Craig Golby MCMI, MIAP is a Project Manager and Business Analyst with retained technical skills in Java and Database technologies working primarily in the Financial Services sector. He is currently looking for contract work. Contact Craig at craig.golby@dignitas.ltd.uk for further information and a detailed CV.

Visual Systems Journal

Notice Board

Green IT 09 is at the Business Design Centre, Islington, London from 6 to 7 May. Visit www.greenituk.com for more information.

SCL Information Governance Conference [...] http://www.iap.org.uk/main/vsj-may-2009/]]>

Visual Systems Journal

Notice Board

Green IT 09 is at the Business Design Centre, Islington, London from 6 to 7 May. Visit www.greenituk.com for more information.

SCL Information Governance Conference – Managing identity in a digital world is on 12 May at Mayfair Conference Centre, Marble Arch, London. See www.scl.org for further details.

Wireless and Mobile 09 is at Olympia Two, London on 20 and 21 May. There’s more at www.thewirelessevent.com.

[Got an activity or event coming up? Email eo@iap.org.uk with the details.]

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Sounding Board

Robin Jones worries about our inability to foretell the future or, in the more extreme cases, the present.

It’s exactly 50 years since Arthur Koestler published ‘The Sleepwalkers’. For anyone unfamiliar with the book (and, if you are, I’d heartily recommend a quick trip to Amazon) it’s a fascinating history of Western science, especially astronomy, from a uniquely Koestlerian angle. His take, conveyed by the title, is that not only are important scientific discoveries frequently stumbled upon rather than logically arrived at but that the discoverer is often unaware that he has, so to speak, stubbed his toe at all.

Lately, I’ve been wondering if technologists are equally prone to metaphorical somnambulism. Take text messaging, for example. The SMS system, more or less as we know it today, was defined within the GSM specification in the early 80s. It was designed to use spare bandwidth within existing signalling formats and so was essentially cost-free from the suppliers’ point of view. Given that early cell phone adopters were almost exclusively business users and that their previous mobile communication device was probably the pager, it’s not too surprising that SMS was seen as a business add-on and a relatively unimportant one, given that you could now actually speak to people while on the move. This worked so well that by the mid-90s the average user was sending one text every two months. Then teenagers discovered texting and now we send over 200 million every day in the UK alone. So, Teenagers 1, Technologists 0.

The trigger for this train of thought was the way in which the netbook market appears to be going. It’s not two years since the Asus Eee PC701 was launched. Its target market was clearly defined by the term ‘netbook’.Using a Celeron M processor, it was fine for a bit of emailing and Web surfing and that was about it. Then Intel introduced the Atom and suddenly everyone and his dog has a netbook offer. Acer, Dell, Elonex, HP, Lenovo, MSI, they’re all represented. And the specifications have become suspiciously elastic. Screens are becoming bigger and so are keyboards, making them usable for more than the occasional hunt-and-peck. Early models all used Linux to minimise the operating system overhead. Now, plenty are running Windows XP and Microsoft are talking up Windows 7′s netbook credentials. So aren’t we now just looking at the bottom end (in size terms at least) of the ultra-portable market? Or is there some specific use for which netbooks are ideally suited that’ll take the world by storm? I don’t know. I’m waiting for a teenager to tell me.

[Something you’d like to get off your chest? Email me (Robin Jones) at eo@iap.org.uk.]

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Members’ News:

Dr Peter M Ashby, MB, BS, DRCOG, FIAP (Cmpn) is standing for re-election to the IAP Council this year. Here, he re-introduces himself to us.

I qualified in Medicine at St Bartholomew’s Hospital, in London in 1960 and from 1980 worked on the writing and developing of medical databases for use in primary care and promoted the use of computer systems for General Practice. During this time I developed one of the earliest software programs for the linking of a Pathology service to General Practice.

I retired from full time NHS practice in 2005 after 45 years and continued in medical education until my full retirement from medicine in 2008. Since then I have worked on investigating system anomalies and in forensic work concentrating on the identification of fraud and the maintenance of accurate data. The need to maintain the security of medical databases and the personal information held on these has provoked a fresh approach into user interfaces and the control of access. It is in this area I have been developing new systems which are less vulnerable. I became a fellow of the IAP in 1987, joining the Council in 2007.

[Don’t forget to email eo@iap.org.uk with items of news about you or your company.]

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Work in Progress

Mike Ryan, the IAP’s Director General, has some very pertinent tips, given the current economic climate, for those considering starting their own businesses.

Being an employee is in many ways a sheltered existence. Coming out from under the umbrella and setting up in business on your own account means you have to start doing things for yourself that probably you have never had to consider before. From my own experience, and from speaking to many IAP members, I have concluded that the following points are the key to succeeding – or maybe even surviving – in business.

