Recently, I wrote about using the JfcUnit and Abbot frameworks to test-drive the creation of a Java Swing GUI. Since then, a post by Liz Keogh on the ExtremeProgramming yahoogroup led me to another option. It a wrapper around Swing written in conjunction with JBehave, but as Liz points out, it’s not dependent on the framework and can happily be used with JUnit, also. I like the fact that it’s really lightweight and fast. Read More
Dale Emery wrote a wonderful post about the Prime Directive on the ExtremeProgramming yahoogroup. This blog entry is mostly to prevent me from losing track of Dale’s comments, as is easy to do on a busy mailing list. I want to be able to go back and re-read his words. Read More
It’s been awhile since I’ve written any Java Swing code, and doing so now is making me feel a little stupid. Test Driving the development of Swing hasn’t improved much since the last time I did this.
Back in 2003, Jeff Waltzer and I decided to experiment with TDDing a Swing application to see if GUIs could be test-driven. It wasn’t always easy, but we convinced ourselves that they could. We started out rolling our own Swing test framework, but soon found ourselves immersed in AWT threading issues and Swing peculiarities. So, since we seemed to be headed down the road of reimplementing JfcUnit, we decided to switch and use the real thing. Read More
Johanna Rothman’s recent post on the AYE Conference prompted this unsolicited testimonial.
If you’re a techie working with people, you can learn loads about being more effective by attending this conference. This is no sit-in-a-room-and-listen sort of thing. You’ll get involved and learn lessons you’ll never forget.
I’m an independent consultant and pay for my own training. This conference is one I won’t skip. It’s well worth the cost.
I’ve often found that Developers and Testers misunderstand each other, even when they have a congenial relationship. (And in some shops, the relationship is anything but congenial.) Developers often don’t see the value of the Testers, or get annoyed that the Testers find issues that weren’t mentioned in the requirements. Testers often think Developers only consider the nominal cases, and don’t give enough attention to the edge conditions. Often, neither understands the others point of view. Michael Bolton, on the agile-testing list, said, Read More
Over on the ScrumDevelopment yahoo group, a ScrumMaster reported problems getting the Product Owner fully involved in the development process. Part of the problem is that the Product Owner isn’t co-located with the development team. The physical distance will certainly make participation more difficult, and less sure. That’s something to work on.
The Product Owner is not following the “rules” of Scrum, and this is frustrating the ScrumMaster. He’s likely right that playing the game by the rules will benefit everyone. He asks for advice on how to handle the situation. Read More
I’ve been neglecting this blog, lately, partly because I’ve been busy working on a software development process assessment for a client. In doing this, one of the meetings I observed was a post mortem of a release failure. The developers involved noted that they’d seen some connection drops by the webserver on the integration environment. The developers, however, didn’t trust that the integration environment adequately represented the production environment. They’d seen a similar problem some months prior, and didn’t know if anyone had fixed it. Therefore they didn’t know whether these problems were the result of the code they were deploying, or, as one developer put it, “just one of those things.” Read More
Last week I was corresponding with Esther Derby on the use of the Prime Directive in retrospectives, and how some people express difficulty in accepting it. She followed up that discussion with an excellent post titled “Are you doing your best?,” where she lists many reasons why someone may be doing their best under the circumstances, though not doing their peak work. When I saw that, I shelved the article I’d been writing on the topic. It’s remained on my mind, however, and I still have a bit to say about it.
Regardless of what we discover, we understand and truly believe that everyone did the best job they could, given what they knew at the time, their skills and abilities, the resources available, and the situation at hand.
— Norm Kerth, Project Retrospectives: A Handbook for Team Reviews
I’ll never forget the 11th grade English class when Mr. Ervin departed from his usual lessons in literature, and lectured us on this topic for the full hour. “Learn the trade and the tricks will follow.” As he repeated this simple advice, he bemoaned the fact that everyone was looking for the shortcuts, looking for the quick and easy, trying to bypass learning any more than was necessary.
Where did he learn this advice? As a carpenter’s apprentice, he had noticed that the master carpenter always had some little trick or technique to apply in difficult situations to make them easier. Carpentry was hard work, and he though if he could learn all of these techniques, it would be much easier to learn. So he asked the master carpenter to teach him the tricks of the trade. “Learn the trade and the tricks will follow,” was the reply. Read More
Esther Derby commented on my Overcoming Resistance entry with an excellent list of reasons why people may appear to be resisting. Thank you, Esther!
She also said
Unfortunately, I hear many people–even those who hope to influence others to change–label people who are “resisting” as clueless, stupid, or selfish. Some would-be change agents attack the motives of the people who aren’t following their ideas, accusing them of wanting to bring the company down.
This may make the so-called change agent feel superior, as he/she belittles people who don’t get his/her wonderful ideas. But it doesn’t help him/her bring about change.
Well, it may make the so-called change agent feel superior, but I’d bet that it’s really an ego defense against feeling frustrated and helpless. Ineffective change agents need love, too.
“Hi, I’m George and I’m a so-called change agent.”