Xilinx news

One word, Alcatel.

Jon

If you intend to outsource something, you really must concentrate on writing sensible _good_quality_ specifications.

With the coders in the next cubicle (at least in the same time zone), you can always discuss the problems immediately,

With development teams in the Americas, Europe and Asia, the common real time discussion window is quite limited due to the time zones.

On a sunny day (Mon, 24 Jan 2011 22:31:04 +0200) it happened snipped-for-privacy@downunder.com wrote in :

That may be so, but Larkin is on one of his anti- crusades these days it seems. Big projects are done all the time on a global scale, look at Linux. That X thing is not even big, it is just very small kids stuff. Webwreck should be re-written from the ground up by people who know how to write a parser. Maybe Altera can help them.

History

The formation of Alcatel-Lucent created the world=92s first truly global communications solutions provider, with the most complete end-to-end portfolio of solutions and services in the industry.

Alcatel-Lucent combined two entities =97 Alcatel and Lucent Technologies =97 which shared a common lineage dating back to 1986. That was the year Alcatel=92s parent company, CGE (la Compagnie G=E9n=E9rale d=92Electricit= =E9), acquired ITT=92s European telecom business. Nearly 60 years earlier, ITT had purchased most of AT&T=92s manufacturing operations outside the United States. Lucent Technologies was spun off from AT&T.

Lucent was briefly in the FPGA business, Xilinx clones I think. So did the Lucent-Alcatel thing result in Xilinx picking up the French group?

John

this is definitely a sore point for me. We all have our 'Project from Hell' and mine involved a French company. The company that hired me had a contract to develop and install some new technology. The customer hired a French company to verify that we met the contract requirements. Now, we were doing things that, to this point, no one had done before, and the best part was that none of us had ever even worked in this INDUSTRY before. We didn't know what couldn't be done!

Now, the interesting thing about the French company, was how they kept 'interpretting' the contract requirements, and asking for tests that I realized had nothing whatsoever to do with the project we were working on. They were taking all our results and technologies, including our software, and just shipping it to the home office to use in their own projects!

Now, the real reason it was the project from hell, was that the management was ALL ex-military. They had very little technical expertise, and they seemed to feel that success required only two things - their orders to get something done, and sufficient effort on our part to follow their orders. It was common to work seven days a week, 10 to 12 hours a day, and they were chewing us out daily that we were behind schedule! The truth was, all of the workers were so burned out that we could barely think, much less be creative and solve problems as they came up. I remember coming in one morning, and noticing a co-worker (who was one of their darlings. It was rumored that he worked so late that, when he went home, he slept in his car because he was too tired to climb the stairs. He got up at 6, went up and showered and changed, and then went in to work!) Anyway, I noticed that he was typing up a test procedure - click... click... click... click at about one letter a second. He was dead on his feet, and it was only 7:30 in the morning!

They laid me off just before the end of the project - I wasn't putting in enough effort! I was only working 65- 70 hours a week!

Charlie

Actually, distance DOES create problems in management, and modern management techniques are not very effective. The ability to manage a distributed workforce is a very rare talent. Among the requirements, is enough technical skill to be able to divide the task into appropriate pieces, and have the ability to make sure that all the system requirements are complete, and that they are being met by each member of the team.

It also requires the right sort of project, where inter-member interaction is only needed for specific tasks, and not for just general co-ordination...

Charlie

It creates problems but it certainly can be done. I worked on the processor Apple used in its G5 PowerMacs. About a quarter of the processor was done in Germany, a little in Texas, and we did the rest along with all the chip integration. It worked out very well but as you say, the system requirements were very well laid out and the project was divided by functional unit.

That certainly helps. Basically it's broken down into smaller projects, each more or less independent.

BTW, we tried to bring on some people in India. A lot of effort was spent coordinating the project and no results were ever seen from them. It takes the right people, too.

Anythng designed in Britain in the 1960s _has_ to leak oil somewhere. I really loved my Triumph, but eventually I had to have a life....

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

Because of the insane engineering decision to have the crank case split vertically.

The british motorcycles usually had vertically split crankcases, so you had a leaky gasket right in the middle. Honda apparently invented the horizontal seam, so the crankcase was just a bucket full of oil.

