Bryc Barrand - The art of project management in large-scale Flex projects

The Art of Project Management
Bryce Barrand

THE ART OF PROJECT MANAGEMENT
What are we in for?

- Who I am
- Step through project process
- Talk through tips and tools for each project phase
- Avoid pitfalls

CONTACT/S: Bryce Barrand TEL: 801 802 6464 eMAIL: bryceb@mediarain.com

CREDENTIALS
me Should I listen to this guy?

What has Bryce done?
- Logomaker versions 1&2
- rainSVG
- Ancestry Press
- Zenprint
- Top secret project “Dr. Zaius”


LOGOMAKER BY HP
Get your own logo for $49. It’s canned, and it’s
cool

- Over 1.5 million in sales
- Over 1 million accounts
- 5 year relationship
- They are still working with us
- 2 versions of the application
- Maybe 1500 hours?


Ancestrypress
Family trees turned into books made of real trees

- Probably the largest app made with
Flex 2


Zenprint and Dr. Zaius
(This guy should get on with it...)

- Other big big big awesome
apps done with Flex


RAINSVG
Making the most out of an old technology

- Big sweet library goes from design to web to print
- Used for HP, Dr Zaius, Aspire, Women’s Professional Soccer League,
Realustrator, Zenprint,
- 1000+ hours
- Rain charges 200,000 depending on amount of library used


SCARE AWAY TIME
Politely excuse yourself if not interested

- We are to the meat of the session
- Step through the different phases of a project
- Following tips are for enterprise scale projects


OUR INTERACTIVE APPROACH
I love the buzzwords!

Discovery Phase
Design/Prototype
Research/Usability Testing
Product Requirements Doc (PRD)
Development
Deployment
Voilá! Happiness.


APPROACH: DISCOVERY
Otherwise known as dating, and a channel on cable
with shows like Mythbusters and Time Warp.

Discovery phase deﬁned: From when
the client walks in till you get a check in
your sweaty hand
Who gets involved: Account manager,
Salesman, Technical PM, a contact if
applicable


APPROACH: DISCOVERY
Testing the waters
1st meeting:
- We talk about their idea/project
- Tell them how good an idea it is, or that we aren’t
interested
- *Give them a “scare away” price and timeline
- Look for red ﬂags
- Ask for a feature list, or tell them you are going to
write it

After 1st meeting:
- Finish feature list
- Do some research if necessary
- Don’t count your chickens, and don’t put in too
much time


APPROACH: DISCOVERY PT 2
Getting ready to dive into the project

2nd/3rd meeting:
- Come back with a decent estimate based on feature list
- Spend maybe an afternoon
- Ask 2 developers to estimate it
- Ask 2 managers to estimate it as well
- Sell them on the prototype phase
- Take 25% down to start the prototype phase
- Trade for ownership?
- Not great for service agencies
- Don’t meet or do anymore research till you get money


APPROACH: PROTOTYPE PHASE
But I like waterfalls...
Prototyping is the anti-waterfall:
- Typical agency and contract work is based off a price
given when you and they know the least about the
project
- Gimme iterations baby!
- High level of trust and communication with client

Prototype Phase Deliverables:
- Wireframes
- Click-through Prototype
- Designs
- PRD/TRD
- WBS


APPROACH: PROTOTYPE PHASE: GUIDELINES
The distant future. The year 2000.

Prototyping Phase Guidelines
- Avoid emotional attachment
- Iterate weekly
- Involve the business people (client), technical
leads, UX, and designers
- This will help avoiding unproﬁtable, unstable,
unusable, or ugly apps
- The whole phase should take about 25% of the
total time
- If you go over, then just charge hourly


APPROACH: PROTOTYPE PHASE: WIREFRAMES

Wireframes
- Start with Wireframes or Flash Catalyst
- Do at least 2 different approaches to
elements
- Involve the business (client), technical leads,
UX, and designers
- Get basic understanding of layout and
functionality


APPROACH: PROTOTYPE PHASE: CLICK-THROUGH

Interactive prototype
- Smoke and mirrors
- No db connection
- DON’T DO DESIGNS OR SKIN ANYTHING
- Change it like crazy
- Try crazy things
- This is the cheapest time to make changes


APPROACH: PROTOTYPE PHASE: DESIGNS
Umm. He is a “designer-type”

