Development in the digital media industry

1. Advanced Software Development 2006 Development in the digital media industry Development in the digital media industry Hannah Smith hannah.smith@teamrubber.com

2. Advanced Software Development 2006 Development in the digital media industry Hello! This is what I�m going to talk about What is Web 2.0 How projects work Agile development Tips on getting employed

3. Advanced Software Development 2006 Development in the digital media industry Firstly, what is digital media? Digital media - a means of communicating using electronic methods for storage and display Multimedia - media that uses multiple forms of information content to inform or entertain the user Companies in Bristol - E3, Aardman, Enable, 3sixty, Netsight, Team Rubber etc

4. Advanced Software Development 2006 Development in the digital media industry What is Web 2.0 The 2nd generation of internet based services. Not just on PCs but a dissemination of info from anywhere to anywhere Includes Social networking - myspace.com, facebook.com Wikis - wikipedia.org Communication tools - skype.com Folksonomy (posh word for tagging) - flickr.com

5. Advanced Software Development 2006 Development in the digital media industry How Web 2.0 came about Web 1.0 - the earliest pages were static and not updated too often without a lot of legwork Web 1.5 - A more dynamic web with CMSs serving up dynamic HTML

6. Advanced Software Development 2006 Development in the digital media industry Characteristics of Web 2.0 Users owning data and exercising control over it Architecture of participation and democracy Rich, user-friendly interface using ajax? Some social networking applications Typically you�ll find: rich content, CSS + XHTML, RSS, clean URLs, folksonomies, blogs, mashups

7. Advanced Software Development 2006 Development in the digital media industry Technologies helping to deliver Web 2.0 Ajax, Asynchronous Javascript and XML. Updating without reloading - bonus! Used by google for google maps Flash multimedia authoring program. Great for games and really flash applications. Language is Actionscript.

8. Advanced Software Development 2006 Development in the digital media industry �more technologies Zope Open source, OO, web application server, has encapsulation and acquisition. Written in Python, which Google and NASA use. Plone Open source CMS built on top of Zope. Great for intranets and workflow. The RBS and Bristol Uni use it.

9. Advanced Software Development 2006 Development in the digital media industry How projects work

10. Advanced Software Development 2006 Development in the digital media industry Team structure This shows the downwards flow of responsibility But it could almost be drawn the other way up - the decisions of developers impact on the future of your business

11. Advanced Software Development 2006 Development in the digital media industry Project lifecycle Get a contract Client meeting and agreement in project scope Dev chunk Testing + review with client More testing and launch Support and maintenance

12. Advanced Software Development 2006 Development in the digital media industry Project managers/software development - why you need to get it A project manager�s job is to manage a project successfully by sharing info and organising stuff They usually end up being a developer�s boss by default as they control features, budgets and quality which all impacts on what a developer has to do If you understand how a project manager is running a project your working life can be much more rewarding and fun!

13. Advanced Software Development 2006 Development in the digital media industry Agile development Agile means �quick and well-coordinated in movement� or �marked by an ability to think quickly� dictionary.com Agile development is defined as �methods which attempt to minimize risk by developing software in short timeboxes, called iterations which typically last 1-4 weeks� wikipedia.com

14. Advanced Software Development 2006 Development in the digital media industry How agile development got born It came around in the mid-90s It was a reaction against heavyweight models such as the waterfall model The development community wanted something light that did away with being slow + bureaucratic and allowed developers to work in the best way they can

15. Advanced Software Development 2006 Development in the digital media industry A whizz tour around the waterfall model It�s sequential, running through analysis, design, implementation, testing and integration, and maintenance one after another Plans are great and this method seriously relies on plans and documents BUT you can�t get it all right straightaway

16. Advanced Software Development 2006 Development in the digital media industry What is agile development then? It�s a series of principles all of which you can take or leave: Customer satisfaction by rapid continuous delivery of useful software (weeks not months) Working software is the measure of progress Late changes are ok, even welcomed Close cooperation between business people and developers Face-to-face communication above any other form

17. Advanced Software Development 2006 Development in the digital media industry � a few more Projects are built around motivated trustworthy individuals Continuous attention to technical excellence and good design Simplicity Self-organising teams Regular adaption to changing circumstances Building prototypes to throw away

18. Advanced Software Development 2006 Development in the digital media industry Comparing agile to waterfalls I�ve always been told it�s better to be proactive (waterfall) than reactive (agile) Whether you like it or not circumstances change Big milestones vs short timeboxes Full system integration or smaller feature integration? So is agile development an excuse to be lazy? ;o) Don�t be fooled by the lack of things written down

19. Advanced Software Development 2006 Development in the digital media industry When being agile is appropriate Take the principles that are suited to your circumstances Make sure your office culture can support the radicalism (small teams, verbal communication and multi-direction feedback) It is more suited to product development than client work

20. Advanced Software Development 2006 Development in the digital media industry Why digital media and web development Digital media is always in need of great software developers - great opportunities Relax - you�re doing computer science which puts you a huge step ahead of the rest It�s fun and social Work environments tend to be more agile - better for the developer

21. Advanced Software Development 2006 Development in the digital media industry Skills that are looked for Technical knowledge Ability to communicate (especially under pressure) Good writing skills Ambitious, always looking ahead Cares about the quality �.. it goes on and on and on and on

22. Advanced Software Development 2006 Development in the digital media industry Improve your chances Write a clear CV and covering letter Commercial experience or why your academic work is relevant Portfolio or links to relevant work Who you know - try and get a meeting to say hi Widen those skills - keep learning Write open source code and contribute Don�t lie ever! It�s more about embellishment or sales tactics

23. Advanced Software Development 2006 Development in the digital media industry Useful/interesting links www.bristolmedia.co.uk - find out what�s going on and get involved in Bristol! www.under-score.co.uk - Bristol media mailing list, post your problem or discuss issues www.wikipedia - great example of Web 2.0ness and brilliantly useful resource http://mikeomatic.com - interesting blog on project management and development techniques www.tomhume.org - discussion on all sorts of stuff, software dev and digital media categories best www.37signals.com - creators of Ruby on Rails and advocates of agile development

24. Advanced Software Development 2006 Development in the digital media industry Thanks Would anyone like to ask any questions?