Minggu, 06 Februari 2011

'The Matrix 4' and '5': Are the Rumors True?

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Even though this may well turn out to be just another cleverly orchestrated Keanu Reeves meme, the Internet is abuzz today with reports that the actor revealed to a group of London students that two more installments in 'The Matrix' franchise may be on the way -- in 3D, no less.



Now, before you start annoying all your friends by whipping out that lame 'There is no spoon' quote again, consider that the original source -- an anonymous Ain't It Cool News reader going by 'El-Nino' -- is questionable to the extreme and that Entertainment Weekly has already debunked the news. Still, we have to wonder if there isn't something to the rumors, given that the 'Matrix' franchise raked in more than $1.5 billion.



But after the debacles that were 2003's 'The Matrix Reloaded' and 'The Matrix Revolutions,' the two disjointed follow-ups to the truly groundbreaking 1999 original, the biggest question may be whether Reeves and the Wachowski brothers should expect anyone to care.



So, what do you think of this very intriguing and probably not true development? While you're contemplating, check our our pick for the best moment from 'The Matrix' trilogy below, and if you dare, click here to feast your eyes on the worst.

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Sundance 2011 Full Roundup: All Our Reviews, Interviews and More

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You might not have been able to tell because we're really good at what we do (wink, wink), but a big film festival like Sundance takes a lot of effort to cover. Thanks to all the team members who contributed, and thanks to YOU for making us one of your favorite film-festival-coverage destinations!



But now we're done (until next January, anyway). So here's all of our 2011 Sundance output in one handy-dandy location.



Interviews



... and gathered together here are Josh Leonard, Jess Weixler and Mark Webber of 'The Lie.'



Read on for all our reviews, features, and cinematical miscellania!

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Renewable Energy and Cleantech Mutual Funds and ETFs: Does Tax Efficiency Matter?

Alternative Energy and Climate Change Mutual Funds, Part VI



Tom Konrad CFA



My recent article, In
Clean
Energy,
Active
Management
Pays
, started a bit of a
controversy. Rafael Coven, the Index Manager for The Cleantech
Index (^CTIUS), which is the index behind the Powershares
Cleantech Portfolio (PZD)
, left
a
comment
on
Barrons
and sent me an email saying, 'Your
comparison of funds and ETFs ignores the tax efficiency differences
which are very significant
.'



Rafael is right that it's important for many investors to consider
taxes before making an investment decision, and that ETFs
are
often
more
tax
efficient
than
mutual funds
. But are the
differences in the particular case of clean energy funds really "very
significant"? I had my doubts, so I decided to look at the
numbers and find out.



Why ETFs are Usually More Tax Efficient



ETFs are generally considered more tax efficient because they make
fewer capital gains distributions. A mutual fund or ETF that
sells a position at a profit is required by law to return a prorata
share of any net capital gains to the fund's investors every
year. Positions held less than a year produce short term capital
gains, while positions held more than a year produce long term capital
gains. When these gains are returned to investors, they are
taxable as short or long term capital gains, regardless of whether the
funds are reinvested.



In general, actively managed mutual funds trade much more often than
ETFs, which passively track an index. While many mutual funds
trade much of their portfolio once or more a year, most ETFs only
trade a tiny fraction of their portfolio in order to keep up with
changes in the underlying index.



Hence a mutual fund with a Turnover Ratio of 100% (meaning that, on
average, 100% of the funds holdings are traded each year) will, on
average, only hold a position for a year, and will distribute the
majority of capital gains to shareholders every year, much of which
will be in the form of short term capital gains, which are typically
taxed at a higher rate than long term capital gains. In
contrast, an ETF with a Turnover Ratio of 10% will, on average, hold a
position for ten years. This allows time for significant
undistributed capital gains to build up, and when those capital gains
are distributed, they almost always come in the form of long term
capital gains, which are usually taxed at a lower rate.



Who Needs to Worry About Tax
Efficiency, and Who Doesn't




Not all investors need be concerned about the tax
efficiency. Most obviously, investors who are investing in
a non-taxable account, such as an IRA and a 401(k). Tax exempt
institutions, such as charities, also need not worry about tax
efficiency. Finally, people in lower tax brackets need be less
concerned than those with high incomes, since the taxes on capital
gains distributions will be lower for them.



Undistributed Gains



Most renewable energy stocks are down significantly over the last three
years (roughly the same period as the track record of most of the
ETFs.) This means that, at least in the short term, many mutual
funds and ETFs will not have any capital gains distributions no matter
how well they perform, because previous year's capital losses will be
available to offset future gains. (While funds are required to
distribute realized capital gains, they have no way of distributing
realized capital losses, except for offsetting future gains.)



The Numbers



Morningstar has data on most fund's tax efficiency, including
adjusted returns assuming distributions are taxable, and potential
capital gains exposure (undistributed capital gains as a percentage of
net assets.) The following two tables and charts compare the ETF
and mutual fund three year returns on both tax adjusted and unadjusted
basis, along with potential capital gains exposure and fund
turnovers. Where possible, I used no-load mutual fund shares
because I feel they are more comparable to ETFs than load shares,
despite the fact that long term mutual fund buyers should generally
prefer load shares because of their lower annual expense ratios.






















































ETF 3yr pretax

total return

3yr tax adj

total return

Potential Cap

Gains Exposure

Turnover

QCLN




-43.34% -43.34% -52% 40%
PZD




-28.31% -28.38% -40% 31%
PBD




-56.22% -56.28% -98% 62%
GEX




-64.96% -65.03% -198% 50%
PBW




-59.90% -59.90% -234% 42%
ICLN




insufficient track record

-64%








































































Mutual Fund

3yr pretax

total return
3yr tax adj

total return
Potential Cap


Gains Exposure
Turnover
WGGFX




-38.09% -38.76% -46% 93%
NALFX




-36.19% -39.81% -25.00% 34%
CGACX -61.73% -61.73% -110% 61%
AECOX




-48.72% -51.72% -68% 39%
GAAEX

-66.23%

-67.52%

-241%

47%

WRMSX




-42.70% -42.88% -260% 114%
SRICX




15.43% 12.65% 0.60% 190%
ALTEX




-33.01% -33.01% -22.18% 41%



etf tax chart.png


mutual fund tax chart.png



As you can see from the tables, the ETFs have indeed been more
tax-efficient than the mutual funds, but the differences are so
marginal that they are difficult to detect in the charts.



