At dynamIt, we moved into The Design Center at Marconi Square down in the Arena District about two months ago. It is a very intriguing building, so I spent a couple hours and did some amateur research on the history of our building. The building was originally built back in the 1890’s. It has seen multiple additions over the last century, but dynamIt’s office is in the original part of the building. In 1891 the building opened as the paint factory for the Dean & Barry Paint Company of Columbus, Ohio. The building saw to the manufacturing of paint and paint products. For nearly a century the building served that very purpose until the company was sold in 1985. From there the building sat virtually empty used only for some auxiliary warehousing, after all there was really nothing around it. Then came the creation of the Arena District and the once seemingly unusable building became a trendy office spot.

So I got to thinking, how cool would it be to go back in time 50 years and walk the streets of Columbus as they were in the late 1950’s? Well, that might not the best idea for me at dynamIt as leaving the office would mean stepping into the backyard of the state penitentiary, but you get the idea. Imagine seeing the sites and the landmarks of the past and hanging out at the popular spots of the time. Think how fascinating it would be to walk around and see how progress has taken over and molded the city.

Then it hit me, 50 years from now, we will be able to do just that. A certain company we all know and love has very detailed photographs of nearly every street in Columbus. I am talking of course about Google. With Google Maps Street View anyone can walk the streets of Columbus in 2008. You do not have to physically be in Columbus to do so. Thus, there is no need to be in 2008 either. All Google needs to do it hold onto this data for the next 50 years and then we will have the ability to travel back in time.

Lately, I’ve been busier at work than ever before. Many would call this a good problem to have for an entrepreneur, but all I can focus on right now are the drawbacks.

Sure my stress level is higher, I get less sleep and feel less rested, I have fewer hours to relax, I have fewer hours to engage in the other fun things in my life. But, there is one thing I miss more than all of these. That is, I feel like I no longer have time to think.

Thinking may be my favorite way to pass the time. It comes in many formats. It may be working through some interesting math problems or completing an intellectual puzzle. Perhaps it’s coming up with new ideas, dreams, plans, goals, etc. and thinking them through. Maybe it is simply reflecting on the day while strategizing for tomorrow.

At any rate, I miss it. My plan for the next month is to control my time better and possibly free up some time to think.

There are two distinct schools of thought in web application development.

First, you have a phased approach, which dynamIt has dubbed web engineering in which the system is carefully planned out and designed prior to any development taking place.

On the other hand, you have agile development in which you use a rapid application development framework, jump right into code. Then get a reaction and iterate the code.

There is no point in arguing which is better, many people have had success with both methods. Rather, I would like to reflect on why I stand firmly by my choice of web engineering.

Quite simply, it is what I know. I have spent years of my life studying pure mathematics. Math is, of course, rooted in logic. When you approach a difficult math problem you must think through it in the right way. There may be more than one correct path, but it is a connected path of deduction that leads you to your result. You may NOT just dive in anywhere in a proof, it does not work that way, each step you make MUST follow from that which came before.

Our web engineering method is no different. We start with a user flow and a wire frame, and from that we deduce a user experience design. Markup follows logically from UXD, and once we have markup we can program in the functionality.

To me this progression is so natural and fits well with my sense of logic.