                1.             Getting work when you need it

                2.             Getting paid on time

                3.             Avoiding tax and cash flow problems

Finding work: You have professional skills, and there are thousands of potential clients out there with problems that you might be able to solve for them. But how are they to know? You have to market your skills, and though this doesn’t come easily to many IT professionals who are happier dealing with PCs than with people, it has to be done. You can’t get off first base in business until you’ve found a customer and got some work.

There are agents whose business it is to find work for professionals like you. Some of them are very good. It is worth paying the agent’s commission if he can keep you working and avoid downtime. But ultimately it is far better to cultivate your own circle of clients. Chat up friends who work in big companies. If you get too much work you can always subcontract it. Never turn work away if you can avoid it – particularly if it comes from an existing client. That client, who might otherwise have stuck with you forever, may not come back. I cannot overemphasize the importance of marketing.

Getting paid: The reason for going into business is to make money. You have to get this bit right. The cornerstone of successful business is to have a clear contract with your client. A contract is an agreement between two parties, one to provide services and the other to pay for them. Verbal contracts are legal – but it is safer to commit the key points to paper or at least email. Contracts need not contain pages of legal jargon; an exchange of letters will usually do.

Contractors or consultants are normally employed to work on projects: parcels of work that finish when a certain target has been achieved. You may be asked to quote a price for the entire job, or the client may propose to pay you by the day until it is complete. The Lump Sum option is tempting – you feel that once you have signed the contract there’s nothing to prevent that large amount of money from hitting your bank account. But in my experience it is often difficult to agree when milestones for payment have been reached, or when the project can be considered complete, particularly with new IT systems where commissioning may be followed by a tail of bugs and problems. Often at this point the client realizes that the instructions he gave you at the outset were inadequate and he has not got what he was expecting. He wants you to change work you feel you have completed.

These problems can all be avoided if you work on a daily rate. The rate you charge will need to vary according to circumstances. For example a year’s contract in a comfortable office around the corner from your home would be very convenient, so it would be sensible to quote a keen rate to secure the job. Short-term work or jobs in very inconvenient places are much less attractive because you tend to get a lot of downtime when you are not earning. Rates have to allow for this, consequently they can substantially exceed £1,000 a day.

Clients are only interested in getting the job done. If you can convince them you understand what’s needed and can fix it, they will try to pay the rate you are asking. But sometimes clients are genuinely unable to pay that much. It is very important the discussion doesn’t end at that point – you want to keep the door open for negotiation. When the client asks how much you charge, instead of saying “£500 per day” you say “Well, taking into account everything we’ve discussed , in normal circumstances I would expect to charge around £500″. This gives the client the opportunity to say “Is there any give in that figure?”, then you say “Possibly – how much do you think you could pay?”

Your contract should also cover points such as where you will be working, working hours, who you will get your instructions from, any other entitlements such as holiday and sick pay. But most important is when and how you get paid. You may, for example, plan to invoice the client at the end of every month, for payment within 30 days. Find out who you should give the invoice to, who will authorize payment, and how the payment procedure works. Then if you don’t get paid on time you know how to follow it up. Don’t be afraid to discuss the arrangements for getting paid before you start the job. That way you avoid misunderstandings and nip problems in the bud.

Avoiding tax and cash flow problems: Suppose you get a contract worth £10,000 a month, and that you employ someone who will do the work for half as much. This could be a very profitable contract, but only if you can finance it in the short term. At the end of the first month you will have to find £5,000 to pay your employee’s salary. You can invoice your client for £10,000 but he won’t have to pay until the end of month two. By that time you will have had to find a second £5000 salary payment. Then if, as often happens in the real world, your client doesn’t actually pay in 30 days, or even 60 days, instead of making money you will find yourself slipping further and further into the red. What happens when you reach the limit of your overdraft? Don’t wait to find out; don’t work for people who don’t pay promptly.

This simplified scenario ignores factors such as administration costs, National Insurance, tax, VAT and bank interest, all of which create cash flow problems of their own. But it illustrates the essential point that before you take on work, no matter how profitable it might turn out to be, you must be sure you can handle the cash flow. That is why it is so important to have a clear understanding with your clients about prompt payment.

In real life there are costs to running any business, and until the cheques start coming in you will stack up a pile of liabilities. Some of your suppliers, being in business themselves, may have some sympathy if you are slow paying their invoices. If you explain the situation to them honestly, they may be willing to be patient for quite a long time. In reality there is not a lot else they can do. Starting legal proceedings costs money, and anyway they don’t want to lose a client. Unfortunately this does not apply with the Inland Revenue or the VAT man, who don’t care if you go broke. Being funded by the taxpayer, they can afford to pursue you to the ends of the earth, regardless of the time and money it wastes. So it is very important to comply with the laws governing business and to pay your tax bills promptly. Taxation can be complex, but members of the Institution can get free advice on tax and accounting matters over the telephone. This service is provided by a top firm of accountants.

