@mkhoury

Recently I’ve been pondering software.  Software to help with this, software to help with that, and lately, I’ve been focusing on product management type software to help manage requirements documents, proof of concepts, etc.  

Requirements documents, while they suck to write (if you have to), can get somewhat manifestoish and complex, so the search was on to my favorite resources, Google & Quora to find out what my peers are using to make their lives a little bit easier.

Some use “Rational,” software IBM (IBM of all places) created to help manage requirements documents.  It looks like crap (yes, I’m big on UI, might be very functional but if it looks like crap and I won’t use it).  On to the next, when I stumbled on this piece from Peter Deng on Quora:

A simple online text editor with basic formatting will do.

I’ve found that for product requirements and vision docs are best when they are concise and formatted for easy scan-ability. No one wants to read a manifesto; if you’re able to boil down the requirements to the most important principles, that’ll provide a solid foundation for your team to work off of.

If your requirements are intricate enough to warrant spreadsheets and sticky notes, then all the more reason to simplify it down to something understandable. Bullet points are your friend. Structure your thoughts well, and the rest will follow. Good luck.

It’s true… So true…  Even after reading “Insanely Simple,” a book about Ken Segall’s relationship and experience with Steve Jobs about keeping things insanely-simple, I fell back to my ways, figuring, things need to be complex with added software types.

No.

They.

Don’t.

Keep it Stupid Simple.

Thanks Peter.

It’s true, so true.  Would I like to work for Google one day?  You bet, but the environment has to change.  Sure, there’s a place for engineering brilliance (that Wozniak delivered for Apple) that comes from Stanford, and MIT, and Yale, etc., but there’s something to be said for passion, drive and perfection - and it should never, ever, ever be discounted or undervalued.

Steve Jobs’s genius, in other words, was a sort of genius that Google places little or no value on.

Really great stuff.

LOL

8. As far as technology, go with what you know. That is always the most inexpensive way. If you know Apple, use it. If you know Vista, ask yourself why, then use it. It’s a startup so there are just a few employees. Let people use what they know.

Cool new site that focuses on products that are the best, not just the newest.

Cool to see where you’ve been!

Fascinating predication.  Ballmer’s way outta step, too 90’s of a guy IMHO.  Schmidt is quite an interesting option.

Russian blogger, Eldar Murtazin strikes again. He has this tendancy of outing the most ridiculous scoops regarding Nokia which in turn, turn out to be true. But still needs to be taken with a pinch of salt.

Pretty damn good web app too.