Local software company Atlassian has suggested that CIOs and software developers take a closer look at social media if they want to take software ideas from concept to reality.
Senior product line manager from Atlassian, Tim Buntel, addressed a Google I/O Sydney media briefing today and spoke about how cloud computing – when combined with social media – will help technologists develop the future of the Web.
“The very technologies we are building on the Web today feed back into the process of making the next set of technologies. Social media will allow teams to build the next generation of product,” Buntel said.
Buntel spoke candidly about how the future of software development and implementation will depend a lot on social media. He also suggested that in order to succeed in developing a new generation of software, a new framework of thinking must be created around the idea of what social media is.
“Everyone rolls their eyes when they say ‘social media’ and they think about Twitter and Facebook. The process of going about developing software is messier today than it was in the past. Generally when we think about developing software, it’s more chaotic,” he said.
Buntel also spoke about how social media tools can help create a greater integrated workplace where geography may be a constraint to colleagues interacting.
“There’s the pure sense of geography. We can have a Google talk session with multiple developers,” he said. “So much [cloud technology] is available out of the box already. The infrastructure is already there to scale with me. I can let the cloud be stretched and moulded.”
He went on to say many solutions being developed by the IT community are placing greater reliance on applications developed through social media and cloud technology.
“If you combine these tools with Google apps, it allows you to take some of these great social things to enhance a team of developers to create software. We’re now using the Web to develop the Web.”
Google Wave was launched to the public last week at its I/O conference in San Francisco.