Interested IAP members should call or email the Office (0208 567 2118 or admin@iap.org.uk) to be put in touch with our accountants. Free legal advice is also available in the same way.

[Interesting project or development? Let us know at eo@iap.org.uk!]

Notice Board

Government UK IT Summit is at Victoria Park Plaza, London on 14 and 15 May. See www.euro-techforum.com for details.

Technology Transactions for Financial Institutions is organised by the Society for Computers and the [...] http://www.iap.org.uk/main/vsj-may-2007/]]>

Notice Board

Government UK IT Summit is at Victoria Park Plaza, London on 14 and 15 May. See www.euro-techforum.com for details.

Technology Transactions for Financial Institutions is organised by the Society for Computers and the Law in London on 16 May. More information is at www.scl.org.

The Wireless Event is at Olympia Exhibition Centre, London on 23 and 24 May. There’s more at www.thewirelessevent.com.

[Got an activity or event coming up? Email eo@iap.org.uk with the details.]

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Sounding Board

Robin Jones wonders about our sometimes-contradictory attitudes to prices and sources.

The natives are restless again. The jungle drums of the technical press are rumbling darkly about the exorbitant cost of Vista upgrades, especially when compared to the equivalent charges in the US.

But there’s another prevalent view, which can be stated as, “If you’re not paying through the nose for it, it can’t be any good.” During the recent contaminated supermarket petrol debacle, the press wheeled out numerous motor vehicle engineers to tell us, with straight faces, that we’d be safer buying our fuel from the ‘Majors’ because they charge us more. Unfortunately, we weren’t told where they live. I wanted to sell them £300 televisions at £900 a throw, because, obviously, they’ll then be 3 times better.

There seems to be something irrationally comforting about paying out a lot of money. Skinflints like me have never understood this. As Sir John Harvey Jones used to say, you can’t control what your customers pay you, only what you pay your suppliers. So the way to a healthy margin is to control your costs. On which basis, the capital cost of employing Linux, OpenOffice, Firefox, Thunderbird et al is, essentially, zero. There are, of course, arguments about the TCO – retraining, management and so on. But if you’re changing operating system anyway, there’s some retraining cost, so now would be a good time to consider all the options. And Linux is getting easier to manage all the time – witness the imminent extension of Linspire’s “Click ’n Run” technology to a range of common Linux distributions.

“Ah yes”, I hear you ask, “but what about all my .NET applications, to say nothing of my VBA macros?” That’s a fair question. I’ve got another one. What other industry would willingly commit to a single supplier for its primary raw material, however reliable and cost-effective that supplier might be?

[Something you’d like to get off your chest? Email me (Robin Jones) at eo@iap.org.uk.]

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Members’ News:

Siddique Khan, MIAP is standing for re-election to Council this spring. Here, he writes about himself and his aspirations for the Institution.

I joined the IAP in January 2002 and a little over two years later was co-opted on to the IAP Council. At 31, I am privileged to have been the youngest ever member selected for the IAP Council. I am currently working as a development lead / software architect for an IT solution company specialising in information management, knowledge management and automation for the Oil and Gas sector. I have very broad experience including business process automation, information management, enterprise content management, knowledge management, workflow automation, EDMS and full text and retrieval search engines.

In the past, I’ve been engaged in various technical roles, as analyst/programmer, senior systems analyst, technical consultant and development team leader to name a few. I strongly believe that the IAP is capable of offering services to the wider world, reaching as far as India and perhaps China. And in fact, I’m investigating the possibility of arranging such affiliations or partnerships with the local professional bodies in these aggressively developing countries to fulfil the real potential of the IAP mission.

[Don’t forget to email eo@iap.org.uk with items of news about you or your company.]

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Work in Progress

As part of her MSc in E-Business at the University of Westminster, Angelina Jones, AMIAP has been researching the technical aspects of Canada’s Government-Online (GOL) initiative. Here she describes her work and its outcomes.

Canada is a sparsely populated country of 30 million people, with two official languages – English and French – and 13 states across six different time zones. E-government was seen as the way to address these physical barriers. It could revolutionise government because the Internet could ‘bridge the challenges of time and distance, and enable the Canadian society to forge a stronger sense of connection both between and among its members and with its government’ (D’Auray, 2003). The Government of Canada (GoC) thus formulated a GOL Strategy in 2000 to manage the transition from traditional government and ease the process of change. According to this document, the aim of GOL is to provide:

‘…citizens with the ability to interact with the government, to receive information, to access programs and services and to do business electronically with the GoC.’

