Publications & Projects

An overview of my publications and projects.

Cleveland Big Data Meetup

• I founded Cleveland Big Data Meetup in 2010 and organized it through 2024 with over 4,000 members and 81 meetup events and at least $20,000 of bulk pizza orders. Cleveland Big Data merged with Cleveland AI in January 2025 to become Cleveland AI and Data Meetup. This page has recordings from the last few years as well as links to the meetup history: https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/cleveland-big-data-meetup-recordings-doug-meil/

Routledge - Productivity Press (Taylor & Francis Group)

• "The Rise and Fall of Explorys and IBM Watson Health - Healthcare Innovation and the Moonshot that Misfired." A book on my experiences at Explorys and IBM Watson Health to be released Summer 2025. https://www.routledge.com/The-Rise-and-Fall-of-Explorys-and-IBM-Watson-Health-Healthcare-Innovation-and-the-Moonshot-That-Misfired/Meil/p/book/9781032793597

Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS)

• "Non-Obvious Ways Medical Data Is Hard: Blood Pressure" - On the history of blood pressure measurement and its often overlooked complexity on data management and analytics. https://www.himss.org/resources/non-obvious-ways-medical-data-hard-blood-pressure

Association for Computing Machinery (ACM)

Case Studies

• "What Happened to IBM Watson Health?" - A massive case study in software portfolio management. I lived this for over 3.5 years from 2015 through 2018, coming into IBM via the Explorys acquisition. https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/252055-what-happened-to-watson-health/fulltext. This post was also referenced in a Harvard Business Publishing case study from INSEAD: https://hbsp.harvard.edu/product/IN1896-PDF-ENG
• "The UK Post Office Scandal: Software Malpractice At Scale" - A multi-decade story of something that should never happen: software falsely generating evidence resulting in hundreds of bogus prosecutions and imprisonments. https://cacm.acm.org/blogcacm/the-u-k-post-office-scandal-software-malpractice-at-scale/

Technology & Frameworks

• "Why Are There So Many Programming Languages?" - However many programming languages you think there are, there are more. And it's been like that since the first programming languages were created. Special thanks to the Computer History Museum on this. https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/262424-why-are-there-so-many-programming-languages/fulltext
• "Lessons From PL/I: A Most Ambitious Programming Language" - PL/I tried to unify scientific and business computing in the 1960's and replace FORTRAN and COBOL, along with applying innovative concepts from ALGOL. An excerpt of this made the November 2023 print edition of Communications of the ACM. https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/274388-lessons-from-pl-i-a-most-ambitious-programming-language/fulltext
• "The Continual Re-Creation Of The Key-Value Datastore" -A short history of the evolution of single-machine key-value datastores such as DBM, NDBM, GDBM, BerkeleyDB, LevelDB, RocksDB, and others. https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/263527-the-continual-re-creation-of-the-key-value-datastore/fulltext
• "The Hadoop Ecosystem's Continued Impact" - People might not run Hadoop clusters like they used to, but a surprising number of frameworks from that ecosystem are still plugging away a decade or more later. https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/273771-the-hadoop-ecosystems-continued-impact/fulltext
• "The Confounding Saga of Java Web Application Development" - There are almost more frameworks for this common development need than you can shake a stick at, plus the stick. Why? https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/276223-the-confounding-saga-of-java-web-application-development/fulltext
• "Blockchain For What, Exactly?" - Real world consequences of blockchain hype, including some from the software industry and a few from my hometown of Cleveland, Ohio. https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/258601-blockchain-for-what-exactly/fulltext
• "A Pragmatic Overview of Wi-Fi Security" - An overview and explanation of some of the 'whys' when people say 'be careful'. https://cacm.acm.org/blogcacm/a-pragmatic-overview-of-wi-fi-security-risks/

Cloud Architecture

• "Delivering Cloud Data and Analytic Solutions" - Reflecting on some of the major changes in the data and analytic space, and some of the principles that haven't changed. https://cacm.acm.org/blogcacm/delivering-cloud-data-and-analytic-solutions/
• "Vendor Software Solutions in a Cloudy World" - Cloud-based vendor software solutions are here to stay, but there are a few things to be aware of. https://cacm.acm.org/blogcacm/vendor-software-solutions-in-a-cloudy-world/

Data Management & Analytics

• "Operational and Analytic Data Cycles" - A post on operational data systems, analytic data systems, and the critical bi-directional relationship between them and how to manage it. This post is effectively a capstone for my other data management, analytics, and governance posts. https://cacm.acm.org/blogcacm/operational-and-analytic-data-cycles/
• "When Data Worlds Collide: Critical Sections In Analytic Workflows" - Experiences from Explorys on customer data onboarding for analytic solutions. There is great power in multi-source analytics, but the challenge is in scaling the validation processes. https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/278411-when-data-worlds-collide/fulltext
• "Data Governance and the Psychology of Tension Management" - Designing systems to enable effective data governance processes is a complex art. Data governance needs to be designed-in and not just sprinkled on top. https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/265719-data-governance-and-the-psychology-of-tension-management/fulltext
• "The Need for Combined Data and Analytic Governance" - On why getting access to data isn't the end of the governance story, especially in regulated environments where the publishing of numbers has consequences. Co-authored with Mike Onders. https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/269431-the-need-for-combined-data-and-analytic-governance/fulltext

• "Enterprise Metrics and Optimization" - On counting code, data and monetary things. Without metrics you are flying blind, but be careful what you try to optimize because you might just get it. https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/261547-enterprise-metrics-and-optimization/fulltext
• "Enabling AI Projects In An Enterprise" - On the practices that enable successful Artificial Intelligence projects, especially for "regular" organizations. An excerpt of this made the June 2023 print edition of Communications of the ACM. https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/270505-enabling-ai-projects-in-an-enterprise/fulltext