Design guidelines
-Designs should be near the ﬁnal of the prototype phase
-Designer should understand what was tried and what worked


APPROACH: PROTOTYPE PHASE USABILITY
I don’t need usability, all my assumptions are
correct the ﬁrst time

- Get a ﬁrm
- Or pay somebody
- Do it for realz
- Iterate here if possible


APPROACH: PROTOTYPE PHASE: WBS
WBS: Weevil Balloon Submarines er... Work
Breakdown Structure

WBS
- Breaking down the project into bite size
pieces
- Now the hours have got to be very accurate
- Word vs Omnigraffle vs Omniplan vs MS
Project

Wombats Bite Sometimes, Wimpy Bryce Surprise, Wallabies BonBons Slapping, Workin’ that Bitty Skirt!, Warts are Bad-a Seriously.


WBS: Weevil Balloon Submarines er... Work
Breakdown Structure

WBS
- Breaking down the project into bite size
pieces
- Now the hours have got to be very accurate
- Word vs Omnigraffle vs Omniplan vs MS
Project

Wombats Bite Sometimes, Wimpy Bryce Surprise, Wallabies BonBons Slapping, Workin’ that Skirt Baby!, Warts are Bad-a Seriously.


Estimating hours tips:

- Estimating hours tips PERT
- PERT formula (Optimistic Estimate + (4 times Most Likely Estimate) +
Pessimistic Estimate)
- Program Evaluation and Review Technique
divided by 6
(PERT)
- Have 2 or more developers estimate the same
piece of work
- Holding the developers accountable (more to
come on this)


APPROACH: PROTOTYPE PHASE: PRD
Potty-mouth Rocker Droids... er. Product
Requirement Document
The Help Window will be a non-modal, in-application popup window.

PRD defined: o The window may be resized or dragged within the application window, so that
the user may continue using the application while following instructions provided in
- Document describing specific features of the product the Help Window.
o The window will consists of at least two panes:
- Simple, to the point
+ A table of contents in tree form displayed on the left-hand side of the

- Doesn’t necessarily define how, but what. (doesn’t dive window.
+ The help content on the right side.
into interface but what a user can do) o The help contents will be loaded from the database
o Help content will be searchable.
- Contains a definition of terms o When the help window is displayed, it will default to help content relevant to
the current application state.
- Outlines responsibility
o Help content to be created includes

- Should be written in tandem with the client + How to create a new Project
+ Editing photos
- Meant to be a companion to the prototype to explain/ + Editing text areas
+ Changing Themes
examine/show what couldn’t be done in prototype + Using different Colors
+ Organizing photos
o If additional topics are to be added after the application launches, writing
additional instructions will be an hourly cost if the project is paid for as a bid.


APPROACH: PROTOTYPE PHASE: FINALIZING
What else do you put in the ﬁnal estimate?:

- Estimating timeline
- Plan on an individual getting in 6 hours a day
- Adding PM and testing
- At least 25%
- “Top down” and “bottom up” pricing
- Putting it all together
- What to pad?
- New technology or ﬁrst time doing something


APPROACH: DEVELOPMENT
Oh yeah, now you are talking my language

Tips:
Tools:


APPROACH: DEVELOPMENT: TIPS
Do I really need to leave 20%?

Tips:
- Never launch on a Friday
- Put your best foot forward
- Junior devs in showoff meetings is a bad
idea
- Balance junior and senior devs
- Focus on your strengths
- Hire the experts not the generalists
- Be developercentric
- Code Reviews


APPROACH: DEVELOPMENT: TOOLS
Like a swiss-army knife, but without the stupid
things that nobody uses like a cork opener

Subclipse
Unfuddle
Charles
AdobeConnectNow


APPROACH: DEVELOPMENT: TOOLS: UNFUDDLE
oooh, I live in unfuddle


APPROACH: DEVELOPMENT: TOOLS: CHARLES
He is in charge


APPROACH: DEVELOPMENT: TOOLS:
CONNECTNOW
Four in a row and you win


APPROACH: DEVELOPMENT: ITERATIVE TESTING
Good QA is your friend

- When should you go into a testing cycle?
a. About 75% the way done with development
b. Early and often
c. After feature complete on the code base
d. Testing?
- Who should do the testing?
- The developers?
- Internal team? External team?
-


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