The key initiative of the strategy was to develop a front-end Web platform to cluster the Government’s services from a citizen’s perspective, rather than basing it on the Government’s hierarchical structure. The GoC believed this would guarantee the accessibility of its Web content and enable citizens to use it easily. As a result, the Government developed the Cluster Blueprint (Fig. 1) to represent the organisation of the intended online services and to provide the Government with an initial idea of how the Web platform could be designed.

Fig 1: The Cluster Blueprint

THE CANADA SITE

Service for Canadian Businesses

Canadians Services for You

Services for Non-Canadians

CLUSTERS

Start-Up Financing   Taxation Regulations   HR   Other

Jobs   Health   Taxes   Youth   Seniors   Other

Going to Canada   Canada & the World   Doing Business with Canada   Other

BUSINESSES                         CANADIANS         NON-CANADIANS

Within each cluster, the information is organised around specific audiences, subjects, and life events, managed individually by a Government department. The first release of the Canada Site was based on this blueprint in 2001 and has since been enhanced to suit the needs of the Canadian citizens based on user feedback.

Aim of the Study and Research Undertaken

Recognising the effort Canada had put into its E-Government, it was decided that my study would aim to assess the Web sites created for the GOL initiative, and evaluate the front end interfaces to decide whether Canada had successfully managed to transform their traditional government to a digital one. The following research objectives were formulated to meet this project aim:

·      To identify and evaluate how the GoC Web sites satisfy technical standards;

·      To assess the overall usability of the GOL Web sites and their content;

·      To obtain further insight into the Canadian Government and explore how successful the digital transformation has been.

In order to optimise the outcomes for the research, both usability testing through the form of a questionnaire adhering to Nielson’s Usability Best Practices (2001) and an impartial evaluation using global Web Accessibility standards were conducted. In total, 14 high-level users (frequent users of the Internet) participated in the testing. They conducted examinations of the site using their own PC environments (see Table 1 for environments).

Table 1: Hardware and software set-up used for testing

The main purpose of the usability questionnaire was to assess the appropriateness of the front-end interfaces used within the GoC Web sites and to measure their overall ability to serve first-time users, regardless of prior Internet usage and experience. Each question was categorised as relating to Concept; Layout & Design; Download Speeds; Navigation & Structure; and Usability. Participants were directed to view specific Web pages and rate the design of each, as well as to determine how efficiently the Web pages could be downloaded.

The impartial evaluation was mainly centred on the GoC’s fourteen Common Look and Feel Standards (2005) which tested each GOL Web site for their conformity relating to universal accessibility regardless of input device and the PC environments used. The Web pages were also scrutinised according to the World Wide Web, Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (W3CWCAG, 1999) to understand the source codes used and how the Web pages behaved under different browser versions and settings. This aimed to determine any dependencies on Dynamic Scripting, Active Content and Cascading Style Sheets. Lastly, in respect of the navigational mechanisms incorporated within the page design, the semantics of each Web site were tested for compliance with the Dublin Core Metadata Initiative (1997). 

Key Findings and Outcomes

Based on the impartial evaluation, all the GoC Web sites contained device-independent applets and scripts, allowing the choice of either a mouse or keyboard input device to access the dynamic features. Users were given the option to view the content using a screen reader but in some cases the Web pages were complex and contained different types of elements such as audio, visual and text. This can make it hard for screen readers to interpret, in comparison to plain HTML tags.

One aim of the CLF standards is to provide a ‘consistent system of navigation’ that ensures that Canadian citizens can find and access the information they require effectively. According to Guideline 13 of the W3CWCAG, only clear and consistent navigational mechanisms can increase the ability of users to find what they are looking for. The GoC has worked towards this by designing a corporate style navigational horizontal banner and menu containing portal links that are featured in each Web page. There is also a consistent vertical menu visible on the left-hand side containing relevant links for the viewed Web site. Combined, we found that the GOL websites complied with the W3CWCAG 1.0 Priority 1 and 2 checklists.

In the usability-testing questionnaire, the participants were asked to summarise the effectiveness of the GoC Web sites stating their level of agreement to the statement:

The GoC website has been carefully designed to allow its users to conduct their business efficiently and effectively online.

All participants either agreed (33%) or tended to agree (67%) with the statement. Another part of the questionnaire aimed to assess the usability of the GOL and showed a 50% agreement in that the Web sites were suitable for first-time users and 64% of participants claimed it was easy to navigate around the Web site.

Overall, the outcomes of the Usability testing suggest the GoC Web sites are usable, with meaningful content that was easy to download. Taking this further, the CLF standards also demonstrated the measures taken by the GoC to achieve universal accessibility, which, taken with the W3CWAG’s priorities, have enabled them to unify the Web presence of the GOL, for consistency and easy recognition for new users.