More striking are the extremely large negative
capital gains exposures of many mutual funds and ETFs. The DWS
Climate
Change
Fund
(WRMSX)
, Guinness
Atkinson Alternative Energy Fund (GAAEX),
Van
Eck
Global Alternative Energy Fund (GEX)
, and the PowerShares
Clean
Energy (PBW)
all have undistributed capital losses equal to
multiples of the funds' current values (260%, 241%, 234%, and
198%).
That means that all the holdings in each fund's portfolio could be sold
for three or more times their current value and the funds would still
not have
to distribute any capital gains. Tax efficiency will remain
a moot point for years to come, at least for these four funds, as well
as for the PowerShares
Global
Clean Energy Portfolio (PBD)
and the Calvert
Global Alternative Energy Fund (CGACX)
.



The only fund for which I can really call tax efficiency a concern is
the Gabelli
SRI
Green Fund (SRICX)
. Why does the Gabelli fund stand out
as having a "problem" with tax efficiency? Because the Gabelli
fund
actually managed to turn a decent profit over the last three
years, while their clean energy mutual fund and especially ETF rivals
lost money hand
over fist
. I recently interviewed
John
Segrich, CFA, the lead fund manager at the Gabelli SRI Green fund
,
and he explained in part how they did it.



When it's a sign you're making money, tax inefficiency seems like a
good "problem" to have.



Turnover



It's also worth noting the fairly high Turnover ratios of all of the
ETFs, ranging from 30% to over 60%. That means that, on average,
the
holdings of Clean energy ETFs trade once every 2-3 years, which is not
enough time to build up substantial unrealized capital gains, although
the majority of capital gains distributions are likely to be in the
form of long term capital gains. In fact, the New
Alternatives
FD Inc (NALFX)
has a lower turnover ratio than all but
one of the clean energy ETFs.



Even when we return to an environment where most of these funds are
habitually making gains, and the negative capital gains exposures of
many of the funds are exhausted, these ETFs will have less of an
advantage in tax efficiency over the clean energy mutual funds than
broad market ETFs have over their peers, unless the ETF turnover ratios
fall faster than those of the mutual funds.



Conclusion



While Clean
Energy
ETFs
are a little bit more tax efficient than Clean
Energy
Mutual Funds
, the difference is not currently significant.
Clean
Energy is a very young sector with high volatility and quickly changing
industry structure. The changeable nature of the clean energy
landscape means that a lot of the usual rules do not apply. Not
only do active
managers
have a significant advantage over passively managed funds like
ETFs
, but passive clean energy funds also have much less
significant
tax advantages than passive broad market funds.



DISCLOSURE: No Positions. GAAEX is an
advertiser on AltEnergyStocks.com.


DISCLAIMER: The information and
trades provided here are for informational purposes only and are not a
solicitation to buy or sell any of these securities. Investing involves
substantial risk and you should evaluate your own risk levels before
you make any investment. Past results are not an indication of future
performance. Please take the time to read the
full disclaimer
here
.

Solar Tracer at the Penny Stock Arcade

Dana Blankenhorn



Look up Solar Tracer Corp. on Google and you'll be asked if you
really mean “solar tracker,” which sends you to a company called Opel Solar (OPL.V),
which makes solar concentrators.


Sometimes you should listen to your Google.


But I wanted to learn about Solar Tracer, which says it was bought this weekend by Sector 10 (SECI.OB), a
failing maker of emergency
response equipment
.


That last is not hyperbole – Sector 10 hasn't brought in any revenue
for over a year. It's a stock market trick old as
time, a shell buying an operating company so the latter can go public
at low cost.


But why? Why would Solar Tracer want to go public sub rosa? (Full
disclosure. I own no penny stocks. I did have some AIG once, before
that went into penny territory. I bought in at $60. If you are looking
for investment advice, move along.)


Turns out Solar Tracer is run by the Tedrow brothers of Florida. CEO
Christian is a writer, CFO Tyler a venture capitalist. The two have
been working on a thriller called the Judgement
Trilogy
– they write under the name Thomas
Tedrow
.


Tyler is managing partner
of HART Capital
Management
in Orlando, which describes itself as “a new kind of
venture capital firm.” Among its listed investments is ChinaPharmaHub,
for which Christian (left) sits on the business
advisory board
. ChinaPharma says it is interested in identifying
and bringing to market interesting drugs from China.


Now that you know something about the management, what would you be
buying, if you were interested in buying into this? Mainly Eugene
Augustin
, an expert on microwave
antennas
last seen in July selling his solar antenna expertise to Lady Bug Resource Group,
a Kirkland, Washington based outfit that apparently held the URL
Newsolartec as a subsidiary. Christian Tedrow was listed as the owner
of that URL until last week, when it expired.


After buying Augustin's expertise, in November, LadyBug named a
Thomas F. Krucker its new CEO. Krucker is a former Toyota executive.
Inside of a month Krucker bought MAG International, which said it was developing electric off-road vehicles (its Web site was
recently disabled.


So what's going on?


Near as I can determine the Tedrows needed a new vehicle after
LadyBug flew away. That's what Sector 10 is, a company that owns what
was NewSolarTec but is now called Solar Tracer.


Back when the LadyBug deal got done, Solar Thermal Magazine ran a piece on the Tedrows, and New Solar. In
that piece Christian Tedrow described the Solar Tracer as a solar concentrator that can heat water into
steam for generating electricity.


There's nothing new here. Solar concentrators are old tech. There
are breakthroughs going on here but little evidence Mr. Augustin has
one.


Still, shares in Sector 10 doubled in value, to 1.8 cents per share , on the day after the
Tedrow news broke. OTC Picks featured the company
without knowing they were out of the emergency response business. Their
story paints the company as an emergency preparedness play.


I'm guessing this is another ride on the penny stock arcade that's
going to end in tears.


But it would be so much fun to be proven wrong.


Disclosure: None


Dana
Blankenhorn
first
covered the energy industries in 1978 with the
Houston Business Journal. He returned last month after a short 29 year
hiatus because it's the best business story of our time. In between he
covered PCs, the Internet, e-commerce, open source, the Internet of
Things and Moore's Law. It's the application of the last to harvesting
the energy all around us he's most excited about. He lives in Atlanta.

Dividend-Paying Energy Efficiency Stocks

Tom Konrad CFA



Clean energy investing is not on for
growth investors, traders, and speculators. Conservative income
investors can invest in green companies as well, and dividend paying
energy efficiency stocks deserve pride of place in their portfolios.




