Post on 30-Jul-2015
transcript
The Nimble Elephant:Bringing Agile to Old-School Publishing
Lee Fife, VP, Publishing Solutions at Flatirons SolutionsShannon Holman, Director, Content Management at McGraw-Hill Higher Education
Mark Logic Digital Publishing SummitThe Plaza | 10 December 2009
Shannonshannon_holman@mcgraw-hill.com
http://www.shannonholman.com/feed/rss/http://delicious.com/sholman
@shannonholmanhttp://www.facebook.com/shannonholman?ref=profile
LeeLee.Fife@flatironssolutions.com
http://www.linkedin.com/pub/lee-fife/2/409/901
1
• Definitions
• Context
• Challenge
• Stats
• Demo
• Process
• Questions
Agenda
2
Definitions
ag⋅ile* — adjective
1.quick and well-coordinated in movement; lithe
2.active; lively
3.marked by an ability to think quickly; mentally acute or aware
old school pub ⋅ lish ⋅ ing — traditional business
1.slow, ponderous
2. trailing market changes
3.primarily driven by past conditions; nostalgic
*Dictionary.com
3
• Nearly 20 years ago, McGraw-Hill was first to market with a custom publishing application for higher education instructors.
• At the time, Primis (“prime information system”) was a bold bet on emerging technologies from Xerox PARC, Eastman Kodak, and Adobe.
• Now, though, a rigid RDBMS approach, an outdated UI, and a tangled back-end make it a challenge to fulfill the promise of just-in-time textbook publishing.
• We decided to start all over again.
Back in the day...
4
Stats
• AdLib converts user-uploaded files to PDFs, and iText renders the table of contents and running head.
• MarkLogic Server 4.1-3 stores over 3.2 million pages of content representing nearly 4,000 books in 80 academic disciplines, along with about 40,000 readings and third-party business cases. • The back-end has been completely
rebuilt in Java and integrated with existing systems for registration, authentication, sales credit, and royalty reporting.
• WebLogic serves up the Flex-based user interface where instructors find and arrange content and personalize their book for print or eBook delivery.
• We signed a contract in Dec 2008 and released in beta in October 2009, delivering a POC and 4 point releases in that timeframe.
5
“Today's orthodoxy has institutionalized a set of internally consistent but dysfunctional beliefs. This has created a tightly interlocking and self-reinforcing system, a system from which it is very difficult to break free. Even when we change one piece, the other pieces hold us back by blocking the benefits of our change. When our change fails to produce benefits, we revert to our old approaches.”—Don Reinertsen, The Principles of Product Development Flow
Nobody said it would be easy
7
But since when was there any fun in easy?8
Agile + waterfall = painful progress
• What worked
• High-level of involvement from Keeper of Vision
• Detailed tradeoffs at all points in project
• Ongoing exploration of options
• What hurt
• Emerging requirements, especially UI/design
• Changing functionality => ongoing adjustment by team
• Governance headaches
Change leads to disappointment if it is not sustained. Transformation is sustained change, and it is achieved through practice. —B.K.S. Iyengar
9
Thanks, Questions, Credits
Old Skool graffiti by Banksy, Clerkenwell Road, London. Available at http://knowledgeoflondon.com/graffiti2.html.
Frank, Robert. “Data Base Lets Authors Customize Textbooks.” The New York Times. 8 October 1992. Available from http://www.nytimes.com/1992/10/08/news/08iht-text.html. Rendered with Foley.com newspaper clipping generator.
Jaipur elephant by Keith Levit via Flickr.
Underwater elephant by Cesare Naldi. Available at http://blogs.nationalgeographic.com/blogs/intelligenttravel/2009/10/.
http://create.mcgraw-hill.com/
BELIEVE! by The Peopleʼs Bboy Thugz Bunny via Flickr.
Houdini pose by MessyMissy via Flickr.
Respect the old school” available at http://www.gluegluedesign.com/.
BKS Iyengar video available at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lmOUZQi_6T.
10
Special bonus track
Show your respect for old school publishing by making your own pressman’s cap
11