I worked at a company that promised agile, but decided not to deliver. They asked me to change. To adopt a different, better world. They couldn't describe the ecosystem to me. They just had a couple practices. They couldn't enumerate the values or the principles. They wanted me to adopt new practices even though they couldn't tell me how these practices...
I don't want to feel stupid
It's clear to me that I don't want to feel stupid
An interviewee just gave up in the middle of the coding exercise. He stopped and said "I don't want to do this anymore. This isn't worth it. This makes me feel stupid. And, I'm not. I know I'm not stupid, but this is making me question myself."
You could say that he gave up. Or you could also say that ...
We need to know how to work together before the shit hits the fan
Extreme Programming proved that adopting a philosophy of "if I truly need to do it, then I should do it all the time" can be amazingly productive. They said, "Forget integrating every 6 months. Let's do continuous integration." Many of my teams have waited until things were falling apart to finally realize that the team needs to work together.
It's cl...
It's clear to me why I fight for Agile
It's clear to me why I fight. Is it clear to you?
I am privileged. I am privileged in that I have experienced agile. I have seen the multiplication. I have felt the whole team working to achieve a common goal. I want back in.
I have worked at many places, all claiming to be agile or to be interested in transitioning to agile. Many were not. When I cont...
The team is the answer
How do you achieve constant productivity from individuals in your group?
How do individuals motivate themselves to have urgency?
How do individuals process the constant flow of information about our craft?
How do individuals make up for their own weakness?
How do individuals multiply their strengths?
How do individuals know how to work together, effective...
Code reviews are not enough
It's clear to me that code reviews are not enough. They give you a false sense of confidence. It is just enough to make you feel like you don't need something else.
The missing links are context and engagement. The best clarification I can think of for this comes from Scrum. They use the (unfortunate) example of hens vs. pigs. When it comes to breakf...
Every development team has needs
It's clear to me that every development team has needs. Here is my take on what a development team needs to be effective. I find these to be true for me, personally, and for the teams that I have been a part of. When a team didn't have these things, they suffered because of it. Developer happiness suffered. Productivity suffered.
We need a clear v...
Cancan, Inherited Resources, and Nested Routes
07 Oct 2010 – Balitmore, MDProblem:My subscription does not have a subscriber. InheritedResources is not populating the `belongs_to` item. SubscriptionsController
belongs_to :subscriber
load_and_authorize_resource
def create
@subscription = build_resource
# do something with subscription
create!
end
end
In `def creat...
Moonshine hearts Rails3 (and Bundler)
Moonshine and Rails3 sitting in a tree...
As of today, moonshine is working nicely with Rails3 and Bundler 1.0. Whew!
"Moonsine":http://github.com/railsmachine/moonshine
Rails deployment and configuration management done right.
ShadowPuppet + Capistrano == crazy delicious
I don't know about you, but I missed the friendly voice of moonshine, "let me ha...
Embracing RVM’s Global Gemset
**[UPDATE]** Management is much simpler with Bundler. I just use the default gemset provided with each version of Ruby. All my gems go together. Bundler selects the appropriate gems for the current project. Nice.
In the brave new world of bundler and rvm, I have been looking for a way to manage my global gems.
The latest iteration is working prett...
