The other day I met a developer who went for a job interview and was asked to write a sorting algorithm. He was caught off-guard, didn’t do it very well, and failed the interview. But the company itself also failed, because it turns out they didn’t understand sorting algorithms either. Here’s the test question: You … Continue reading
A few words about meaningful metrics. When implementing a change of working a while back in my development team my boss of the time said, “Well, okay, but I want you to show me that your changes are making a difference”. What’s the metric for better software? I knew all about the dangers of measuring … Continue reading
I’ve long wanted the ability to create burn-up charts for very, very simple projects, where a project tracking tool would be considered overkill. So I took some time out recently and I’ve come up with a spreadsheet that does this. My criteria were: low tech (well, as low as a spreadsheet can be); must be … Continue reading
A tweet escaped from Product Tank this week from Benjamin Mitchell, watching Tom Loosemore talk about alphagov: “It’s a mix of ignoring them [non-Agile managers] & making shit up” #ProductTank How is this consistent w/ Agile values of openness & trust? There’s a conference-worth of material to unpack from that question. You can make up … Continue reading