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April's Software Test Professionals Conference ended with a panel discussion about the future of the industry. Rex Black said agile methods were "picking up steam." His colleague on the panel, Cem Kaner, a professor of software engineering at Florida Institute of Technology, replied that agile software development is, on the other hand, already mainstream, and those not already doing agile are in danger of being left behind. Let's talk about it during tomorrow's stand-up meeting.
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Kent Sharkey wrote: Let's talk about it during tomorrow's stand-up meeting. Not if you're agile. Standups are for presenting status and raising red-flags - discussions are taken offline.
/ravi
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Shows how "agile" I am.
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TTFN - Kent
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Heh.
2 years ago I resisted agile because it was alien to me as the bubonic plague. I wanted nothing to do with it. I was convinced it was another left-wing (I'm not a conservative) hippie-induced (I am a hippie) fad (I my pet rock) designed by the weirdos of Silicon Valley (I have many close friends who I respect who work in the Valley).
Today I wonder how I got on without it. I'm much less stressed, more able to estimate a realistic ship date (I love reality vs. arbitrary schedules - agile lets me clearly identify why a release date may be unrealistic), and able to have a shippable (but not necessarily complete) product at almost any time in the dev cycle.
An agile organization makes sense to me today. Maybe because I learned agile isn't some voodoo you throw on a project to make it magically ship on time, but is a way of running a development organization.
/ravi
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Ravi Bhavnani wrote: An agile organization makes sense to me today. Maybe because I learned agile isn't some voodoo you throw on a project to make it magically ship on time, but is a way of running a development organization.
I hear you. I'm partly hesitant as I'm feeling a bit out of the biz these days. I see the value in it. I'm resistant to the religion, but I've always pushed for many of the same ideas: small, rapid cycles, heavy customer involvement, etc. I'm sure if I were involved in a real agile project, I'd love it.
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TTFN - Kent
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I would say that Agile has always been with us. The problem is that then somebody thought that they way to do things was top down. Those projects tend to fail unless there is a lot of government money behind them, and usually they are never pointed to as being an example of how to do a project. A lot of people made a lot of money and fame by proposing to go with top down. Often they left the project before it failed and thus the blame was not pointed at them (ie FAA's Advanced Automation System). The government still has not learned that top down is an expensive approach.
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It is used in places like Microsoft and SAP, so it must be mainstream.
Not that it makes any difference...
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During the past year though I decided I don't want to write software for WinRT, simply because I find the .NET version Microsoft has released for WinRT beyond crap and I don't want to go through a Compact Framework nightmare yet again. "You can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave."
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Thanks for posting this.
This is a good heads-up as I was looking at getting one of these things.
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There’s actually over 400 open source VM images available, made by the community and companies like BitNami, and hosted by MS Open Tech. It's like your work is virtually complete!
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Master motivation and time management. Unleash your personal productivity. Set powerful goals. Focus and direct your attention with skill. Learn the secrets of work-life balance. Assuming you have the time to learn time management
[edit] I should add that JD was one of the more awesome individuals I had the great luck to meet when I was at the Fish Shop. He was one of the core drivers behind learning from the customers, that lead to the creation of these books/sites[^].
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Kent Sharkey wrote: Assuming you have the time to learn time management
And assuming you work in a vacuum. The minute you depend on someone else, your personal productivity literally goes into the sh*tter. (heehee[^]).
Marc
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true. dat.
I literally literalled at that one.
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TTFN - Kent
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Do you literally mean literally, or do you mean not literally?
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Uhm...
Yes?
No, wait. I literally mean literally, yes.
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TTFN - Kent
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A few months ago in its "Scroogled" ad campaign, Microsoft was complaining about how Google uses your search terms and Gmail contents to deliver targeted ads. Now, Microsoft is touting how Windows 8.1 uses your search terms to deliver targeted ads, even when you're doing searches on local drives. "The All-seeing Eye of Agamotto sees all"
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Petard! Fetch the Petard! Quick, tie us to it, then run it up the flagpole and see if anyone salutes...
And, yes, I do know what a Petard is...
This message is manufactured from fully recyclable noughts and ones. To recycle this message, please separate into two tidy piles, and take them to your nearest local recycling centre.
Please note that in some areas noughts are always replaced with zeros by law, and many facilities cannot recycle zeroes - in this case, please bury them in your back garden and water frequently.
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And hoist they be.
They just aren't that good at this marketing thing at (most of the) times.
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TTFN - Kent
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Ptttthhhwep! You owe me a monitor wipe!
This message is manufactured from fully recyclable noughts and ones. To recycle this message, please separate into two tidy piles, and take them to your nearest local recycling centre.
Please note that in some areas noughts are always replaced with zeros by law, and many facilities cannot recycle zeroes - in this case, please bury them in your back garden and water frequently.
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Kent Sharkey wrote: A few months ago in its "Scroogled" ad campaign, Microsoft was complaining about how Google uses your search terms and Gmail contents to deliver targeted ads. Now, Microsoft is touting how Windows 8.1 uses your search terms to deliver targeted ads, even when you're doing searches on local drives.
Except that they don't.
Quote: Editor's note: Microsoft has requested the following clarification: "Bing Ads are integrated only in the web search portion of Windows 8.1 Smart Search -- the ads are never shown in local device search results or searches."
Did you ever see history portrayed as an old man with a wise brow and pulseless heart, waging all things in the balance of reason?
Is not rather the genius of history like an eternal, imploring maiden, full of fire, with a burning heart and flaming soul, humanly warm and humanly beautiful?
--Zachris Topelius
Training a telescope on one’s own belly button will only reveal lint. You like that? You go right on staring at it. I prefer looking at galaxies.
-- Sarah Hoyt
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Yeah, the local part was wrong, but even so: Microsoft complains that Google uses the search (and email) data to target ads, then does it themselves. It still strikes me as a little hypocritical, even if most of the article/rant was wrong.
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TTFN - Kent
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Seriously? Whenever I see a link to a Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols article with Microsoft in the title, I know there's no point in clicking it, much less reading it. He is 100% predictable--the article will be yet-another-in-a-long-series anti-Microsoft rant of no value to anyone but his fellow We Hate All Things Microsoft cultists.
If you think 'goto' is evil, try writing an Assembly program without JMP.
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True, but a stopped clock etc.
Occasionally, his rants are almost accurate. OK, not this time, but still
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TTFN - Kent
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Kent Sharkey wrote: True, but a stopped clock etc.
... makes a half decent LART for use against fanbois and haters alike.
Did you ever see history portrayed as an old man with a wise brow and pulseless heart, waging all things in the balance of reason?
Is not rather the genius of history like an eternal, imploring maiden, full of fire, with a burning heart and flaming soul, humanly warm and humanly beautiful?
--Zachris Topelius
Training a telescope on one’s own belly button will only reveal lint. You like that? You go right on staring at it. I prefer looking at galaxies.
-- Sarah Hoyt
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I'll grant that sometimes his rants contain a grain or two of truth, as do all effective lies. But I maintain they are useless as part of any honest effort to evaluate a Microsoft product or service.
If you think 'goto' is evil, try writing an Assembly program without JMP.
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