Software Engineering - Design & Process

• "Anna Karenina on Development Methodologies" - Commentary on effective development practices and methodology wars. An excerpt of this made the June 2021 print edition of the Communications of the ACM. https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/251396-anna-karenina-on-development-methodologies/fulltext
• “The Art of Speedy Systems Conversions” - The 1994 action movie Speed makes for a great analogy on managing system conversions. An excerpt of this made the September 2021 print edition of Communications of the ACM. https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/252981-the-art-of-speedy-systems-conversions/fulltext
• "The Art of Design Regret" - How software engineers can learn from their mistakes: real and perceived, and sometimes imagined. An excerpt of this made the October 2021 print edition of the Communications of the ACM. https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/254482-software-learning-the-art-of-design-regret/fulltext
• “Design Orientation and Optimization” - The never-ending tension between vertical and horizontal prioritization and design optimization. https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/254849-design-orientation-and-optimization/fulltext
• "Log4j and the Thankless High-Risk Task of Managing Software Component Upgrades" - The difficulty of downstream component users to manage version upgrades: damned if you don't, damned if you do. https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/257897-log4j-and-the-thankless-high-risk-task-of-managing-software-component-upgrades/fulltext

Software Engineering - General

• "Software Stories: Legal Trouble" - The intersection of software & legal experiences, including software licensing (open source & commercial), the patent process, and getting deposed in a lawsuit. https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/257660-software-stories-legal-trouble/fulltext
• "Software Quotes and Counter-Quotes" - Types of conversations I keep having in software development. https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/255942-software-quotes-and-counter-quotes/fulltext

Organizational Dynamics

• "Developing Technical Leaders" - On going from an individual contributor to tech lead to manager and beyond. An excerpt of this made the August 2022 print edition of Communications of the ACM. https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/259794-developing-technical-leaders/fulltext
• "Inorganic Growth In Tech: Getting Shredded With Acquisitions" - On organic vs. inorganic growth and why absorbing an acquisition is a lot harder than just popping a pill. https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/268374-inorganic-growth-in-tech-getting-shredded-with-acquisitions/fulltext
• "Making Bad Decisions" - A case study of organization decision making going sideways during a whiteboard installation, and why bad decisions are sometimes so hard - but not impossible - to remedy. https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/259104-making-bad-decisions/fulltext
• "Stack Ranking: Organizational Cancer" - On why stacked/forced rankings are highly problematic, and especially with claims of "only hiring the best" are placed on top. This pattern, like cancer itself, it something that will never totally go away. https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/266168-stack-ranking-organizational-cancer/fulltext
• "The Perils of 'Stay In Your Lane'" - the pros and cons of staring straight ahead. https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/277840-the-perils-of-stay-in-your-lane/fulltext

Education

• "Reinforcing Computer Science Education" - How Computer Science students can reinforce and expand their skillsets. https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/256530-reinforcing-computer-science-education/fulltext

Technical Communities

• "Tech Meetups in a Pandemic" - The challenges of managing technical communities and relationships in a global pandemic, based on my own experiences managing the Cleveland Big Data Meetup and Covid-19. https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/255619-tech-meetups-in-a-pandemic/fulltext

Technical Writing

• "Lessons Learned Writing For BLOG@CACM" - lessons learned writing for the Association for Computing Machinery blog, and how to become a better technical writer in the process. https://cacm.acm.org/blogs/blog-cacm/264260-lessons-learned-writing-for-blogcacm/fulltext

ACM Digital Library Profile

• ACM Digital Library profiles include citations from ACM publications such as Communications of the ACM and others. Mine is: https://dl.acm.org/profile/99659728703

Quotes

• "Revamping Python for an AI World" - Because of my "Why Are There So Many Programming Languages?" post I was asked to comment on Mojo, a version of Python enhanced for AI workloads. I am not sure I have any business being quoted in the same article as Chris Lattner and Guido van Rossum, but I do think that Mojo is very interesting and it's approach of leveraging Python is smart and can help avoid the PL/1 experience of trying to come up with an entirely new language. - https://cacm.acm.org/news/revamping-python-for-an-ai-world

Apache HBase Blog

• "The Effect of ColumnFamily, RowKey and KeyValue Design on HFile Size" - an archive of a 2014 Apache HBase blog. Some of the formatting was lost when this went to archive, but the text is still there. https://blogsarchive.apache.org/hbase/entry/the_effect_of_columnfamily_rowkey

Selected Personal Articles

• “Actual History of Explorys, Part 1” - Long form article on the history of Explorys (2009 to 2015).?Explorys was a healthcare analytics startup. https://themeildeal.blogspot.com/2021/01/the-actual-history-of-explorys-part-1.html?
• “Actual History of Explorys, Part 2” - Long form article on the history of Explorys (2015 to 2018) during the IBM Watson Health years. https://themeildeal.blogspot.com/2021/02/the-actual-history-of-explorys-part-2.html?
• "Observations on Healthcare Publishing" - I wrote this post after HIMSS published my article on the evolution of blood pressure measurement. There is a lot about open access charges in publishing that I didn't know about. https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/observations-healthcare-publishing-doug-meil
• “How To Create A Successful Technical Meetup” - I finally wrote this in 2016 after 6 years of questions of how I started the Cleveland Big Data Meetup. Always eager to help another meetup organizer. https://themeildeal.blogspot.com/2016/08/how-to-create-successful-technical.html
• “How To Get Involved With Open Source Software” - I finally wrote this up in 2018 after giving years of advice of how to get involved with Open Source software. Based heavily on my experiences with the Apache HBase community and Apache in general. https://themeildeal.blogspot.com/2018/11/how-to-get-involved-with-open-source.html

Contact: doug (at) meil (dot) org