In my clean energy
investing workshops
, I tell attendees that investing in clean
energy stocks does not have to be riskier than investing in any other
sector. The key to investing in clean energy with a low risk
profile is the same as low risk investing in any other sector: find
stable, profitable companies selling at reasonable valuations.



Identifying stable, profitable companies is not always easy. Even
if a company is profitable today, rising competition, the falling price
of alternatives, or changing technology can rapidly undermine business
models and profits. A rapidly changing legal, regulatory, and
cultural landscape further complicates the search. All of
these factors apply in clean energy, but much more in rapidly evolving
technology and incentive driven sectors such as solar PV and cellulosic
ethanol than in more staid sectors such as energy efficiency and
conservation.



The Economics of Energy Efficiency



Energy
efficiency
stocks
lack the sex appeal of solar
stocks
or smart
grid
stocks
, but that very dowdiness makes them much more stable
than most other alternative energy sectors. Further, unlike most
renewable energy, much energy efficiency makes economic sense without
incentives, so the companies are less dependent on the government to
drive sales. If Google
(GOOG)
had chosen to make energy efficiency cheaper than coal
("EE<C"), rather than renewable
energy
cheaper than coal (RE<C)
they'd have been done before
they started.



Dividends

One reason firms pay dividends is because it's a way to signal to
investors that management is confident about their ability to pay that
level of dividend far into the future. Dividend cuts are
embarrassing to management, and even worse for a company's stock price,
so companies that pay dividends tend to believe that they will be able
to remain profitable and keep on paying that dividend.



Safer Clean Energy Stocks



Given this, dividend paying energy efficiency stocks are a great place
to start when looking for relatively stable clean energy
investments. The list that follows is simply a result of me going
through our
list of energy efficiency stocks
and pulling out the ones that pay
a dividend. I plan to look more deeply into many of these
companies in future articles.












































































Company
(Ticker)

Yield*

notes /
articles

Aixtron AG
(AIXG)
0.3%

LEDs

Cabot Corp
(CBT)
1.8%

green building

Eaga PLC
(EAGA.L)
5.0%**

UK residential energy efficiency

General
Electric
(GE)
2.8%

A little of everything

Honeywell
(HON)
2.2%

HVAC, building controls

Johnson
Controls
(JCI)
1.6%

Building controls

Kingspan
Group, PLC (KGSPF.PK)
0.6%**

Green Building

Linear
Technology Corp. (LLTC)
2.7%

Efficient power conversion

Neo-Neon
Holdings (1868.hk)
1.5%**

LEDs

PFB
Corporation (PFB.TO)
5.0%

Green
Building
/
PFB
Corporation
Philips
(PHG)
2.5%

Lighting

Power
Integrations
(POWI)
0.5%

Power
conversion / Power Integrations


Waterfurance
Renewable
Energy (WFI.TO)
3.5%

Geothermal
Heat
Pumps





*The dividend rates were as of January 28, 2010, and may have changed
due to changes in the stock price or dividend policy since then.



**These London and Hong Kong listed companies follow the European
practice
of declaring a final and interim dividend that varies much more than
the typical US-based dividend, so the dividend may be less of an
indicator of earnings stability.



If you know of any dividend paying efficiency stocks I've missed,
please let me know in a comment.



DISCLOSURE: Long
PFB.TO, WFI.TO

DISCLAIMER: The information and
trades provided here and in the comments are for informational purposes
only and are not a solicitation to buy or sell any of these securities.
Investing involves substantial risk and you should evaluate your own
risk levels before you make any investment. Past results are not an
indication of future performance. Please take the time to read the full disclaimer
here.

Why I Believe in Thin Film

Dana Blankenhorn


When most people think of solar energy, they see flat panels on a
roof.


They don't think about thin film. They don't see it.


This is one of the many advantages of CIGS and other thin
film solar technologies
. So what if its efficiency is half that of
a panel? It conforms to the shape of the place where it lays.


Thin film can also be productized in ways no panel can. It can be
turned into something retailers can sell or bloggers will drool over. Try doing that with a panel.


With the exception of the 800-pound Gorilla First
Solar Inc (FSLR)
, it's true
that we're still measuring the annual supply from these manufacturers
in megawatts, figures utility companies can't (and often don't want to)
hear, except as window-dressing or a source of subsidies.
But changing that equation is as simple as getting the right product
into mass production. (Skeptics should listen again to the words of
former DEC CEO Ken Olsen. 'There is
no reason for any individual to have a computer in his home
.')


Personally I think I've seen the future and it's thin.


Copper indium gallium (di)selenide is also not the only possible formula for a thin film. Sharp
(SHCAY.PK)
is looking at amorphous silicon, despite Applied
Materials' (AMAT)
failure with it.
Maybe they will succeed, and maybe they'll fail too. The search for new
materials will go on. (Like the man told Dustin Hoffman in The
Graduate, 'One word. Plastics.')


There is a ton of competition in this space. Analysts at Greentech
Media recently wrote a list of just CIGS thin film companies for a
story on one of them. Want to hear it? Solar Frontier, Q-Cells
(QCLSF.PK)
, Solyndra,
SoloPower, MiaSolé, Wuerth Solar, Stion, GSP, Nanosolar. They can't all be wrong, can they?


And is that an exhaustive list? Far from it. Venture capitalists are
funding more all the time, often on the promise of greater efficiency.
While analysts at Greentech Media are very positive about companies
like AQT Solar
that can get into production fast and cheap, or SoloPower, with its claims of UL Labs approval,
it's clear to me that this is the first mile of a corporate marathon.


Put it this way. How many PC makers from the late 1970s can you
name? (Other than Apple.) In terms of this market, I don't even think
we're at 1977 yet.


There are just so many directions in which improvement can happen
with thin films. Efficiency, production cost, durability, materials
cost, etc. It's true that the total power being supplied by CIGS right
now looks pathetic next to standard panels, but the advantages are just
too obvious.


That's why companies like Dow Chemical and (now) Intel
are putting cash into the space. Dow likes the idea of solar systems
that go on with the roof, that in fact are the roof. Intel likes Sulfurcell, a German company that claims (as
others do) that thin films can be as efficient as panels.


The way to look at this is not through the eyes of current
production, or short-term profits. It's about the technologies behind
the curtain, the new materials and techniques that can get that to
market. A good venture capitalist will invest in 10 plays knowing only
three will ever bring him any return, but in hopes that 1 of those
three will be huge. That's the right attitude to have.


What does it mean when every roof, every wall, every tent
and bleach blanket can be delivering solar power to its owner?
Remember, electronics and many electrical devices are requiring
less-and-less power every year.


