This document discusses the benefits of observable or transparent work practices in software development. It notes that many software people already work observably by default due to creating technologies that support practices like blogging, documentation of work processes, and iterative development with feedback. However, it also acknowledges that not all software people choose to work observably, and explores some of the reasons why including lack of time and preference for privacy over performance. It argues that working observably can amplify one's efforts and help share knowledge more broadly through network effects.

1. Being Observable culture, environment, habit Jon Udell TUG2010 October 2010 http://jonudell.net http://delicious.com/judell/tug2010

2. “The women could bring their crafts out into the communal yard, to chat and help one another as they worked and watched the children play.” “The children, in turn, could play at helping, pretending to do what the big folks do, as children will. ” “Such play can function as a sort of vocational kindergarten, teaching the children the basic steps in processes that they will have to master in earnest later. ”

4. what does daddy do for work? He drives to the office in the morning and comes home at night. 1960 2010 (imagined) You can see for yourself! It’s all online! But basically he writes articles and software, and … He sits in his office at home and talks on the phone and types on the computer 2010 (actual)

7. jimmcgee: knowledge work as craft work (corollary) john leeke: craft work as knowledge work JL: My father documented his work in the arts and trades. He was a commercial artist through the 20s, then shifted into furniture and buildings at the craftsman/artisan level. JU: And he left behind detailed logs of his practice? JL: Yeah, detailed files of every project he ever worked on. So I learned that as part of my carpentry and woodworking, growing up in his shop, and continued it when I left his shop and came east to work on old buildings.

8. themes of john’s work (and mine) narration of work tacit knowledge text, audio, and video network effects

9. narration of work We've been using this tool since November, internally at UserLand. We shipped Radio 8 with it. When we switched over our workgroup productivity soared. All of a sudden people could narrate their work. Watch Jake as he reports his progress on the next project he does. We've gotten very formal about how we use it. I can't imagine an engineering project without this tool. - Dave Winer, 2002

10. tacit knowledge

11. tacit knowledge

12. what is it like to be a ________________? teacher farmer programmer scientist doctor social worker

13. joegregorio Practice Theory

14. jon galloway Troubleshooting an Intermittent .NET High CPU problem “Hopefully it’s helpful to you, but I know that there are folks out there with some real skill at diagnosing application performance issues, and there are better debugging tools available, too. How would you go about diagnosing something like this?”

15. chrisgemignani Task: Recreate a New York Times infographic using Excel New York Times version Excel version

16. looking over chris’sshoulder (mistakes included!)

17. why do many software people work observably? we created, and are comfortable with, the technologies of observable work: web publishing blogging microblogging podcasting digital video tagging syndication our work processes, and products, are fully digital: design discussion source code documentation tests executable code we practice, and value: feedback iterative refinement testable outcomes

18. but not all software people work observably (scotthanselman’s message re: “Count your keystrokes!”) If I type for 6 hours a day, 5 days a week, 50 weeks a year, for the next 44 years, that means there are 198M keystrokes left in my hands. That's a ceiling of 168M more words I can type in my lifetime. OK. So now, next time someone emails you ask yourself "is emailing this person back the best use of my remaining keystrokes?" Instead, consider writing a blog post or adding to a wiki with your keystrokes, then emailing the link to the original emailer. (message not received) UPDATE: This is about reach and effectiveness vs. efficiency. If you email someone one on one, you're reaching that one person. If you blog about it (or update a wiki, or whatever) you get the message out on the web itself and your keystrokes travel farther and reach more people. Assuming you want your message to reach as many people as possible, blog it. You only have so many hours in the day.

19. why don’t most people work observably? Text “I’m too busy to blog” “I don’t publish half-baked ideas” “I don’t get paid to do it” Subtext “I am not a performer”

20. an exception to the rule: lucasgonze

21. an exception to the rule: danmeyer

22. an exception to the rule: sal khan

23. not avoidable! friends coworkers not observable!

24. an imaginary business awareness network (from Shane Pearson, VP of Marketing and Product Management for BEA, via Phil Windley)

25. an open and syndication-enabled shared data space

26. messages to people, data for systems feed message data <item> <title>Hawaii Reggae Guild</title> <pubDate>Sun, 03 Oct 2010 22:52:21 +0000</pubDate> <guidisPermaLink="false">http://www.delicious.com/url/d107b1cb6d87eb32858daa7fa25b68a9#alohavibe</guid> <link>http://www.google.com/calendar/ical/usb3tucgslji5pdrfgf1luij94%40group.calendar.google.com/public/basic.ics</link> <source url="http://feeds.delicious.com/v2/rss/alohavibe">alohavibe's bookmarks</source> <category domain="http://www.delicious.com/alohavibe/">trusted</category> <category domain="http://www.delicious.com/alohavibe/">ics</category> <category domain="http://www.delicious.com/alohavibe/">feed</category> <category domain="http://www.delicious.com/alohavibe/">category=music,reggae</category> <category domain="http://www.delicious.com/alohavibe/">url=http://hawaiireggaeguild.com</category> </item> feedurl: http://www.google.com/.../ical.basic.ics category: music,reggae url: http://hawaiireggaeguild.com John LeBlanc added a feed feed to the Honolulu hub

27. another open and syndication-enabled shared data space

28. ad-hoc webhooks … items omitted …

29. mashing up messages message from a person messages from a computer

30. actual webhooks