thinking-out-loud

innerHTML and non-block elements

I ran into an interesting [read: really frustrating] IE issue today. If you have a non-block element, e.g. a form, and you try to insert content using innerHTML, e.g.

form.innerHTML += '<input type="hidden" name="a" value="b" />'

You may get an error along the lines of "Unknown runtime error" (hresult: -2146827687). The short answer is that form is a non-block element and you cannot insert a block element inside a non-block element. Interestingly, this has been working for me for for the past two months. I haven't figured out what changed yet to push it over the edge.

So, the fix for me was relatively straight-forward. I already had a div nested inside the form, and so I just grabbed it, prototype-style:

$('left-form').innerHTML += '<input type="hidden" name="a" value="b" />'

form.submit();

And everything was cool again.

Ahhhh, minutiae, how I love thee.

I found the right direction from this forum, so um, mad, um, er, props. Or whatever the cool kids say.

Free Scrum Process Guidance for VSTS

Ken Schwaber and Conchango have released SCRUM Process Guidance for VSTS. I am including his entire posting from the scrumdevelopment yahoo group. It is a very active group, and you can find some really insightful commentary there. Definitely consider subscribing.

Ken said:

I have worked closely over the last eighteen months with ConChango, a UK based consultancy, to prepare guidance for managing projects using Scrum. This work was prompted by our mutual concern over the quality and misdirection of Microsoft's initial contents, which badly represented Agile. I feared that, without adequate alternative, many Agile and Scrum "newbies" would think that the MS work actually had some resemblance to the real stuff.

I was and still am delighted with Conchango's help in this initiative.

They have not only invested strongly, but they have become potent Scrum advocates in the UK and throughout Europe. Even better, they did so without any direct belief in product sales or direct payback. Colin Bird, Howard vanRooijen, Ian Shimmings, and Steve Garnett all went way above and beyond their normal work to make this happen. As a result, the VSTS Scrum for Team Systems is now available, after an extensive Beta, as free downloads for use with VSTS, or as a standalone guidance system.

I am delighted to recommend that everyone take a look at this work.

See below for more details,

Ken

"Over the weekend we launched the microsite with the new process and multimedia guidance that we filmed when you were last over (I know I worked you hard - but I think the finished version was worth it). you can find it at: http://scrumforteamsystem.com/ProcessGuidance/ - we have also made the guidance available as a separate download, so that people can get access to the content even if they don't live in a Microsoft / Team System world – you can get access to the downloads from http://scrumforteamsystem.com/cs/forums/2/ShowPost.aspx

- I thought it might be a useful resource for your Certification Courses or people who are interested in getting started.

So far we've had 70 downloads in the first 12 hours and the first blog post I've found has been very flattering:

"I've been testing their Scrum for Team System product for awhile now and now they've released it as freeware...The add-in is pretty slick and covers all the major aspects of Scrum and is a much better implementation (IMHO) over something like MSF for Agile (that comes OOTB with TFS)"

We're Hiring

I thought I would post this opportunity and see if any of you are interested:

Improving is hiring, and we're looking for some talented mentors.

You are an expert at object technology. You know how to tame a complex domain with objects. You groove on creating adaptive object models – where appropriate. You understand how to get things done, iteratively and incrementally.

Agile Manifesto? Yep.

You are comfortable guiding individuals and teams, and you can speak to a business person without confusing the hell out of them. You have developed/led software development using [one or more of] XP, Scrum, FDD, RUP, Fusion, MSF.

You are comfortable either .NET or Java -- preferrably both -- (but would secretly rather be doing Ruby, Python, Smalltalk, lisp, even, gulp, Javascript 1.6).

You love simplicity. You respect the bottom line. You understand that risk isn't just something to avoid. Sometimes, it is something you take.

Shipping software is a must. Theory is great, but Ivory Tower Folks need not apply.

You would really catch our eye if you have production experience with Sharepoint, Biztalk, ESBs, Web Services, REST, BPM. If you've hand cranked your share of WSDLs and Schemas, that's cool too. It wouldn't apply so much in the current opportunities, but it would be great long term.

We're looking for w-2 or contract-to-hire , but would consider 1099 contractors we know we can trust.

We have competitive salaries, profit sharing, friendly people, and laptops that most people envy.

We are particularly interested in people who live in the Dallas and San Diego areas or are willing to travel there. Travel happy people get paid more. Let us know your threshold for pain.

If you are interested drop us an email and a resume: mailto:[email protected]

Buy A Feature: Innovation Games at Perot Systems

Luke Hohmann was in Dallas recently on business and had a little time to kill. Being easily one of the most driven/productive people I have ever met, he scheduled a session during that time with our mutual friend Russ McClelland over at Perot Systems to discuss how Perot might be able to apply Enthiosys' Innovation Games in their own business, and they invited Todd and me to join them and help facilitate.

Luke chose to use Buy a Feature, which is a really interesting way to understand what features your customers care about. The basic idea is that you create a list of typically upcoming features for your product, and you assign a price to each feature. Then you round up a group of your customers for a session. The customers are each given some play money and a list of features. They then proceed to buy the features. The magic really comes when people start to run out of money and have to start negotiating. This is underlying goal of Buy a Feature -- get your customers to negotiate with each other rather than having you negotiate with each of them individually and attempt to rationalize the results.

A few notes that I took away:

• There is a bit of an art to assigning that price.
• note the plural "customers." This is one of the most important parts. You should invite multiple, different customers to your innovation games.
• I offered to bring a video camera, but Luke said that video cameras can creep people out, so he avoids them, but he uses a "Bad wedding photographer" and observer roles to capture the interesting parts of the conversations during the games.

Being a bit of an agile junkie and husband to a [stunningly beautiful, brilliant] elementary school teacher, I value the use of manipulatives in communication. I took the liberty the night before of printing up the features and roles that people played in Luke's canned problem for the demo on 3x5 cards. Luke ribbed me a bit, but he played along, and in the end, I think I won him over on using the cards for Buy a Feature.

I actually printed up a set of feature cards for each individual, which I think in hindsight was overkill, as well as a lot of work. But I think it would be useful to have a deck of features per group of people, primarily because it makes it possible for the people to easily sort what is bought and what isn't. Additionally -- and this is one of the main reasons that people like me like using cards -- there is a real tactile experience when using the cards. The negotiations can reveal information in the body language associated with manipulating the cards. Another nice thing about having the cards is that you could very quickly work through another Innovation Game, 20/20 vision. Whether you use the cards or not, I think you will be happy with the way that the game helps you better understand your customer. And that makes Luke happy.

Luke has a new book coming out on Innovation Games in the summer- to late-year timeframe. Having had the priviledge of reading the early drafts, I think it is a really good, really practical book. Ping him over at Enthiosys, and I am sure he would be happy to keep you in the loop about the publication date.