More to the point, what does it mean to an industry that depends on
long-term contracts for construction of panel systems if the wall can
deliver just as much power for the cost of wallpapering? Or painting?
That's a silly question today, but one that the people in this business
should probably start thinking about.


Dana
Blankenhorn
first
covered the energy industries in 1978 with the
Houston Business Journal. He returned last month after a short 29 year
hiatus because it's the best business story of our time. In between he
covered PCs, the Internet, e-commerce, open source, the Internet of
Things and Moore's Law. It's the application of the last to harvesting
the energy all around us he's most excited about. He lives in Atlanta.

How to SSH into your XenServer from Mac and Windows



Sometimes it comes in handy to manage your XenServer via command line. Maybe you just want to perform some of the xsconsole functions. Here are some options:



From a Mac:



1. Navigate to Applications > Utilities > Terminal

2. use the ssh command to get to your XenServer. lets try an example where we are connecting with teh default root account on a host called xenserver-phx01 and password is MyPassword1



ssh -l root xenserver-phx01


You can aso specify a port if you were to change the default ssh port from the default of 22



ssh -l root xenserver-phx01 -p 8080





Here is a screen shot of the mac terminal accessing a XenServer







of course you can also run the xsconsole to get the Text UI:







The same commands apply to a connection from a linux machine.




Here are some screen shots from a windows machine using putty.










If you have many machines to administer among difference connection types Felix Deimel from mRemote.org (merged with VisionApp) has a cool tool called mRemote that you can use as well.







You can use the configuration console to enter the address, port username etc for connection.








Happy SSH'ing!

rat








How to Activate License code and download the Citrix Ready Demo Licenses.



This document will help Citrix Ready Partners understand How to Activate License code and download the Citrix Ready Demo Licenses they are entitled to.


Please follow the steps below to download the License.






Step1: Login into MyCitrix - Choose a Toolbox - Select Partner Use License











Step2: From the Current Tool, Choose Partner Demo Licenses and click on Get Software











Step3: Choose the appropriate Citrix Product to download the Demo License.











Step4: For example choose XenDesktop, copy the Serial Number (License Access Code)






FYI -XenDesktop Platinum Edition includes XenApp Platinum/Enterprise Edition Demo License











Step5: Click on Choose a Toolbox - Activate System/Manage Assets











Step6: From the drop down, select Activate/Allocate and the paste the License Access Code and click on Continue











Step7: Select I Cannot find my reseller and click on continue.











Step8: Choose your contact information and click on submit.











Step9: Verify your contact information and click on Submit.











Step10: Click on Continue.











Step11: Enter the Quantity and enter the Hostname of the License Server and click Allocate.




Please refer FAQ for more information



Please refer to the Citrix Ready Program Benefits under the number of licenses allocated for all 3 Levels under Citrix Ready Program.












Step12: Confirm the allocation and click on Confirm.











Step13: Click to download the license file.














If you need any more information, Please don't hesitate to write to citrixready@citrix.com



Virtually Everything You Need to Set Up and Use VDI for Free



With XenDesktop 5 Express, you can create a virtual desktop (VDI) production environment for up to 10 users or an evaluation environment as a POC ...for free! The XenDesktop Express download includes everything you need plus a tutorial video that walks you through the installation process. (You could also use XenDesktop with Microsoft Hyper-V or VMware vSphere as the virtualization layer, but we recommend the included XenServer 5.6).



Then when you're comfortable with your XenDesktop environment on a LAN, you can try it out on a WAN for free with Citrix Access Gateway VPX 5.0.1 Express.



Here's what you need...



Product Download



Download XenDesktop 5 Express edition from: http://www.citrix.com/tryxendesktop



This download (filename: XD5_Express.zip) includes:



  • XenDesktop5.iso - XenDesktop Controller & Virtual Desktop Agent

  • XenServer 5.6.0-install-cd.iso - XenServer 5.6 virtualization infrastructure

  • XenCenter.ja.msi - Install for XenCenter Japanese language version

  • XenDesktop_Express_Edition_License.lic - 10 user XenDesktop license

  • XenDesktop5_Express_Edition_Tutorial.wmv - Step-by-step guidance for a XenDesktop setup







Licenses



Included in the XenDesktop Express download zip:

(Note: Product offers a 30 day grace period until license is applied.)



  • XenDesktop 5 Express License file - Covers Controller, Virtual Desktops, and XenServer

  • XenServer License - License using XenDesktop Controller's licensing feature (refer to tutorial video)







Sample Configuration



One or more servers capable of supporting the following:



  • Windows 2008 or Windows 2008 R2 servers




-- Desktop controller, 2 GB quad core

-- Optional server for other pieces (IIS SQL, Web Interface*, Active Directory, etc.)



*Note: Web Interface could be included on the Desktop Controller instead.



  • Windows 7 virtual desktops (VDAs), at least 1GB and 1 core each VM







Documentation






More documentation can be found here.





General Info






Phase 2: Access Gateway



Once you're comfortable with your XenDesktop environment on a LAN, it's time to try it out on a WAN ...for free. Citrix Access Gateway VPX is a virtual machine based solution for remote access to your XenDesktop environment. Access Gateway VPX configured in 'Express mode,' will allow a max of 5 users for 1 year. Here are links to the resources:





Hope you find this information helpful. If you've tried this yourself or there are other resources that you've found useful, please share!





Laura Whalen

Citrix Systems, Inc.

Follow me on Twitter



When a tree falls



...unobserved, in a remote forest, does it make a sound?'. You can of course argue this till you're blue in the face, but I like the simple empirical approach: 'No. Sound is a human experience of vibration, so no humans means no sound'.



Yesterday another redwood crashed to the ground without a sound. Nobody was paying attention to it. The news: the double whammy announcements by OpenStack.org of the Bexar release of OpenStack, and the simultaneous announcement by Cisco that it would embrace and contribute to the development of OpenStack.

It is difficult to understate the significance of OpenStack, and Cisco's participation, to all prospective operators and users of cloud infrastructure. On behalf of the community, I want to recognize the help of Michael Enescu, CTO for Open Source Initiatives and Lew Tucker, CTO for Enterprise Cloud at Cisco, who have championed OpenStack at Cisco. Also, Canonical has announced that it is joining the OpenStack community, which is a substantial shift from its earlier embrace of Eucalyptus, and a very welcome addition of a high calibre engineering team to the OpenStack effort.



