Co-op student thrives on Microsoft projects

by Jennifer Pepper, from the May issue of the Inside sCo-op newsletter for UW co-op students

While the majority of co-ops endured a winter term bundling up for the icy trek to work or class, Naheed Hirji (pictured), a 2B systems design engineering student, was enjoying the winter in sunny California on his co-op work term with Microsoft. He was employed as a program manager, designing Microsoft’s new mobile OS, Windows Mobile 7, for release in 2010.

While he couldn’t reveal too much about the project in the works, he explains, “The aim of Windows Mobile 7 is to be a hybrid between business and consumer-oriented phones.” While competitors like Apple’s iPhone were initially consumer-oriented, their recent focus has been on making it enterprise-friendly, using tools such as Microsoft Exchange email.

On the other hand, RIM’s BlackBerry is traditionally too business-focused for the average user in their mid-teenage years. Considering that Microsoft targets the entire market, from business users to consumers in the student demographic, the plan is to develop a platform that incorporates the best of both worlds, including all the features today’s generation loves.

Hirji is thrilled to be working for a company that provides him with an abundance of freedom and two market-leading projects to manage. Considering the target audience, he admits that he is at an advantage designing phones for other young people. Additionally, as the phones will be used by millions across the world, there is a sense of pride associated with working on the project and its features.

When asked about his transition to California, you could hear him smiling on the other end of the phone. “The first few days before you leave, there is a sense of nervousness that comes over you. You don’t know anything about the place you are going to, you don’t know other students, and you wonder if you’ll find friends in this foreign place.”

But his adventure out to the West Coast became easier after the first month. Hirji experienced many of the perks. “There’s an abundance of places you can visit on the weekends: San José, San Francisco, Las Vegas, and Seattle. I just got back from LA for a five-day visit. As a co-op student, Microsoft definitely gives you leeway to explore. Not to mention the great California weather; it’s the middle of April and already 30 degrees.”

While Microsoft’s future includes the release of Windows Mobile 7, Hirji’s future may include one of three different paths. He is considering earning his MBA after a few years in the working world, getting a master’s in International Development from McGill, or jumping into work full-time in a role similar to the one he is in now.

Overall, he enjoyed working on his own large-scale projects and gaining a high level of responsibility. Through his end-of-term presentation to the general manager and division managers of his team, he learned how to defend his technical decisions and to provide business justification for his work – two skills which are bound to come in handy in his future.

Hirji has some advice for others seeking program management co-op positions in Silicon Valley, which is home to many other high-profile headquarters such as those of Yahoo, Google, Apple, eBay, and several others. “In your interview, it’s all about user-based design questions. They want to know your ability to determine what the user wants and designing with that as your focus.”

Back to top

New web content management system coming to Waterloo: part 2

What will the new web content management system (CMS) mean for those on campus who manage websites? “I believe that the new system will be a benefit to the managers of both small and large websites,” says Terry Stewart, chair of the UW Web Advisory Committee. “The system is entirely web-based: there is no software, such as Dreamweaver or Contribute, needed. As such, management of one’s site could be from any computer connected to the Internet.

“But more than that, a CMS offers a number of advantages. Primary is the separation of content from design and technical aspects. This will allow the manager to focus on content with the design provided by the CMS.… It could actually empower you to do more, on your own, and in a shorter period of time.” And since it is web-based, he adds, “managing content should be no more difficult than what you are using now.”

Eva Grabinski, web and e-communications officer in the Faculty of Engineering, headed one of the WAC subcommittees that looked into the need for a web content management system on campus. She supplies answers to some typical questions.

What will this mean for me, if I manage a small campus website?
EG: If you manage a university website, it means that you will be able to use the CMS to manage your website. How much you are affected by the CMS depends entirely on what sort of and how much website work you do.

Will staff need to get training?
EG: Training courses are definitely part of the planning to help areas adopt and use the CMS. How extensive your training needs to be really depends on the sort of web work that you do. It is expected that the training needs and times for technical staff will differ from those of web-page maintainers.

How much change will we see in the look of our websites?
EG: The look of Waterloo's websites in the future will depend on a new common look and feel that includes navigation, visual style, and how sites are organized. All that is being developed by a separate group working on a redesign for Waterloo's web space. However, CMS will make it easier for that overall common look and feel to be maintained. Simply put, standards for the look and feel of websites are entered or coded into the CMS, producing website or web-page templates. Then, when website maintainers create new web pages in the CMS, the applicable templates — and hence the look and feel — are automatically applied to the web pages.

How much change will we see in the function of our websites?
EG: From the perspective of website maintenance, a CMS will offer beneficial changes in terms of the function of university websites. Some of these benefits are:

• the ability to change web pages via website browsers so you don’t have to be at a computer with specialized software installed, in order to change website content;
• the ability to schedule the automatic appearance and removal of content, which can be useful for things such as announcements. This means you don’t have to remember to remove the content at a certain date, and you don’t have to be at a computer at the time that the content needs to appear or be removed – for instance, if you are off sick;
• the ability to create polls or surveys online, or add videos or photo albums, without having to know how to do coding — eliminating the need to request such things from technical staff.

(This is the second part of a two-part article. Part 1, on Friday, gave a general introduction to the new Open Text web content management system that’s to be implemented on campus over the next year or so, and described the committee process that preceded the decision.)

CPA staff

Back to top