I am your lecturer!

I grew up to understand that you do not disrespect elders. I was in a polytechnic where lecturers are thin gods and even brag about their ability to truncate destinies through mass failure and award of arbitrary marks. This epidemic and malicious practice have contributed to poor technological education like all other aspects of technology.

A friend of mine had to drop out of LASU after discovering he is more knowledgeable and technologically advanced than his lecturer. Listening to Larry Page about how Stanford will produce the next Google engineers coupled with the fact that Facebook started from a University. I always wonder if our lecturers can just keep quiet and give room for creative innovations.

This demonic practice by lecturers has made computer science students like others read to pass and not necessarily interested in competency. I was told by a friend that the best student in his class in a Nigerian University (name deliberately withheld) does not know how to format a laptop. No wonder we have not been able to produce high level technologically competent graduates.

A student of Yabatech was almost failed for disputing HTML codes with his lecturer. The docility of our academic staffs has truncated and declined the zeal and ability to acquire the right IT knowledge by young Nigerians.

NO LECTURER IS AN ISLAND OF KNOWLEDGE!

 I will implore our lecturers to allow participative learning like what obtains in other part of the world. Young students will be more exploratory and interested in new technologies because they have no family pressure, limited responsibility and are eager to take risks. I understand our computer science syllabus is a bottle neck as well, but lecturers should please encourage their students to tow the path of individual competency.  Like I put it in my previous post;

“NOBODY CARES ABOUT YOUR DEGREE, WHAT YOU CAN DO IS THE ROOT OF IT”

We need your comments to further understand the impact of the post. Your comment is highly appreciated. Further enquiry should be directed to pelumiapantaku@gmail.com or @Pelulomo_27 on twitter.

MY BLACKBERRY WILL MAKE ME POOR!

As a young man, I have people caress and spend more time with their phones than any other thing. I have a BB (as it is known) that allows me real time access to friends, news, gossip, music, gist and even social dating. We have our day shared between this wonderful work of technology and other more productive aspects of our lives.

However, a very alarming discovery is the increasing decline in productivity and efficiency which the use of BB is causing for young people. One established fact is this phone (and other devices) affects concentration. One of the co-founder of twitter agreed that it is unhealthy to spend three and a half hours on twitter. Alas, we spend 8, 10 or even 15 hours with our phones thereby making case for how unhealthy this generation is drifting.

 There is seed and harvest time!

The time sowed in unproductive chat, gossip, flirting using BB will definitely result in poverty in the future. Suddenly, jobless graduate have companions in their phone thereby removing any sort of productive reasoning. Ladies now flaunt BBs as a means of social class thereby questioning our development as a society.

I am a culprit as well!

I am bothered on how to use my time productively in order not to regret in my future. I am getting over mine through intricate use of the facilities and applications for information gathering, e-books download and mentoring. You can deploy BB or other devices into more productive use in order not to be poor in the future. Please, let us change our ways and reduce the time we spent using BB in order not to regret in the future.

Further enquiry should be directed to pelumiapantaku@gmail.com or @Pelulomo_27 on twitter.

I am Computer Science Graduate?

You will agree with me that the peak of IT education cannot be found in our higher institutions. I wonder where my children who definitely would be IT inclined will have to attend to ensure their budding talents will be uncovered for the good of mankind. Unfortunately, I am also surrounded with friends, cousins and other relatives who pride themselves as graduates and looking for a job. The only touching story around me is my friends that are proud to claim they are a computer science degree graduate.

“The fact is nobody cares about your degree, what you can do is the root of IT”

I am sick of docile computer science graduates who sleep, water gardens and even run errands for their guardians. The fact is the University or Polytechnic attended did not provide world class education that can allow them to walk into a highly demanding organization and function effectively without requiring weeks of training (hence the traditional probation period in Nigerian firms).

Another difficult pill for me to take is that these people during the job hunting process sleep and watch movies or even womanize if they desire. This type of laziness is a major concern in the Nigerian technological space as we struggle to turn out globally competitive technological driven workforce. With this attitude, they even forget the little information which was passed to them while in the university.

The reality is that everywhere and sector in Nigeria requires technological oriented solutions which can only be discovered and solved by competent Nigerians. Computer science certificate will not take you there, your grit and hard work will ensure that your competence is upgraded to the level which you dictate where and what job you will undertake.

STOP BRAGGING, START WORKING!

Start from dusting your computer system and learn everything you need to know on how it works. Discover the aspect you like in IT and begin to develop skills that will make employer have no option but to employ YOU!

Further enquiry should be directed to pelumiapantaku@gmail.com or @Pelulomo_27 on twitter.

Moving from Programming to Software Development

Programming is often regarded as software development. This is very rampant in this part of the world based on the unstructured manner in which programming skills are acquired. Developing a program is often mistaken as the development of software because there is limited formal standardized IT education thereby complicating the ignorance of potential entrants into the IT field.

I was once in this web based on the raw skills of coding which I possess thereby making me to regard myself as a software developer. I remembered fumbling in an application exhibition based on inexperience and ignorance about the details involved in the art of developing softwares that are customer satisfactory and profitable. Most young programmers like I was are challenged by the failure to transform their programming skills into well knitted softwares. Some that have been able to somehow navigate this path have also been challenged by the commercialization and profitability of the software they have produced.

It is surprising that these challenges hold sway considering the huge revenue and volume of trade in the software and application development. In essence, it is high time Nigeria youths and programmers learnt the basics of software engineering in order to be globally competitive. If you are a “code warrior” as these set of programmers are called please follow the analysis that will be detailed in this article.

