I've found that the first 80% I can generally get done pretty quickly; most of the design and architecture is in my head and always running as a background task. I use Evernote to organize TODO's (always at the top of the list), and have little discussions with myself about stuff like features, UI's etc.
Life.Gets.In.The.Way.Restart.
Arrrrgh. Inevitably. Back to Evernote and pick up where I left off. It gets much harder during that last 20% (which usually takes me more than that first 80%), because the jump from Proof of Concept to Product is brutal.
Do.The.Worst.First.
A friend of mine, Sid the Sailor, used to talk about "painting the windowsills when the whole house needed cleaning"... especially combined with that last 20%, I have a tendency to go down rabbitholes (hey maybe I'll use RabbitMQ for this)... so, back to Evernote, and add the TODAY list - what's most important to get done. Then, suck it up, and do it. These often require very long late night sessions since it can often take hours for me to get started and get the momentum up to deal with the pile of poo. (Cause if it was fun it woulda been done).
Invite.Others.to.the.Party
During the process, unless it's Top Secret(tm), invite others to take a look at what you're doing. Early on it's nice to get some approval, later on, it's nice to get some feedback about usability. Be careful to avoid party poopers since you don't need to be discouraged - this shit is hard enough already.
Launch.the.fucker.
I have trouble with this one, because it's scary. It also generally means I'm going to end up with a pile of feedback (or bug reports) from a bunch of pissed off strangers. I really don't like it because it means work, and lots of it. It's the chasm between a brain fart and reality. And I get faced with the ultimate reality of "Hey maybe this sucks and I've just wasted a huge amount of time".
Now, in "practice what I preach mode", you might want to check out xlogs - http://xlo.gs - it provides logfiles for Amazon AWS and more. and i'm just launching it now :)
I've found that the first 80% I can generally get done pretty quickly; most of the design and architecture is in my head and always running as a background task. I use Evernote to organize TODO's (always at the top of the list), and have little discussions with myself about stuff like features, UI's etc.
Life.Gets.In.The.Way.Restart. Arrrrgh. Inevitably. Back to Evernote and pick up where I left off. It gets much harder during that last 20% (which usually takes me more than that first 80%), because the jump from Proof of Concept to Product is brutal.
Do.The.Worst.First. A friend of mine, Sid the Sailor, used to talk about "painting the windowsills when the whole house needed cleaning"... especially combined with that last 20%, I have a tendency to go down rabbitholes (hey maybe I'll use RabbitMQ for this)... so, back to Evernote, and add the TODAY list - what's most important to get done. Then, suck it up, and do it. These often require very long late night sessions since it can often take hours for me to get started and get the momentum up to deal with the pile of poo. (Cause if it was fun it woulda been done).
Invite.Others.to.the.Party During the process, unless it's Top Secret(tm), invite others to take a look at what you're doing. Early on it's nice to get some approval, later on, it's nice to get some feedback about usability. Be careful to avoid party poopers since you don't need to be discouraged - this shit is hard enough already.
Launch.the.fucker. I have trouble with this one, because it's scary. It also generally means I'm going to end up with a pile of feedback (or bug reports) from a bunch of pissed off strangers. I really don't like it because it means work, and lots of it. It's the chasm between a brain fart and reality. And I get faced with the ultimate reality of "Hey maybe this sucks and I've just wasted a huge amount of time".
Now, in "practice what I preach mode", you might want to check out xlogs - http://xlo.gs - it provides logfiles for Amazon AWS and more. and i'm just launching it now :)