With its announcement Cisco has embraced a both a technology base and a process for delivery of an open, interoperable and compatible cloud framework. Building on the contributions of a community of over 50 vendors and about 150 developers, OpenStack is delivering open source cloud infrastructure that operates at provider scale, and guarantees openness, portability and compatibility. It supports all major hypervisors, including XenServer Hyper-V, KVM and (courtesy of Citrix) VMware ESXi. So, if your application vendor were foolish enough to insist that they would only support the app virtualized on ESX, you could still build a free cloud, and run the workload on ESXi.



OpenStack allows you to build a scalable service-provider class cloud of your own, featuring compute, block and object storage, and in future, a wide variety of value-added services from a rich ISV ecosystem that can use it. To be clear: Every ISV solution built to use the Margherita Pizza model of cloud infrastructure will also be able to deliver value on an OpenStack cloud. OpenStack is already making headlines in the service provider segment. With the help of our friends at CloudScaling, Internap has announced the first production deployment of a service based on the massively scalable OpenStack object store.



Cisco's announcement signals clearly that OpenStack has emerged as the industry's leading, collaboratively developed alternative to proprietary, closed cloud solutions. Figures released at the announcement event yesterday are indicative: About 150 contributors from over 50 member organizations contributed to the Bexar release. The rate of feature delivery is incredible, and the ISV ecosystem around OpenStack is growing fast. For example, Gazzang is now offering security for data in the cloud.



Anso Labs, a boutique code foundry that collaborated with NASA to deliver the original Nebula compute cloud that has evolved into OpenStack Nova has also been very active in the community. At a meeting at the Hilton Santa Clara last night, over 200 attendees got a first peek at the latest open source tools and APIs from Anso, and got to hear Chris Kemp, CTO of NASA, describe their use of the technology to build clouds for the NASA scientists. Gordon Mangione from Citrix articulated our strategy for the delivery of OpenStack clouds to the enterprise and service provider segment.





‘Mubarak, Mubarak, What Have You Done?’

Yasmine El Rashidi









Chris Hondros/Getty Images


Protesters gather on the front line between anti- and pro-Mubarak factions on the edge of Tahrir Square as an Egyptian Army tank stands by, Cairo, February 3, 2011








On Tuesday, February 1, we headed to Tahrir Square for the “million man” march with some apprehension. After a week of growing protests, the military, which had arrived on Friday, had increased its presence in downtown Cairo, and the perimeter of the square was now completely barricaded with concrete blocks and metal barriers. Just two narrow entryways had been left—each manned by a dozen soldiers and just as many civilian volunteers. Despite the soldiers’ promise not to use force, many of us who entered the square wondered if they would trap us inside, and then, perhaps even shoot. By 4 PM however—well after the 3 PM curfew set by the military—we knew no harm would come, and the protest turned into something of a festival.


The army and the protesters worked together to weed out infiltrators trying to stir up trouble, and the crowd began chanting about the people and army being one. Estimates of the turnout varied, from one million to three. There was barely an empty square foot in the entire square and adjoining streets; people sang, played cards, shared meals, and later in the evening, began to talk of holding a soccer tournament, together with the army. One Al Jazeera correspondent compared it to a rock concert. People spoke of feeling pride at being Egyptian, some of them for the first time in their lives.


There were still a few thousand people in Tahrir Square early Wednesday morning—mostly men, who had remained following Tuesday’s march. I had gone home Tuesday night after spending the day there, and my plan now was simply to drop by early to get a feel for the “morning after.” When I arrived at the square, I was checked thoroughly by four soldiers and five civilian volunteers—three men and two veiled women. They searched my bag, gave me a pat down to insure I was not carrying a weapon, and asked for my ID. Eventually I was waved in, with a stern warning that any form of violence or incitement would not be tolerated.


Many were still sleeping when I got there, just after 8 AM: some on the grass with blankets over them; others in blue nylon camping tents. A few were at the foot of the sand-colored army tanks that had been stationed around the square and were now covered with anti-Mubarak graffiti. In scattered corners, hundreds of others were having breakfast and had already resumed chanting for Mubarak to leave—taking turns at loudspeakers to come up with inventive new slogans. In one corner, by a metro stop that has been closed for a week now, a gathering of 400 protesters recited poetry—their own, against the current regime. “Mubarak, Mubarak,” one of them repeated, “what have you done, look at the country, where art thou?”


Intermittently, two young men who referred to themselves as “The Organizing Committee”—self-appointed civilians who had already spent several nights in the square would take the mike, and with husky voices, tired from days of chanting, call on the crowds to make this ninth day of protest another peaceful one. No fighting, no arguing, and no tension—even if provoked. “We are here as one. We are having a good time. We are well fed and we are united—young, old, Christian, Muslim, men, women. We are simply Egyptians, and we want to show the world what the Egyptian people are all about—peace and unity.”


People were clapping, beating on drums, and singing along to rhyming anti-Mubarak jokes and refrains. (One dark one was about having to flee the country: “Egyptair, Egyptair, business is good, Mubarak’s staying, so we all need flights.”) A few portable radios were on, tuned to the news or playing popular Egyptian songs. Men and women were entering the square with bags filled with food—breadsticks, packets of wafer biscuits, cartons of mango and guava juice. I recognized one of the women, a historian and collector, carrying bottles of Nestle water. Nearby, two young boys selling biscuits were arguing about how to divide their profits. A man nudged my shoulder, noticing my camera. Pointing to the picture of Mubarak strapped around his neck and marked with a red X, he took off his shoe, placed it on the president’s head, and asked me to photograph him.









Yasmine El Rashidi


An anti-Mubarak demonstrator








One man called on the president to step down soon: “Please, my arm is aching from holding up this sign,” he said.


I circled Tahrir for awhile, chatting with protesters who in some cases had been there for three or four days. “If Mubarak does not leave, I will die on Tahrir’s soil,” one man shouted in my ear, wagging his finger, then pointing up to the circling military helicopter overhead, waving it to go away. “Take Mubarak with you, take Mubarak with you,” the crowds shouted as it circled lower and closer, observing them.


No one was satisfied with Mubarak’s address to the nation the night before, in which he’d promised not to run in the September presidential elections, and the general sentiment was that it was too little too late. Those gathered were already planning ahead for more nights in Tahrir, and for this week’s Friday prayer, discussing who would lead the sermon in the square and where exactly that imam—or civilian—would stand. Mubarak had said in his speech that he would die on Egyptian soil; many of the people I talked to said they were prepared to die in Tahrir Square if he didn’t yield.