The start

Developing software is like building a house. Most times, I advise programmers to form a team in order to have variety and different perspective which will contribute immensely to the overall development of software. Building a house also involves bricklayers, welders, carpenters, painters and electricians thereby making the team to consist of persons with numerous skills (Graphics designers, database managers, programmers, project managers and marketers). This is imperative to ensure that software is acceptable by client/market, tasks are divided, adequate coordination during development and conformity to timeline.

I know our culture and society does not enhance trust which is required in such team, but it must be in place and some level of trust should be developed as the new term in business these days is collaboration (after all GlaxoSmithKline and Pfizer are collaborating despite being competitors).

Select a Methodology

It is important to have a plan and a detailed method of developing the software. There are numerous methodologies and approaches that can be adopted in developing softwares. Among of them is waterfall model, Agile, Spiral model, Prototyping and even Prince2. A detailed research into these methodologies will influence selection of the methodology. The preferred methodology should be objectively selected and totally agreed upon by the team. A discussion of the methodologies, roles and responsibilities of each team member and overall understanding of how the methodology works must be conducted before commencement of the project.

Tasks in Software development

I thought about the most concise format of explaining the details, I feel the use of waterfall methodology to explain the details will be appropriate as it has detailed and explicit outline of steps involved in the methodology.

·         Understanding the Problem: Every new system or even software is conceived and developed to solve a problem or introduce change to a current system. Every programmer or software development team must take time to understand the problem which the software to be developed is solving. The understanding will shape the requirements which will be designed for the software.

·         Planning: The entire software development process must be segmented into tasks and phases for easy evaluation. Detail timeline for the development must be set. This timeline is often constructed like a Gantt chart in order to know task duration and the resources required to finish each stage of the development. Resources for clarity mean man power, financial, internet (if needed) and other resources as required by tasks.

·         Designing: This stage is the most imperative in the entire process. This is where extensive consultation is conducted. This phase of the development involves the transformation of the requirements (derived from understanding problem stage) into a technical implementable format. This process can be initiated by the selection of the relevant technologies that will be appropriate for the development. Interoperability must be put into consideration as most programmers usually have predefined technologies to use even when there are better options. The design includes tasks like UML and Data flow illustration and software components (interface, database connectivity, transaction processing, error management, session management in case of web based applications). The design document provides the blue print for how the software will be developed technically.

·         Implementing: This is where the coding is conducted. This is where the instructions and details in the design document are converted to the actual software.

·         Testing, Evaluation and Maintaining: Testing is where the functionality of the implementation is investigated for flaws. This task is usually concerned with the discovery of flaws which must be fixed to ensure that the software conform to requirements. Experience has shown that numerous flaws and let offs are discovered during testing prompting repetitive implementing and testing cycle in reality. Evaluating the entire development follows after satisfactory testing is conducted. Evaluation documents the overall development process including the usefulness of the software for the development team. The evaluation usually involves installation for clients or commercial packaging for off the shelve softwares. Maintaining often conducted for customized software is the optimization of the installed software for optimal usage.

This explanation shows that ordinary coding (Implementation) cannot produce good softwares. This also shows the problem which numerous programmers are facing as software development involves more steps than coding. Developing a software or application requires high level of management thereby detailed focus on the systematic approach must be imbibed to ensure success.

This piece is my contribution to improving the human capacity in the Nigerian and global IT space. If you have learned something or you have any corrections, please leave your comments. My name is Pelumi Apantaku and my twitter handle is @Pelulomo_27

Where is My Finger………………!

Technology was developed as a means of improving the world and also helping every aspect of our lives. One of the interesting and contentious areas of technology use is in security. A lot of arguments have been made on whether technology is a security plus or another invention to escalate our security concerns.

Interestingly, my fingers are itching following the various thumb printing sessions I have encountered as a Nigerian. I had my finger print for the INEC registration, National ID Card, Nigeria immigration, GSM SIM card registration and will soon be asked to finger print for my drivers’s license. The fact is my finger is tired! The same finger spent over two years in the UK and only printed at Heathrow.

So many questions bother my mind. But the chief of it is my curiosity to know “where the prints of my fingers are?” Every government in the world normally disclose the service that manages their data and even go as far as making it available over every aspect of governance and even for the private sector in case of verification.

The only thing close to knowing where my finger print was kept is the display of some server rack during INEC registration advertisement. My heart bleeds because a very unique part of me is kept in a place I cannot tell my children or even boast of with my friends across the globe. As a nation, I know we have our challenges. But, finger print records should properly be managed because of its importance and even the possibility of malicious use by unscrupulous officials.

If security was at the base of taking biometric details of Nigerian citizens, I am still waiting to hear a landmark case where forensics pitch biometric record of a citizen with the evidence extracted from a crime scene.

What would have convinced me as an IT expert is prosecution based on the forensics findings from illegal ballot papers during election tribunal. My finger would have identified me if I stole ballot boxes or thumb print numerous times (still the same finger print). With the records from all these places I have dropped my finger prints, I will definitely be identified within 5 minutes. I am waiting for a day which we can use all this white elephant projects for purposeful societal benefit.

Also, my finger bothers why a single finger print is not enough to identify me.  Sometimes, I am lost for answer but my right side of brain suggests maybe my finger print can change as a Nigerian (LOL!). In essence, I think the current places where my finger print is should be publicly announced and also my finger should be spared of the stress by harmonizing the numerous duplication of my finger. Please my finger is complaining!

This piece is a direct (Uncensored) anger at the continuous finger printing in Nigeria by D-GITZ Media. Follow us on twitter handle @originaldgitz and D-GITZ Media friends group on Facebook.