Esendex Developer Competition Winners

I have participated in Esendex 2-way SMS Challenge and CallMeBack has got runner-up! CallMeBack is an innovative service that puts the callee in control of when to return a call, and the caller still pays for the call!

Originally posted on Esendex:

The SMS Developer Challenge invited talented developers form across the globe to submit their ideas for innovative use of 2-way SMS.

With fellow judges Mike Short, Chairman of the Mobile Data Association, Ewan MacLeod, Editor of SMS Text News, we awarded first place - a cash prize of £1,000 - to TextQube. Developed by UK-based Reynardine Software, TextQube makes it very easy for companies to mobilise their existing data by simply querying database information on a PC by SMS.

We all agreed that TextQube has real potential to drive more innovation in 2-way SMS as it allows businesses to trial a service to assess the business case before committing to further development and enhancements.

Mike Thompson of Reynardine Software said "It’s terrific to win this competition and a big thanks to Esendex for the opportunity to demonstrate the product and Reynardine's passion for efficient 2-way communication by mobile. TextQube is fantastic for SMEs that want to mobilise and control information on a new level."

Two runners-up have been awarded £500 each, CotralisSMSGPS from the Netherlands, and CallMeBack from Singapore. CotralisSMSGPS, chosen because it uses SMS to augment a blog post with a location, enables blog postings to be made from anywhere. Conference call service, CallMeBack was chosen due to its ability to use SMS to put the user in control of a conference call.

Mike Short commented, “All entries to the challenge have shown extraordinary levels of creativity and innovation. Dedicated to the mobile industry, I’m always eager to know about new developments so it was interesting for me to see the ideas that people have for the use of 2-way SMS.”

“As a mobile fanatic, I’ve really enjoyed judging this competition” said Ewan MacLeod. “The high quality of entrants reflected the interest in technology for the future of SMS as a communication and business service.”

Non-Programmer with Computer Science Major

Slashdot has an interesting discussion started by a graduate with Computer Science major and is looking for non-programming jobs. I have a computing degree, and I did find a few of my peers with the same degree who are not so proficient with coding, and is reluctant of getting their hands dirty.

From the discussion, there are a few points that I do believe:

• Computer Science is not about coding, it is about shaping solutions via computational methods
• But, saying that computer scientist is not the same as a programmer, and need not even know how to program, is just elitist crap!
• Accenture is always looking for fresh faced graduates who can't actually do anything. And it still looks good with Accenture on your resume..
• If you are majoring in Computer Science and you don't enjoy programming, then you kinda like majoring in psychology and don't like dealing with people
  
• We have to admit this - programming plays a large part in a Computer Science degree.
  

As pointed out, there are in fact a lot of other areas in IT that need no coding skill:

• Test engineers - Some testers automate tests with scripts, but some just run them
  
• Project manager - Keep track of dates, and understand the geeks
• Documentation - Good tech writers are as valuable as developers
• Technical sales - Can you hide a product's warts long enough to sell it?
• Administrators - Both the classic IT role, and as a system upgrade specialist
• Teaching - How many of your lecturers know only how to lecture?
  

Lastly, it was pointed out that programmers usually have some bad habits, which I do agree. Quoted:

Far too many programmers tends to think they do all the cool stuff, and everyone else are just useless fluff. They show scarily little appreciation for the amount of work people around them do to work around the problems caused by prima donna programmers that deliver poorly documented, badly written pieces of shit and refuse to acknowledge there are problems with their code.

Developers should not be only code writers. Developers should be capable of designing, coding and testing. By getting involve in the full spectrum of development, a developer is then truly responsible over the product. A good developer should also care about and acknowledge the existence of other issues - operation, cost, usability, etc..

Noisy and arrogant, I will always remember this comment.