The creation of the CLF standards supports the conclusion that the GoC understands the impact Internet technologies have for them and their citizens. Based on this we believe that trust is vital for the endurance of Canada’s GOL and to build their citizens’ confidence to form (blind) relationships over the Internet. By investing time and money to meet technical standards, Canada will continue to secure a good relationship with its GOL users and this should work towards achieving the long-term success of Canada’s E-Government model.

References:

D’Auray, M 2003, “The Dual Challenge of Integration and Inclusion: Canada’s experience with Government Online”, Journal of Political Marketing, Vol. 2, No. 3 / 4, pp. 31 – 49.

Dublin Core Metadata Initiative, 1997, “Dublin Core Metadata Element Set, Version 1.1: Reference Description”.

Government of Canada, 2000, “Government On-Line Strategy”.

Nielson, J 2000, “Designing Web Usability: The Simplicity of Practice.” New Riders Publishing, Indianapolis.

The Common Look and Feel Working Group (CLFWG), 2005, “Common Look and Feel Standards for the Internet”, Treasury Board Secretariat Internet Advisory Committee. Government of Canada.

W3C Web Content Accessibility Guidelines, 1999, “Checklist of Checkpoints for Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 1.0 & 13”.

[Interesting project or development? Let us know at eo@iap.org.uk!]

Advance notice: IAP Spring meeting, Friday 20th April - put this date in your diary.

In a radical departure from tradition we shall be holding our 2007 Spring Meeting on the famous WW2 cruiser HMS Belfast. Members with nervous stomachs need have no fear, though; nowadays the Belfast (pictured) is a floating exhibition, [...] http://www.iap.org.uk/main/vsj-feb-2007/]]> Notice Board

Advance notice: IAP Spring meeting, Friday 20th April - put this date in your diary.

In a radical departure from tradition we shall be holding our 2007 Spring Meeting on the famous WW2 cruiser HMS Belfast. Members with nervous stomachs need have no fear, though; nowadays the Belfast (pictured) is a floating exhibition, safely moored in the River Thames just by Tower Bridge. We are planning an extended lunchtime meeting, with the emphasis on hospitality and networking. But there will also be some technical input and, of course, the opportunity to roam freely around the nine decks and exhibition areas of this fascinating vessel. The event will fit easily into a single working day, or, being on a Friday, it also offers members and their partners the opportunity to stop over in London till Saturday for some shopping. We can advise on nearby hotels. Full details are available on the IAP Web site. This event could well be oversubscribed so it’s not too early to get your name down. Email admin@iap.org.uk or call 0208 567 2118. The cost to members will be £40.00 including VAT. The cost to guests and other non-members is £70.00 including VAT. An excellent three-course lunch and drinks are included in the price.

[Got an activity or event coming up? Email eo@iap.org.uk with the details.]

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Sounding Board

As a rule, we treat IAP News as a vehicle for members and partners. Now and then, though, something comes our way that we feel deserves an audience just because it’s likely to be helpful to a significant proportion of the membership. And anyway, rules were made to be broken. So here’s Patricia Passarelli, Editor and Evangeliser at JavaBlackBelt, talking about, well, JavaBlackBelt.

Even after a becoming a Sun Certified Java Programmer, it’s tricky for programmers to market their skills. Plus, they need a self-paced way to keep up with the changing needs in technology. JavaBlackBelt provides a meaningful alternative to Sun and other industry-led certifications. It’s a community based, mass-authoring approach for creating certification and study/learn exams on a variety of Java and related technologies. Most certifications can be passed after a course on syntax and gotchas. And they don’t necessarily prove the potential and aptitude of a developer. The self-study/learn exams on JavaBlackBelt are a true self-diagnostic for developers. With them, developers can prove they really know Java, understand the topics and sub-topics and identify knowledge gaps. JavaBlackBelt isn’t geared toward passing particular certification exams. It promotes valuable learning for skills building – skills that can be put into practice immediately.

This is how it works: users sign up – for FREE – and take exams, from basic J2SE to exams on frameworks like Spring and tools like ANT. They can also progress up the belt track – a skill-level recognition system borrowed from the martial arts. The colour of the belts earned endorses users’ technical knowledge. Every time users “level-up” their belts it’s posted on the home page with their photos and links to their profiles. After taking an exam, users can review the answers to the questions they got right – and those they got wrong. Instantly they can identify knowledge “weak spots.” During an exam, they can vote on question quality and appropriate targeting to the exam objectives. Users can also give feedback to improve or correct question content and syntax. These unique, mass-authoring features, as part of the exam process, are how JavaBlackBelt.com exams continually evolve to ensure that they remain useful to developers – as they evolve. JavaBlackBelt exams have real-world value making them a meaningful metric for learning and skills building.

