ronpih's Blog

Tired...

It's been a long week and I'm happy to finally reach the weekend.

Long Time No Write

I've always been a sporadic blogger with multiple blogs.  Ironic, isn't it?  Lately, I've been posting more at my other blog, although I'm far from prolific over there.  One problem is that if I have 2 blogs, how will they be different?  I haven't really had an answer to that.  I guess one way to think about it is my other blog is my work blog and this is my personal blog.  Yeah, that's it.  Nothing personal to say tonight, just this little bit of musing...

Nerd Test

2008

2007 was a year of change for me and I'm looking forward to 2008.  By far, the biggest change that happened last year was that I lost 97 lbs.  I'm still not totally where I want to be but I'm darn close.  And actually, if I stayed at this weight I'd be happy.

The key to the success I've had so far is that I was ready and made a commitment to do what it takes to make it happen.  All the other good stuff flowed from that.  Another key that came after the commitment was finding a program that worked for me.  I'm not sure, though, that the program will work for everyone.  Being ready and committed were far more important for me than the particular program.  One realization that came to me early on in the program is that I was responsible for doing it (not the program).

The big challenge in this area for 2008 will be to maintain the weight loss I've accomplished so far.  And the folks from the program have told me already that will be the biggest challenge.  One reason I chose this program is that once you reach your goal, the program continues for 6 more months at a minimum and if you backslide or have other problems they work with you to solve them.  So, it's with excitement and some trepidation that I look forward to 2008.

Random Notes while reading http://leansoftwareengineering.com - II

Is this just another Agile blog?
Hmmm... Deming and Ohno over Ward and Kent?  Customers over developers?  Sounds different (and interesting).

Release early, release often
Jim McCarthy?  Interesting - I referred to the VC++ in the mid-90's in my previous post, which was the time of Jim McCarthy on that team.

OK, based on what's said in this post I get why the earlier post talked about software services and online applications.  Lots of new concepts and ideas here: minimum deployable feature set, ideal final result, minimal testable customer value, minimize work in process.

Schedule is orthogonal to workflow
I'm not sure I grok the whole import of this post but one thing that does resonate is the minimalism of Scrum.  I've seen multiple instances of people tying practices to Scrum that I didn't get from reading the literature.  Most of those efforts could not be called successes.  I like that the folks here are not taking the definition as something to be followed like a recipe but are looking at the essence and trying to improve it.  Kind of like what they're suggesting with the software engineering process itself they're proposing.

More later...

Random Notes while reading http://leansoftwareengineering.com

I'm not at home right now and I'm using a computer that isn't mine so this post contains notes to myself from reading the posts on the Lean Software Engineering blog.

About the authors
I remember Corey Ladas from his posts on the internal Agile Development alias at Microsoft.

What is Lean Software Engineering?
This post posits that packaged or integrated software is from the "old world" and equates small increments and high frequency delivery with software services and online applications.  I wonder if there isn't a way to do packaged/integrated software delivery with small increments and high frequency.  When I joined the VC++ team, they were operating under what was called the subscription model - releasing quarterly with one major release guaranteed every year.  This was back in the mid-90's.  That model was abondon when the management that spawned it left the team and VC++ was merged under the larger Visual Studio umbrella.  Maybe CTP's are the first step to a more frequent delivery model for large, integrated software products?

"The new model of software development promises to deliver no more and no less than what the customer wants, when the customer wants it." - When I read this line, the first question I have is "What if you have millions of customers?"  There may be a lot of different wants there...

There's a nice frame from Corey of inventory accumulating at the beginning, middle, and end of a development process in response to a question in the comments.

I met with Don Reinertsen for a couple of hours today
I agree with their perplexity...

more later....

Microsoft Repositions

Interesting

52.2 Manage It!

Book #2 is Manage It! by Johanna Rothman.  For this one, I wrote an Amazon review.

52.1 The Dip

Last year on my birthday I decided to count the number of books I read during the year.  Somewhere in the middle, I lost track.  Well last week was my birthday so I figured I'd try it again this year.  The first book for this year is a little book from Seth Godin called The Dip.

How do you know when to quit something and when to stick it out?  Sometimes you should quit and sometimes you shouldn't.  This book lays out a model on how to decide when to do what.  This was a quick read and presented a useful model.

2 blogs

I used to have more but now I'm down to 2 blog, this one and the one at http://blogs.msdn.com/ronpih.  Why 2?  Well, this one is on my private web site and the other one is Microsoft provided.  I haven't thought too much about what to do with each one until today but I guess the other one will be mostly related to work and this one will be mostly not related to work.

As things are now, it looks like the other one will have more meat.  This one will be more sporadic and scattered.  I guess I'm saying the other one will be more appealing to most folks than this one.  Unless something interesting happens personally.  Which may happen.  Sometime.  In the future.  Maybe...

Chrome

This morning I'm listening to an album I haven't listened to in while and I have to admit that right now, it's my favorite album.  That album is Chrome and the artist is the group Catherine Wheel.  Catherine Wheel was never a mega-super popular band but, for me, their music is the best.  Every album is great.  And Chrome is so great I just had to mention it today.

MSDN Testing Forum??

(via the Braidy Tester)

This is very cool.  I wonder why I didn't hear about it internally?

The Context-Driven School

I guess if I have to identify myself as belonging to some group, it would have to be the Context-Driven School.  The ideas behind this group resonate with me because they avoid the dogmatic, the prescribed, the unthinking adherence to a set of predefined rules.  The seven basic principles talk to the value of practices in context; there are no best practices.  They talk to the value of people working together.  They talk to the coopertative exercising of judgement and skill.  These principles are valuable to me and, by adhering to them, give value to projects I and my team work on.

Paul Gerrard wails on Jonathan Kohl

(via James Bach's Blog)

Initial (potentially muddy) thoughts on this: After reading Kohl's original post on post-Agile and his FAQ I have to say that I totally agree with what I think he's saying - consider all practices and use what makes sense for you.  The term "post-Agile" doesn't resonate with me, however, since it doesn't say what it is.  In the first post, he defines post-Agilism as "Process Skepticism".  Why not call it that?  Well, that term doesn't really say what it is either.  You are skeptical of big-P process.  I can get behind that idea.  I've seen teams crash and burn from blindly following process.  But then what?  Again, what Kohl writes about this resonates with me but the name he applies to it doesn't seem to define what the result of it is.

Now that Agile is mainstream some are looking for the next thing.  But how many "next things" do we have to go through to realize there's no real destination; only a continuing journey.  Or maybe what it is is: Consider different ideas and do what makes sense in your situation.  What would we call that?

Gerrard seems to be violently agreeing with what I see as the intent behind Kohl's posts.  It feels to that there's more context to this than I as someone passing through and reading it know about.

Need to Catch Up

I was just thinking today that I have a lot to learn in my new job.  And all stuff that I've ignored for years: SQL, Office, Sharepoint.  Gotta roll up the sleeves...