When I left mid-morning, I began to sense that the day might take a turn for the worse. As I passed two army tanks that were blocking one of the roads I saw a shrieking woman in a purple veil take on a group of thirty protesters. “You are ruining our country,” she yelled. “We had peace for thirty years, and in one week you have brought us to war. Mubarak is good. Mubarak is the best.” From a distance, the Organizing Committee called for the argument to be broken up. A young man in a green ‘Brazil’ hoodie and black jeans jumped to the cause, taking the woman’s arm and asking her to calm down. He escorted her out of the square, and a human shield formed to prevent her from charging in again. “What is happening,” someone’s voice echoed through a loud speaker, “is that NDP people”—i.e. from Mubarak’s party—“are trying to infiltrate the crowds and cause conflict. We will not allow that. We respect everyone’s opinions, but for those who are pro-Mubarak, there are hundreds of other squares around the city for you to occupy—this one though, is ours.” The voice then called on a group of two hundred men to block a far passage into the square where pro-Mubarak protesters were rumoured to be approaching.


I turned around, and noticed the speaker point up to the monolithic building—the government’s administrative center known as the mugamma—to his left. He asked the crowd to follow his finger, directed up at a corner of the roof. “YOU!” he shouted. “Yes you, in the dark glasses who we have seen every day spy on us from above. You can go back and report to the president that we are not going anywhere, until he does.” The crowd roared in applause. The mugamma has been closed for days now, shielded by the military, patrolled by soldiers.


As I exited Tahrir, I noticed the pro-Mubarak crowds beginning to gather. Two hundred of them stood at one of the main entry passages chanting against the opposition figure Mohamed ElBaradei, calling him a traitor and spy. They heckled protesters entering the square in a similar way, trying to provoke a confrontation. After lingering a little, they followed me down the Corniche in the direction of a rally, past the charred remains of the NDP headquarters, which had been burned over the weekend, past rows of tanks and soldiers, and on to the State TV and Radio building, where several hundred more pro-Mubarak protesters were already congregated, blasting the national anthem. There were some women among them—one in a wheelchair, fuming, at what had become of the city—but mainly men: some teachers, some white-collar employees, and scores of lower-middle class men in their twenties.


My notebook gave me away, and they surrounded me—dozens of them—roughly demanding that I take notes and report their accusations against the Tahrir protesters. I was pushed and shoved and someone spit in my face. Some of those around me seemed to have switched sides, moved by the president’s Tuesday speech. “Please write,” one man in his forties ordered me in broken English, tapping his finger forcefully on my notebook. “Mubarak, I am sorry. Please, forgive me. I am sorry.” Others wanted me to document their conspiracy theories: In particular, that the Muslim Brotherhood is funded by Iran, and that ElBaradei, who is known to have a villa in Austria and thought to have made a relative fortune from his IAEA post, pays anti-Mubarak protesters LE50 (about $9) a day to stay in the square. “And they get free KFC,” one urged me to add. “And it’s LE200 not LE50.”


The pro-Mubarak crowd seemed tense, on the verge of rioting. Among them, I also spotted a dozen uniformed police—the same ones who had vanished from the streets after Friday’s protests—now cheering, dancing, being carried on people’s shoulders wielding pro-Mubarak signs. One of them looked wearily at me as I pointed my camera up at him. He seemed to direct a soldier to me, who checked my journalist’s card and gave me the ‘OK’ to go ahead with my work.









Yasmine El Rashidi


Pro-Mubarak demonstrators hoisting policemen on their shoulders








I managed to move away from the crowd, and as I walked home, I called a friend who hadn’t yet been to the square that morning—Elijah Zarwan of the International Crisis Group—telling him it felt like clashes were imminent. Newscasters on State TV, perhaps knowingly, had already issued warnings that violence could erupt and urged citizens to stay home.


At 11:46 AM the government restored Internet access—it had been blocked for six days, since midnight on Thursday—and warnings about violence were circulating there too—on Facebook posts and Twitter feeds. We had all heard that pro-Mubarak protesters and thugs had been on the streets the night before, and an unofficial photocopied flyer had been circulating urging protesters to return home and accept Mubarak’s concessions. It appeared to be a warning—I was not sure from whom. Things seemed on the brink.


I had not been home for long before the first rocks were thrown in Tahrir Square around 2:30 PM. A friend called me immediately, reporting that he had been struck in the back by one. I got a cab and rushed back toward the square, hopping out amid thousands of pro-Mubarak protesters on one of the bridges that lead into it. There were children and families, but mainly tough-looking young men, shouting at their adversaries—some insults, some pro-Mubarak slogans, and many calls for them to get lost. The bridge was packed and from either side of it I could see hundreds, and then thousands, of pro-regime demonstrators marching in from different directions. There were reported to be thousands more approaching the city. In their midst, again, were police, chanting along. Some soldiers stood nearby, in a human chain, casually watching the protesters approach.









Yasmine El Rashidi


Pro-Mubarak demonstrators massing on a bridge near Tahrir Square








I hurried through the masses of people until I reached the Egyptian Museum, which faces Tahrir Square. There, some ten thousand pro-Mubarak protesters had gathered, and I noticed many of them were carrying thick, long, wooden sticks. I tried to push further toward the screaming I could hear coming from deeper in the square itself. I could also see smoke that looked much like the fumes of the tear gas the security forces had fired on us days before. In a split second things seemed to turn. The pro-Mubarak crowd in front of me lunged toward the protesters inside the square, hurling stones, picking up debris from the ground and throwing it into the air. I ran to the side of the bridge by the museum, just missing a horse that came galloping out from the crowds with a big man in his twenties. About a dozen more horses hurtled out. I also heard someone shout “camel.” It was a tactic we had never seen before.


Someone screamed at me to get out of the way. The barricades the army had put up ahead of Tuesday’s march seemed to have been cleared, and now the soldiers, who had been friendly with the protesters over the weekend, simply watched the pro-Mubarak demonstrators attack. I could hear piercing shrieks coming from further in the square. Pieces of metal and other debris seemed to be falling from the sky. Something seemed to be exploding, and I guessed it was shells of tear gas—it was a familiar sound. On the bridge above me, thousands of people had gathered to watch, standing on railings and shoulders. Men began to exit the crowds with their hands on their heads, covered in blood. People rushed in with tissues and water.