JavaBlackBelt is not a “fast food” approach. Rather it emphasises an ongoing commitment to learning that continues long after a developer gets a certification. It’s a meaningful alternative because it’s a community-managed track for many certifications. And it’s a place for developers to get their skills recognised – which motivates learning. This encourages a longer view toward self-improvement.

See www.javablackbelt.com for more details.

[Something you'd like to get off your chest? Email me (Robin Jones) at eo@iap.org.uk.]

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Members’ News:

Nominations for the Council of the IAP

The Institution is a democratic body governed by a Council elected by and from its members. Five members of the 15-strong Council retire in rotation each year. Nominations for the 2007 election, accompanied by the nominee’s manifesto (in electronic form and not exceeding 150 words, please) must be received at the Institution Office by 19 February. Contact the Office (020 8 5672118 or admin@iap.org.uk) for further details or an informal discussion if you are interested in playing your part in the governance of the Institution.

New Fellow

We welcome Simon C. Stobart, BA (Hons) PhD who has been elected a Fellow of the Institution. Dr. Stobart began working as a programmer with Commercial Union while studying part time for his first degree. This was followed by a brief period as a part time lecturer in computing at New College, Durham. The remainder of his distinguished academic career to date has been spent on the staff of the University of Sunderland (an IAP Education Partner). Working initially part time as Research Assistant and Lecturer while studying for his PhD, Dr. Stobart has taken on increasing departmental responsibilities – he is currently Principal Lecturer in Computing with co-ordinating responsibility for the postgraduate programmes. He is widely published and engages in a considerable amount of consultancy work, both with local businesses and internationally.

[Don't forget to email eo@iap.org.uk with items of news about you or your company.]

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Work in Progress

Here, Sarah Bird, of Browne Jacobson, discusses the implications of the new legislation from an employer’s perspective. If you’re an employee, though, the information is equally useful. You just view it differently.

The Employment Equality (Age) Regulations 2006 came into force on 1 October 2006. The Regulations protect workers of all ages from age discrimination and impact on almost every aspect of the employment relationship – from recruitment and promotion to dismissal. They will potentially affect many commonly established practices, from the wording of job advertisements to the sending of office birthday cards. Increasing awareness of age diversity throughout your business is crucial. The message is clear focus on skill and ability and not age.

The Regulations

In summary the Regulations:

• prohibit unjustified age discrimination in employment;
• require employers who set their retirement age below the default age of 65 to justify or change it;
• introduce a new duty on employers to consider an employee’s request to continue working beyond retirement;
• require employers to inform employees in writing, at least 6 months but not more than 12 months in advance, of their intended retirement date and their right to request continued working;
• remove the upper limit for unfair dismissal and redundancy rights;
• permit service-related benefits up to five years’ service;
• leave occupational pensions largely unchanged – most age-related rules found in occupational pension schemes are effectively exempted; and
• remove the age limits for Statutory Sick Pay, Statutory Maternity Pay, Statutory Adoption Pay and Statutory Paternity Pay.

Retirement Notification

Businesses should be preparing for the new rules on retirement. Identify retirements that are coming up in the next 12 months or so and prepare standard letters to be sent to employees notifying them of their retirement date and of their right to request to continue working.

The important things to remember are:

• That notification of retirement must be sent out within the time limits laid down;
• employees must be notified of their right to request continued employment beyond retirement; and
• businesses must consider requests for continued working beyond retirement in the way laid down in the Regulations.

When you have to send the notification of retirement depends on whether the retirement is before or after 1 April 2007. In almost all cases where the proposed retirement date is before 1 April 2007, it is best to send out the notification of retirement as soon as possible. For retirements on or after 1 April 2007, the notification of retirement should be sent between 6 and 12 months before the retirement date.

If you receive a request from an employee to continue working beyond retirement you should follow the steps set out in the table below:

As a business you should consider the factors you plan to consider when dealing with requests to continue working. It is a good idea to prepare a list of criteria to decide whether to agree to requests to continue working beyond retirement. For example the approach could be:

1. To never grant such request unless there is a staff shortage, difficulties in recruitment or succession or a short term project that needs completing.
2. To always grant the first request for one year but not subsequent ones unless the factors in (a) apply.
3. To grant all requests up to a maximum age but not thereafter.
4. It could be dangerous to grant or refuse requests on the basis of performance. If for any reason the retirement defence to an unfair dismissal claim, the reason for dismissal will probably be capability. The dismissal will then be unfair unless a proper capability procedure is in place.
5. Requests could be subject to an occupational health check so long as that can be justified – which it probably would be if there is any physical element to the job.

