to initiate and adapt learning activities and projects; 
8. form instructional groups that work to achieve learning goals; 
9. choose suitable instructional materials for lessons and encourages students to select resources that will help them learn; 
10. teach highly coherent, well-planned, well-paced lessons that include time for student reflection.

The Convergence of 'Math' & 'Art'

The hardest thing to do is to try and teach something that everyone already knows. Everyone knows how to listen, how to read, how to think, and how to tell anecdotes about the events in their lives. Young people do these things almost everyday. Yet the challenge is that the level of any of these skills, possessed by the average individual, may not be adequate for certain special situations. Examples: Psychotherapists must be expert listeners and lawyers expert readers; research scientists must scour their thinking for errors and journalists report stories that transcend normal story-telling.

There is another dimension to the complexity of learning: our world is increasingly being  indexed, and measured, and this massive quantity of information and data has a story to tell. But it is a foreign language to the human brain, columns and rows of data. Math courses taught us to manage numbers that come in the dozens. But when they are counted in exabytes, then our young people need new ways to interpret the data, new ways to help them tell their story. The answer: Computationl thinking - the new convergence of 'math' & 'art'