As I’m working with smaller and more agile projects, I’m increasingly seeing the classic way that Scrum is executed as more of an impediment to agility than a helper. This is especially the case when it comes to the classic Sprint Planning as described in [the Scrum Guide](http://www.scrum.org/Porta...

During the recent panel debate in Colombo Agile Meetup my colleague Lasantha Bandara asked the following question: How do you start an agile project and ensure room for future enhancements? How can we achieve flexibity at the beginning? This is my answer: Flexibility is about having an acceptable co...

There are only so many ways to test that your persistence layer is implemented correctly or that you’re using an ORM correctly. Here’s my canonical tests for a repository (Java-version): import static org.fest.assertions.api.Assertions.*; public class PersonRepositoryTest { private PersonRepository ...

Two of my favorite libraries in C#: FluentAssertions and NUnit (of course). NUnit has a “hidden” gem (that is, it’s well documented, yet few developers use it): [TestCase]. Look at this: using FluentAssertions; using NUnit.Framework; public class RomanNumeralsTest { [TestCase(3333, "MMMCCCXXXIII")] ...

After having worked with Scrum for a number of years, I still witness sprint reviews where the team’s demonstration of the product is confusing and the value produced in the sprint is unclear. The demo may consist of just a bunch of different functions and screens without any meaning. Or maybe the t...

When I learned math in elementary school, I would reach for my calculator. But my father stopped me: “You only get to use the calculator when you can do math without it.” As you can imagine, at the time I though this was unfair and unreasonable, but later I have discovered what advantage it is to un...

When a software architect gets a good idea or learns something new, he has a problem. The main job of the architect is to ensure that the right information in present inside the heads of the people who should build the application. Every new piece of information in the architect’s head represents a ...

Do you ever feel it’s hard to get real progress in a sprint towards the business goal? Do you feel the feedback from a iteration picks on all the details you didn’t mean to cover this sprint? Do you feel like sprint planning meetings are dragging out? Then a Rainbow Sprint Plan may be for you. Here ...

Sometimes, small questions lead to big answers. Sometimes these answers are controversial. One such question is “What does this warning about serialVersionUID mean”? All the advice out there basically is for developers who don’t know what’s going on to write code that will ignore errors when somethi...

I have tried to create a simple process for debriefing workshops. This is the current process I use, and I think it may be useful for others. I give everyone sticky notes with three colors I ask everyone to write “a thing that surprised you about the workshop”, “a thing that you learned today” and “...

We were taught to categorize, but we know that searching beats sorting We were taught that information is scare, but we know that the real problem is too much information, not too little. We were taught that information must be protected from being viewed, but we know that the greatest threat to inf...

I’m working on this idea, and I don’t know if it appeals to you guys. I’d like your input on whether this is something to explore further. Here’s the deal: I’ve encountered teams who, when working with SOA technologies have been dragged into the mud by the sheer complexity of their tools. I’ve only ...

Changing your perspective even a small amount can have profound effects on how you approach your system. Let’s say you’re writing a web application in Java. In the system you deal with orders, customers and products. As a web application, your classes include staples like PersonController, PersonRep...

An “Agile” project is one that actively seeks to incorporate changes as the project progresses, rather than assuming that the plans from the beginning of the project will work for the whole project duration. Not all organizations want to adopt “agile” as their project metaphor. And some organization...

I hate giving promises for things I can’t control. I can promise that I will attend a party or that I will set aside time to help you with your problem. I cannot promise that the party will be fun or that your problem will be solved. Giving promises on effort is honest, giving promises on outcomes i...

As a user, I can add social security number, so patient logs have social security numbers As a developer, how would you react if you were given this user story? Would you throw it back in the face of the product owner, or would you try and understand it? How about the following dialogue? Developer: ...

Do you know how to apply coding practices the technology stack that you use on a daily basis? Do you know how the technology stack works? For many programmers, it’s easy enough to use test-driven development with a trivial example, but it can be very hard to know how to apply it to the problems you ...

I recently attended the XP Days Ukraine conference in a rainy, but beautiful and Christmas-decorated Kiev. I conducted a coding dojo and gave a talk where I demonstrated pair programming live together with Dima Mindra. After the talk, I got a few questions about how to run a Coding Dojo. This articl...

The next half year, I’m scheduled to give the talk “Experience Agile Programming” in Kiev, Gothenburg and Riga. In the presentation, I pair with a local developer and show a coding kata in Java, Ruby or CoffeeScript. After the presentation, I engage the audience in a discussion of what they saw, whe...

Instead of using Scrum, maybe we should use MyScrum. It’s like Scrum, with the stuff added that you think will super charge your MyScrum. This is my MyScrum: I want to measure velocity every week I want to demostrate the product with a cadence that makes sure users show up to the demo I don’t want t...

The term Extreme Programming (XP) was coined in the nineties. Originally, it described a set of practices that have mostly been widely adopted today. Among these practices were continuous integration, test-driven development, user stories and frequent releases. These practices are hardly radical or ...

On larger projects, I’ve always ended up resorting to writing down a lot of detailed specifications, many of which are wrong, irrelevant or we might not be ready to answer them yet. On small projects, the dialogue between the customer and the developers can flow easy, and good things happen. The qui...

Oracle released Java 7 on July 28, 2011. This is nearly 5 years after the release of Java 6 in December 2006. The release received a lot of bad press, both because it is very meager on features, and because it shipped with a severe bug. Nevertheless, once the most serious bugs have been fixed, you m...

Last week, I was invited to do a coding dojo for the Java user group in Bergen. I have written a few words about the dojo part of the exercise in a previous blogpost. After “classical” TDD-training, I decided to try something different and gave the group a competition to play with: Extreme startup, ...

Last week, I was invited to do a coding dojo for the Java user group in Bergen. I chose a format that let people work more independently rather than the classical style of “lots of people passing the keyboard around and looking on the code on a projector”. The result was an informal, competitive and...

For those of you who already use PuTTY: Here’s a little improvement that’s surprisingly little known. Probably because it is very hard to explain. But I’ll try. Here is how you can avoid starting programs, entering login information or indeed typing passwords when you use PuTTY: Download Putty insta...

This blog post is a summary of my lightning talk at XP2011 I needed to fail with modern methods for requirement gathering in order to understand old methods for requirements gathering. Many software projects write requirements in what is refered to as “user stories”. But a use story is not a story a...

Can the various European Agile User Groups benefit from working together? I am cautiously optimistic. At XP2011 this week, Jurgen Appelo has taken the initiative to launch the Agile Lean Europe network. This is an initiative to bring together representatives from 17 European countries. Sergey Dmitri...

This blogpost is a summary of my ScanDev 2011 talk: “Fearless Improvement” What is the goal of your current project? I currently work on a project for the transmission system operator for the Norwegian electrical grid. The value of the system we’re building is that my beer stays cool. Skill If you’r...

Teams gather around task boards to plan their day. If the conversation and the task board match, we stay on topic and we understand what the rest of the team talks about. The last month, my project has redesigned the task board with this in mind. Here is a picture of our task board as it looked a fe...