One of our guys just downloaded the latest version of Mingle, the project collaboration software from Thoughtworks. On initial inspection it seems to provide a nice visual interface to specify and layout features, tasks, etc for different views of the product and iteration backlogs (including a Card Tree for laying out cards in what looks like an org chart). It also supports some pretty slick (and configurable) burndown charting for whatever data you are interested in, and has a wiki for documentation. It seems to be striking a decent balance between developer collaboration and management reporting.

One feature in particular that looks really useful is an interactive online version of a card wall.  Not only is this customizable, but it can total up work effort per swimlane (which is what used to pain me when we used to use real cards & pinboards). Pretty cool stuff.

Will be interesting to see what others think of this compared to XPlanner, etc, and whether people will pay for it (it costs for projects with more than 5 people). What do people think of this compared to other “paid-for” offerings from vendors such as VersionOne and Rally ? On initial glance, it looks very functional and seems to be very flexible.

The fifth installment of the CEP podcast series has been posted here and on the Lab49 website. This is the third and final part of the interview I did with Daniel Chait of Lab49 and Brad Bailey of the Aite Group.

All of these CEP podcasts and other audio/video sessions we have recorded can be found on the Lab49 website at: http://www.lab49.com/insidethelab/audiovideo

The fourth installment of the CEP Podcast series has been posted here. This podcast is the second part of the interview I conducted with Brad Bailey of the Aite Group and Daniel Chait of Lab49. In this part we are continuing to discuss the challenges facing capital markets firms and how CEP provides an opportunity to manage these market challenges in new ways.

All of these CEP episodes, and other  podcasts we have done can be found at http://www.lab49.com/insidethelab/audiovideo

Did you know that Bear Stearns has an entire energy business, Bear Energy ? Not just trading natural gas on the financial markets, etc, but actually OWNS a powerplant ! Its trading business therefore supports its physical energy business (by buying/selling natural gas to power their powerplant, and trading the power itself). The business is built on the back of Bear’s acquisition of Williams in 2006.

(Not an April Fool’s joke). “Swiss financial giant UBS has reported that its writedowns as a result of the sub-prime crisis have more than doubled to about $37bn (£18.5bn)”. Article here. I wonder how much more has yet to unwind.