Checking Out of Indymac

The last major development project I worked on at Indymac Bank was a dynamic way to create innumerable check lists. These were to be inserted in multiple places in the Lead-To-Close (LTC) web application that had been developed to automate the process of bringing new construction loans into our existing systems. It was a project I had been thinking about for years, as Loan Explorer (LE) had what was supposed to be a dynamic check list and we had long contemplated upgrading it. I knew that truly dynamic check lists would require logic and the building block of all logic is variables, so well over a year ago I began laying the cornerstone of a new variable system to LE.

Because of this I volunteered to design the new check list system. While mock-ups of what the check lists would look like and requirements for what data they would hold were being developed, I created the design for the data base tables that would dynamically created the check lists and store the entered check list data. I also took some of the mock-ups and encoded them in the tables so that everyone could see what the data would look like.

I didn't code the web applications at Indymac, mostly that was done by Indian consultants. Slowly, since the first out-sourcing fiasco of our department, we had been building a pretty good group of people in India and on-shore and for the most part the problems of the past were just that. These people knew how to code, and though we had to steer them in the right direction now and then, for the most part they did an amazing job of turning the mock-ups, the requirements and my coding specifications into a workable, reusable and expandable engine for the delivery of check lists. Not an easy job for sure. My specs told them what the system had to do with the data, but I had no clue as to how it would do it.

Besides designing the data system and writing the specifications, I also entered the data for a half dozen or so of the check lists. I finished the last one a week or so ago. I was able to see some early and intermediate versions of the check lists actually run and it looks like my last major development project will be another success, due in no small part to the excellent work of the contractors here and in India.

After all that work, it would have been nice to see the finished product. But not having to worry about it any longer is also not too shabby.