A man stared at me and asked where I was from, why I had a camera, what I was doing with a notebook. “Those filthy foreigners and their reports,” he said. I had heard that journalists were being harassed, and I quelled the instinct to panic. I lingered at the bottom of the bridge and called a friend who had been on the “anti-Mubarak” side of the square. He said there was still fighting and that he was stuck right in the center, unable to move. I wanted to tweet about the situation, and reached into my pocket for my phone. I had no chance—a round of gunfire went off just a few feet away. And then more. Successive shots. It sounded close—and as if someone in the pro-Mubarak crowd was aiming at the anti-Mubarak side of the square. People started to scream and run. A man pushed me forward, urging me to go up the bridge. A little boy tripped beside me, and his father grabbed him by his middle and fled.


I managed to get away, and found myself back near the State TV building, once again surrounded by pro-Mubarak demonstrators who had stationed themselves beneath Al Jazeera’s Cairo bureau next door, and were chanting messages up to its reporters. I raced through the crowd, apprehensive that they too might be armed. My speed may have given me away, and a group of young men pointed at me and started to shout “Spy! Traitor! Spy!” I panicked, and tried to disappear into the thick of the crowd, emerging a few minutes later with an Egyptian flag hoisted high—my “cover” bought for $2 from a young boy. Others in the crowd were holding flags, and it seemed to keep me safe. As I walked up another bridge, I passed trucks carrying gangs of thugs— the same type we had seen in the protests last week—being off-loaded onto the street. They had pro-Mubarak banners and were armed with wooden and metal sticks. I caught a glimpse of a knife stuck in the back of one man’s trousers. They saw my flag, and waved me on.


By Wednesday evening, many of my friends were among thousands stuck in Tahrir, which was still surrounded by pro-Mubarak armed men. Egypt’s Minister of Health had reported that five hundred people were injured and one killed in Wednesday’s afternoon violence—a figure he updated Thursday to eight deaths and 900 injuries. A friend—who saw it from an apartment overlooking the square—told me a fire had broken out on top of the Egyptian Museum. Activists were posting Facebook updates by the second, when possible identifying those hurt or detained, and making urgent pleas for help—for medical supplies and to transport injured protesters to hospitals. I heard that a journalist I knew had been severely wounded. The defence ministry was urging people to go home, and there were reports that armed men were circling Tahrir and fanning out across the city. In my neighborhood, the civilian patrols who have manned our streets for the past week (using passwords, changed daily, to admit residents) had been warned that the night would be rough.


At around 1 AM Thursday morning, there were reports of new gunfire and explosions in Tahrir. There was also shouting near my house, and someone was roaring into a loud speaker in the distance—I couldn’t make out what. I could hear explosions somewhere in the distance—perhaps across the river. A rumor spread that thugs would storm Tahrir at dawn. There were already flames in the square, and pro-Mubarak men were hurling Molotov cocktails and glass at protesters from a bridge. Reports of protesters who had gone missing—“kidnapped”—began to come in on social networking sites. Some activists and civilian volunteer patrols had managed to detain thugs and hand them over to the military. An activist tweeted, “We find that every thug arrested has ‘Police’ written on his ID. Those are the only pro-Mubarak protesters” Several confiscated police IDs were posted on the internet.


My father, who lives in another central Cairo neighborhood, called me early Thursday morning, warning of the escalating violence downtown. A friend of his who tried to make her way over one of the bridges to Tahrir around 6 AM had been stopped by armed thugs and warned to turn back if she cared for her life. I also learned that the 72-year-old father of a friend of mine had been hit by a stolen car filled with thugs in the middle of the night as he patrolled the streets with other civilians, and is now in an ICU. Reports of armed men around downtown were streaming in every minute.


Asked what it would do to quell the violence, the government only said, “we will invite, and re-invite, opposition parties to the negotiating table for discussions.” On State TV, which seemed to be broadcasting events from a parallel universe, the pro-Mubarak protesters were being depicted as “pro stability.” I got news that the deputy head of the Egyptian state channel Nile TV had resigned half way through the day—unable, she said, to feed the government’s lies. There was much talk, meanwhile, about who was behind the pro-regime mayhem. Even though some people attribute it broadly to the “government,” many believe it has perhaps been orchestrated by former minister of the interior Habib El Adly and leading members of the ruling National Democratic Party—in particular businessmen, who have benefited greatly from the regime. Among the NDP strongmen often mentioned is Ahmad Ezz, who is suspected by many of having manipulated and financed the rigged parliamentary elections in November. There had also been hired thugs out during those elections and the NDP is known to have unleashed hundreds of them to ensure victory.









Yasmine El Rashidi


The charred headquarters of the ruling NDP party








Many people I am in touch with have been trying to get food and medical supplies into Tahrir since early Thursday morning, but most routes in are now blocked by thugs. “Everywhere I turn I find men with knives and guns,” a friend who was heading there by car with supplies told me at 9 AM. On Facebook, friends and activists are posting feeds: “5 of my journalist friends have been beaten and had their equipment confiscated. The pro-mubarak thugs are targeting journalists.” And another: “Friend was trying to deliver medical supplies, they smashed his car and he had to turn & run away #Jan25”. As gunshots and machine-gun fire are reported across the city, hospital workers describe overwhelming numbers of people coming in with concussions, internal bleedings, and third-degree burns. One activist tweets, “We’ve lost 10 Egyptians in the first gulf war in ‘91 and 307 in our war with Mubarak. #egypt.”


Aida Seif El Dawla, the human rights activist who runs the downtown El Nadim Centre for victims of violence, has been posting news of kidnappings, injuries, and deaths. At 12:16 PM she writes, “Watching Mubarak’s terrorism first hand from the window. Officer supervising the violence.” At 4 PM a friend called from downtown. He was out of breath and panicking—he had just seen a group of thugs drag a foreign-looking man down the street, beating him, accusing him of being an Israeli spy.


Later in the day Aida Seif tweets: “Tomorrow, Anger Friday. Demonstrations all over Egypt chanting Mubarak OUT!”

Macworld Expo 2011: The video roundup


At this year's Macworld Expo, team TUAW put the pedal to the metal: three full days of live-streamed interviews, product demos and plenty of special guests. We welcomed the main man of Expo, Paul Kent, and discovered iPad and iPhone apps we were eager to share. We chatted with journalists galore, CEOs aplenty -- and the occasional kissing bandit. All the video segments after day one are linked below; enjoy!


Jammit


Percipo


BusyMac


Cows vs. Aliens


IDG's Paul Kent


Rogue Amoeba


Mac OS Ken


Kelly and Doc Rock


Apparent's Socialite


Ars Technica's Chris Foresman


The iGrill


Read on for more...

