I’ve often come across a situation where a team needs to undertake a major refactoring or some other technical change, which may take in the order of days or weeks, … Continue reading The word puzzle analogy for technical changes
Category: Software design
Plan for legacy systems
The other day I was looking at some old Elm code, refamiliarising myself with one of the key language concepts (Signals) and found an article to help me. One part … Continue reading Plan for legacy systems
Deploy first, build after
There’s a lesson I learned a long time ago, and which I still find useful: deploy first, build after. Many years ago, when I was working with Mat Wall, we … Continue reading Deploy first, build after
Anti-needs
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
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?
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