Posts by: Steve Nimmons

2025: The Future Of Public Services In Wales

Last week in Cardiff, First Minister Carwyn Jones welcomed the launch of ‘2025: The Future of Public Services in Wales’ at its Cardiff launch conference. Professor Steve Martin, Director of the Centre for Local and Regional Government Research helped conceive and design…

Buy the Book: The Fractal Organization

The Fractal Organization: Creating Sustainable Organizations with the Viable System Model [source: Amazon] I was having a very interesting discussion with Nigel Green @taotwit about a week or so back, one topic that came to the fore was the Viable System Model…

Policy Enforcement Point Pattern

Figure 1 – Policy Enforcement Point Pattern [source: Steve Nimmons] Scenario: End-user requests access to an application / service. Request is routed through a Policy Enforcement Point. Policy Enforcement Point transfers the request details to a Policy Decision Point for evaluation and…

Maxims on Monday: Dedicated to Adam Smith

Wisdom of the great Adam Smith, social philosopher and economist: On the road from the City of Scepticism, I had to pass through the Valley of Ambiguity. Virtue is more to be feared than vice, because its excesses are not subject to…

Web Natives, Viral Friends

Figure 1 – Conceptualisation – Pulling it all together [Source: Steve Nimmons] If you’ve not yet seen this video from Friends School in Lisburn (FSL), take 8 minutes or so and peruse now. It could be argued that such ventures are highly…

Market Scan: Managed File Transfer

Figure 1 – Managed File Transfer Magic Quadrant 2009 [source: Gartner]   Figure 2 – Managed File Transfer Options MindMap [source: Steve Nimmons]   I was doing a quick options scan of the Managed File Transfer market earlier in the week. Gartner…

The Papier Mâché Rhino Anti Pattern

Human propelled papier mâché does not a rhino make Some pretty odd things happen in Japan, but these scenes from Ueno Zoo in Tokyo take the cake. Rhinos (depending on species) range in weight from 750 pounds to 8,000 pounds and stand…

The Ivory Tower Anti Pattern

Office of the First and Deputy-first Architects Ivory Towers are created by intellectual elitism, over-specialisation and condescension. The Ivory Tower Anti Pattern is a trap for the idealist, perfectionist and the aloof. Elegance, sophistication and aesthetics are not substitutes for architectural realism.…

The Dangers of Reification Fallacy

The model is not the economy A Reification Fallacy occurs when something abstract is treated as if it were real. The ‘evidence speaks for itself’, ‘nature knows best’, are examples of Reification Fallacies. Reification itself is not (necessarily) problematic (contrast reification and…

10 Point Baloney Detection Kit

Baloney Detector I am by no means a devotee of Dawkins, but I did enjoy this video from the Richard Dawkins Foundation for Science and Reason. It features Michael Shermer, Director of the Skeptic’s Society, describing his 10-point Baloney Detection Kit. Shermer…

The Cookie Licker Anti Pattern

Beware the Cookie Licker A greedy sibling has gorged themselves on cookies, you have designs on the last one. Anticipating your move, they lift and lick it, claiming it, but with neither appetite or need. The manner of its claim renders ‘ownership…

Maxims on Monday: Dedicated to Bertrand Russell

Bertrand Russell 3rd Earl Russell, OM, FRS Russell was an exceptional thinker, a true polymath, philosopher, logician, mathematician, historian, and social critic. I am at odds with many of Russell’s views on political and social activism and religion, but revere his intellect…
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