Continue reading Macworld Expo 2011: The video roundup

Macworld Expo 2011: The video roundup originally appeared on TUAW on Thu, 03 Feb 2011 10:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Calculating a Budget for an Agile Project in Six Easy Steps

A former student of mine called the other day. He asked a good question: how do you calculate the budget for a project if you are using an agile approach to delivery. Here is the overview of the six steps to do this. I will follow the overview with some detailed comments.

  1. Prepare and estimate the project requirements using Planning Poker

  2. Determine the team’s Velocity

  3. Using the team’s burn rate and velocity calculate the budget for the Iterations

  4. Add any capital costs

  5. Using the definition of “done” add pre- and post- Iteration budgets

  6. Apply a drag or fudge or risk factor to the overall estimate


Prepare and estimate the project requirements using Planning Poker


The project requirements have to be listed out in some order and then estimated. If you are using Scrum as your agile approach, you will be creating a Product Backlog. Extreme Programming and you will be creating user stories. OpenAgile and you will be creating Value Drivers. Kanban and you will have a backlog of work in progress. Regardless of the agile approach you are using, in a project context you can estimate the work using the Planning Poker game. Once you have your list, you need to get the team of people who will be working on the list to do the estimation. Estimation for agile methods cannot be done by someone not on the team – this is considered invalid. It’s like asking your work buddy to estimate how much time it will take to clean your own house and then telling your kids that they have to do it in that amount of time. In other words, it’s unfair. Planning Poker results in scores being assigned to each item of your list. Those scores are not yet attached to time – they simply represent the relative effort of each of the items. To connect the scores to time, we move to the next step…


Determine the team’s Velocity


The team needs to select its cycle (sprint, iteration) length. For software projects, this is usually one or two weeks, and more rarely three or four weeks. In other industries it may be substantially different. I have seen cycles as short as 12 hours (24/7 mining environment) and as long as 3 months (volunteer community organization). Once the duration of the cycle is determined, the team can use a simple method to estimate how much work they will accomplish in a cycle. Looking at the list of work to be done, the team starts at the top item and gradually working their way down, decide what can fit (cumulatively) into their very first cycle. Verbally, the conversation will go something like this:


“Can we all agree that we can fit the first item into our first cycle?”


- everyone responds “Yes”


“Let’s look at the second item. Can we do the first item AND the second item in our first cycle?”


- a little discussion about what it might take to do the second item, and then everyone responds “Yes”


“Okay. What about adding the third item?”


- more discussion, some initial concern, and finally everyone agrees that it too can fit


“How about adding the fourth item?”


- much more concern, with one individually clearly stating “I don’t think we can add it.”


“Okay. Let’s stop with just the first three.”


Those items chosen in this way represent a certain number of points (you add up the scores from the Planning Poker game). The number of points that the team thinks it can do in a cycle is referred to as its “Planning Velocity” or just “Velocity”. With the velocity, we can then do one of the most important calculations in doing a budget…


Using the team’s burn rate and velocity calculate the budget for the Iterations


The team’s velocity is a proxy for how much work the team will get done in a cycle. However, in order to understand a budget for the overall project, we need to take that estimate of the team’s output and divide it into the total amount of work. Our list has scores on all the items. Sum up the scores, then divide by the velocity to give you the number of cycles of work the team will need to complete the list. For example, if after doing Planning Poker, the sum total of all the scores on all the items is 1000, and the team’s velocity is 50, then 1000 ÷ 50 = 20… This is the time budget for the team’s work to deliver these items. To do dollar budgeting, you also need to know the team’s burn rate: how much does it cost to run the team for a cycle. This is usually calculated based on the fully-loaded cost of a full-time-employee and you can often get this number from someone in finance or from a manager (sometimes you can figure it out from publicly available financial data). In general, for knowledge workers, the fully-loaded cost of a full time employee is in the range of $100000/yr to $150000/yr. Convert that to a per-cycle, per-person cost (e.g. $120000/yr ÷ 52 weeks/year x 2 weeks/cycle = $4615/person/cycle) and then multiply by the number of people on the team (e.g. $4615 x 7 people = $32305/cycle). Finally, multiply the per-cycle cost by the number of cycles (e.g. $32305 x 20 cycles = $646100).


This is the budget for the part of the project done in the cycles by the agile team. But of course, there are also other costs to be accounted.


Add any capital costs


Not many projects are solely labor costs. Equipment purchases, supplies, tools, or larger items such as infrastructure, land or vehicles may all be required for your project. Most agile methods do not provide specific guidance on how to account for these items since agile methods stem from software development where these costs tend to be minimal relative to labor costs. However, as a Project Manager making a budget estimate, you need to check with the team (after the Planning Poker game) to determine if they know of any large purchases required for the completion of the project. Be clear to them what you mean by “large” – in an agile environment, this is anything that has a cost similar to or more than the labor cost of a cycle (remember: agile projects should last at least several cycles so this is a relatively small percentage of the labor costs). In the previous example calculation, the cost per cycle was $32305 so you might ask them about any purchases that will be $30k or larger. Add these to the project budget.


Using the definition of “done” add pre- and post- Iteration budgets


Every agile team is supposed to be “cross-functional” but in reality, there are limits to this. For example, in most software project environments, teams do not include full-time lawyers. This limited cross-functionality determines what the team is capable of delivering in each cycle – anything outside the team’s expertise is usually done as either pre-work or after the iterations (cycles) are finished. Sometimes, this work can be done concurrently with the team. In order to understand this work, it is often valuable to draw an organization-wide value stream map for project delivery. This map will show you the proportion of time spent for each type of work in the project. Subtract out all the work that will be done inside the agile team (their definition of “done”) and you are left with a proportion of work that must be done outside the agile team. Based on the proportions found in the value stream map, add an appropriate amount of budget based on the project’s cycle labor costs.


Apply a drag or fudge or risk factor to the overall estimate


And of course, to come up with a final estimate, add some amount based on risk or uncertainty (never subtract!) Generally speaking, before this step, your project budget is going to be +/- 20%-50% depending on how much you have used this approach in the past. If you are familiar with it and have used it on a few projects, your team will be much better at understanding their initial velocity which is the foundation for much of the remaining budget estimates. On the other hand, if you are using this method for the first time, there is a high degree of anxiety and uncertainty around the estimation process. Please feel free to add a buffer that you feel is appropriate. But again, never, ever, ever remove time or money from the budget at this last step.


Please let me know if you have any comments on how you have done this – tips, tricks or techniques are always welcome in the comments.