So long as the new rules on retirement are complied with, there should be no risk of unfair dismissal claims arising from compulsory retirements of employees over the normal retirement age or (if there is no normal retirement age for that employment) over the age of 65. A normal retirement age below age 65 is only permissible if it can be justified as a “proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim”.

Browne Jacobson LLP provides legal services to the IAP and its members. Members are entitled to a free 30-minute telephone consultation with them on any topic related to their professional activities. See www.brownejacobson.co.uk for more details.

Further information on age discrimination can be found at www.agepositive.gov.uk.

[Interesting project or development? Let us know at eo@iap.org.uk!]

Notice Board

The 3rd annual Government UK IT Summit brings together senior public sector decision-makers to discuss IT and communication procurement issues related to e-government. It’s at Victoria Park Plaza, London SW1 on 8 and 9 May. Contact Tim Graham on 0207 903 6027 [...] http://www.iap.org.uk/main/vsj-may-2006/]]>

Notice Board

The 3rd annual Government UK IT Summit brings together senior public sector decision-makers to discuss IT and communication procurement issues related to e-government. It’s at Victoria Park Plaza, London SW1 on 8 and 9 May. Contact Tim Graham on 0207 903 6027 or email tim@euro-techforum.com for details.

Internet World is at Earls Court 2, London from 9 to 11 May. See www.internetworld.co.uk for more.

The Wireless Event is at Olympia, London on 17 and 18 May. See www.wlanevent.com for further details.

[Got an activity or event coming up? Email eo@iap.org.uk with the details.]

———————————————————————————————————————–Employment Exchange

Darren Brook, MIAP is an experienced software developer. He has experience in systems analysis, database design and software development. Latest technical skills include .Net, VB, SQL Server, Crystal Reports, ADO, HTML, XML and COM. He is currently available for work and can e-mailed at darrenbrook@btconnect.com

[Want your entry printed here? Email eo@iap.org.uk with the details.]

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Members’ News:

We welcome two new Fellows

Richard C. Acland

Richard obtained his grounding in business systems while working as a computer operator in the mid-eighties. Experience on a Honeywell DPS7 Mainframe and on-the-job training enabled him to move up into a job as a developer and in 1988 he helped to found the software house Chase Business Solutions, where he was Technical Director until 1997. Chase had a £1-million turnover; its clients including Cambridge University Press, Bridge Oil and Armstrong Pumps. In 1998 Richard became MD of Hi Tech (South) and more recently its subsidiary Software Process and Design, one of the IAP’s Partner companies. Hi Tech has produced award-winning software for Pension Funds; other clients have included the NHS, Kingfisher and Mercedes Benz.

Vijay S. Rathore MSc

Graduating with a MSc from Sunderland in 1989, Vijay Rathore has had a distinguished career in the financial industry, working in many parts of the world. An early assignment with Hill Samuel involved preparations for the “Big Bang”. This was followed by a five-year assignment in Brussels designing and installing software for Europe‘s leading online bookmaker. In 1997 he moved to Citibank in London where his responsibilities included managing their Y2K compliance programme and the installation of a comprehensive new dealing room floor system. In 1998 Vijay became Technology Director and later Managing Director of the NASDAQ stock market. During this period he has carried technical and commercial responsibilities on a vast and awesome scale.

[Don’t forget to email eo@iap.org.uk with items of news about you or your company.]

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Work in Progress

Two years ago, Brian Swan of Exoftware made a very well received presentation to the IAP Symposium on the principles of Agile software development. Here, his colleague Sean Hanley develops these ideas for a wider audience.

The last 40 years of the 20^th century saw lean manufacturing and concepts such as ‘Just-in-Time’ revolutionise the manufacturing industry. Indeed, they have become de facto standards. Many such principles readily apply to the software industry. These concepts are captured within Agile software development methods.

History: Software development has a long legacy featuring of a number of processes and methods. Most common of these is the waterfall method where requirements gathering, design, development, testing and deployment are distinct steps – one step cannot be started until the previous one is completed. The waterfall method is not “bad” per se, but really only suits projects where the requirements are fixed – where the end result is definite and exact. However, in most modern projects, change is inevitable given that markets and needs constantly shift. Many teams have found that by using waterfall methods, they are, in fact, failing; failing to deliver value, quality, on time and on budget. This is at a huge financial and human cost.

So lightweight processes that address the need for this level of flexibility and that encourage a craftsmanship approach to software development have emerged.

What is Agile software development? Agile is an umbrella term for a group of methodologies (Extreme Programming, DSDM, Crystal, Lean, Scrum etc.) that share similar values and principles, such as delivering high value, high quality software early and often. They are lightweight approaches that encourage continuous learning and are marked by their ability to create increased business and IT collaboration.

While each of the methods that form the family of Agile processes has a similar goal, they achieve it through different practices. We have taken the best practices that we have seen work from all the Agile processes and put them together for clarity.