I was an MG person, myself.

John

Does the law require that you remain productive during those three months?

But cutting staff because you are downsizing /is/

Here in California, an employer can ask an employee to take their stuff and leave, this very day or this very instant. I did that last week. And an employee can quit without notice. I've had people walk into my office, say "I quit", and walk out.

John

It can't and that is part of the problem.

Some good guys do and others lounge around - there obviously isn't much you can do about it. My boss didn't work anything like as hard after he handed in his notice but he still did a decent job.

Sometimes it is easier and better for all concerned to negotiate an early split by mutual consent. But a contract of employment is a contract and either side can choose to enforce it to the letter.

I object to the employment contracts that top merchant bankers have which say that even if they wreck the company they are still entitled to full pay for their entire term, golden parachutes and pension pots to go with it. Fred the Shred being the most egregious example.

In the UK you would only do that if someone was moving to a competitor, was guilty of gross misconduct, endangering life or serious criminal acts. You would have to pay the three months compensation and holiday allowance too. These days with multi GB media smaller than the size of a thumbnail secrets walking is virtually impossible to prevent.

I have had a couple of employees escorted off the site that way.

On the flip side although you can in principle enforce the three month notice on an employee it generally isn't worth the effort except possibly at more senior levels. Most people are reasonable about it in the UK, but if they are not then the employer doesn't really have much leverage against someone who is planning to leave anyway.

Regards, Martin Brown

I've read stories of where a group of folks were asked to come out to the parking lot for a "meeting" and then told... oh, hey, you're laid off -- we'll be sending your personal effects to you via mail!

That's pretty brutal, but I suppose it's meant to insure there's absolutely no chance someone starts to sabotage their employer... although you have to wonder what sort of relationship management has with their employees when that sort of thing crosses their minds; it kinda implies that the relationship was more one of "we're each out to exploit the other as much as possible" rather than one closer to "everyone wins."

That's when you say, "You can't quit, because I've already fired you!" :-)

---Joel

e,

here in Denmark it is the same 3 month minimum notice for employer after first 6 months, and it goes up by one month for ever 3 years of emplyment. It is only one month for employees.

The law says you have to do you jobs as you normally would but you have the right to spend some time for job interviews etc. and an employer can't make you do jobs that you normally wouldn't.

heres special rule that if you fire more that ~10 there has to be collective negotiations of how it is to be done and what the terms will be

well you can tell an employee to leave immediately you'll just have to keep paying the him for the severance period.

an employer can "expel" an employee, but that'll be in real serious case like stealing, spying, working for a competitor, not showing up for work without and valid reason etc. it doesn't happen very often and usually ends up in court

technically I don't think an employee has the right to just leave, but you can't someone to show up for work

-Lasse

Nope, you always let them quit. If you fire them, they have a chance at getting unemployment, which can cost you. If they quit, they are SOL!

Charlie

There are more restrictive federal rules for things of the scale of the Xilinx closing:-

Best regards, Spehro Pefhany

Here, severance is voluntary on the employer's part; one week per year is common but not mandatory. Employees usually don't het severance if they quit, and may not if they are fired for cause. We are required to pay an employee for any unused vacation time.

John

Note - I might not be entirely accurate here, since I am not involved in HR (other than helping with some technical interviews), and I've had the same job for the last sixteen years.

Yes, you are bound by your contract (which employers must have with each employee, except for very short-term temporaries). Of course, it would get very messy if the employer had to sue the employee in court for breach of contract - generally if the employee is not going to do useful work for those 3 months, the employer and employee will reach an agreement. For example, if the employee is going to work for a competitor, the employer will probably effectively give him 3 months paid leave. It is also possible to make different arrangements, such as cutting out the 3 months so that the employee can start a new job immediately.

The point of all this is to give both the employer and the employee a degree of stability. When you have a permanent job, you know you have a predictable income for the next three months at least. And when you have employed someone, you know they are not going to drop everything and disappear without notice.

It makes it harder to fire a worker who doesn't do a good job (though you can still be fired on very short notice if you are doing something criminal, or dangerous, or grossly disloyal to your employer).

Perhaps the Norwegian way takes some of the fun and excitement out of the employer-employee relationship...