In the tech industry we’re reasonably good at capturing needs. Sometimes we skip the needs (or assume them) and go straight to requirements. That’s not great, but the intention is … Continue reading Anti-needs
Category: Software design
The benefits of timeboxing a solution
A colleague pointed me to a nice article by Sue Davis about writing for the public, and among the suggestions was the idea of timeboxing feedback: “If you don’t, the … Continue reading The benefits of timeboxing a solution
Discovering the Elm language
Are you looking for a better front-end coding experience? I’ve just spent several weeks completing my first project with the Elm language. This is my experience. (Spoiler alert: It’s pretty … Continue reading Discovering the Elm language
Technical bankruptcy
Lukas Oberhuber, CTO of Simply Business, has surfaced a term I think a lot of people will find hugely useful, and which really should be used more widely: technical bankruptcy. … Continue reading Technical bankruptcy
Keeping up to date aggressively
A software developer friend of mine has good advice, which he repeats solemnly: “You have to keep up to date aggressively .” I agree. He is specifically talking about software … Continue reading Keeping up to date aggressively
Past and future problems of solutionizing
Most tech people I know agree that solutionizing is a bad thing. This is when the non-technical “customer” (a project manager, a product owner) tries to specify the technical solution … Continue reading Past and future problems of solutionizing
Have you designed for delivery?
Your software may be designed to work. But is it designed to be delivered? That may sound like an odd question (“Why wouldn’t it be?”) but I’ve been involved in … Continue reading Have you designed for delivery?
Choosing a technology because it’s popular
In the ideal world a technology will be selected on its own merits alone. But we don’t live in an ideal world, and every technology has to work in a … Continue reading Choosing a technology because it’s popular
You can criticise if you’ve been there
If you’ve got a bit of development experience it’s easy to criticise the technology efforts of others. If you’ve got more than a bit of development experience then it’s harder. … Continue reading You can criticise if you’ve been there
A small lesson in Scala
For fun, I’ve been working through the recent Coursera course on functional programming with Scala, run by Martin Odersky, Scala’s creator. It’s been a good ride, but towards the end … Continue reading A small lesson in Scala