Values, Principles, Practices: Agile begins with a set of values that drives down into principles and then into core practices. This means that teams get a value-based process and system that is a translated into actual practice. The values of Agile centre on what makes any team tick – people. By focusing on people-based values, Agile immediately realises that you can have any process in place but if you don’t address people issues, you’ll never succeed. The principles then take the values to the next level, detailing some basic ideas the process is based on. Then come the practices. These are not new by any means. In fact, they represent some of the best practice in software development today. What makes Agile different is how these practices are put together.

The figure shows a basic representation of Agile best practices that we have distilled. The central circle shows practices that a pair of programmers works on daily. Moving outwards, the next ring shows practices that are performed by a team of developers. The outer layer gives us practices done together as one team – customers, developers, testers, business analysts etc.

Each practice relates directly to the core Agile values shown at the four corners: Communication, Feedback, Courage and Simplicity. That is, each practice gives us a concrete way to action Agile values and make them part of the process.

Developer Practices: In the inner circle we have developer practices that are carried out every day. Take for example, Test Driven Development (TDD). Nobody argues against the importance of automated unit testing to create robust maintainable software, yet almost nobody does it. Very often it is because developers have never been taught how. TDD teaches them how to drive their development through tests. This means quality is in-built and code is delivered already tested. Importantly, this also acts as an enabler to Refactoring, which ensures that we keep our code as clean as possible and provides valuable design benefits.

Why is TDD important? Well, where in the process of software development would you least like to find defects? At the end, before you deploy. And yet testing is scheduled at the end of the software process, where changes are the most costly.

Other practices in this circle include Pair Programming and Simple Design. Simple design really refers to simple, evolving design. So rather then designing up front for what we think we need, we design for what we know we need, keeping it simple and allowing it to evolve. Pair programming involves two programmers working on production code as a team. While many people have bemoaned productivity loss, studies have shown an overall improvement in productivity and quality.

Team Practices: Working outwards, we have team practices. For example, countless studies have shown that a key indicator of project success is the ability to deliver working software early and often. So we need to practise things like Continuous Integration, which involves knowing how to create a development environment that allows us to continuously build our software, integrate it and test it in an automated fashion. Other practices such as Coding Standards and Metaphor focus on creating a shared language amongst the team (both developers and the business). This is a vital ingredient in ensuring that communication is clear and productive. Practices such as Open Workspace and Collective Ownership look at creating a shared team vision. One of the goals of Agile is to create a sense of shared ownership and vision of the project for the whole team. Sustainable Pace fits into this team idea in that it discourages “hero” type working hours and recognises that teams are made up of people who cannot and should not work excessively – especially to the detriment of the project.

Project Management and Planning Practices: Finally, we come to the outer ring and project management and planning. Here we look at Release Planning, Small Releases and Iterative Development. Agile looks at developing release plans that are relatively small (usually three months) and comprise iterations (two week work ‘packets’). User Stories or requirements are written, estimated by developers and then prioritised by business people. The top priorities get into iteration one, which is broken down further into tasks, which pairs of developers sign up for. Acceptance Tests are defined by the business and ensure that developers know exactly what a given story is supposed to accomplish. In this way there is an overall plan that drives down into weekly and even daily plans. At the end of the iteration, the business re-prioritises and the process begins again.

Studies have shown that because of this high level of feedback, incremental development cycles are better because they produce software that matches customers’ needs and is more predictable than the traditional waterfall approach.

The other practices such as On-Site Customer and One Team are about close IT and business collaboration.

Software Craftsman: Software development should take a craftsmanship approach – a thinking, knowledge-based trade, part science, part engineering and part art, with people at the centre.

If we can agree this we need a process that supports craftsmen to do the best possible work. That means getting rid of obstacles in their way and valuing their craft.

Take, for example, the 1977 the Gossamer Condor, the first man-powered aircraft. When the Smithsonian museum in Washington DC asked for blueprints for the plane, the team responded: “We’re paid for flying figure eights, not drawing blueprints.” An excellent point: we are paid as software engineers to build software – not write documents. Yet, in most companies, software developers spend a lot of their time doing just that. Some documentation may of course be required but it should be thought of as “only what is needed.”

Agile processes like eXtreme Programming also provide the basis for teaching good software development practices like unit testing, test driven development and refactoring. They provide the structure for mentoring and cross learning and encourage continuous learning. Importantly, they are structured yet flexible enough for small teams to deliver really great software – and teach them something in return.

Agile methods are the most lightweight, flexible and people-based approaches that teams can use. As we have seen in our own work, more and more teams – both large and small – are learning how to extract the most value from them.

You can contact Sean at shanly@exoftware.com

[Interesting project or development? Let us know at eo@iap.org.uk!]