Posts Tagged ‘development’

VBA Macro to Convert Dates in a Range – the Dirty Way

November 1, 2011 by marco · Leave a Comment
Filed under: Snippets, VBA, mySQL 
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I used this hacked Excel-Macro to convert all dates in a selected range from a manual data import using Excel to generate all required INSERTs for our MySql database from 03.08.2011 16:51:01 to 2011-08-03 16:51:01 In case you wonder, where you can find your Visual-Basic editor and execute your VBA-code… follow these instructions. Here is [...]

Emulate sendmail on your Dev Machine

February 8, 2011 by marco · Leave a Comment
Filed under: Linux, Serverstuff, Tools 
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In order to prevent email delivery during development and log all email messages that would have been delivered, you can actually do a simple trick: Replace the file /usr/sbin/sendmail (on Ubuntu, use ‘locate sendmail’ to find it if it lies elsewhere) with this little shell-script, or rather make a _bak of the original and save [...]

Feedbackloops in Software Development

February 28, 2010 by marco · Comments Off
Filed under: Productivity, Software development 
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Since feedback is a form of communication, excessive feedback will have the effect like an explosion in communication paths and will eventually produce more noise than signal. Any feedback loop in the system must help facilitate the management of change and efficiently adapt requirements along the the way. If this is not the case for [...]

Software Craftsmanship Manifesto

January 22, 2010 by marco · Comments Off
Filed under: Books, Software development 
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I have just received a new book: “Apprenticeship Patterns“: Skimming through the first pages I noticed the words in the 3rd column extending from the points in the 2nd column and thought, ‘Hmm, I have heard about these 2nd column points’… The following table popped up in my mind, which I would like to share [...]

The Ballpoint Game – A Scrum Simulation

October 29, 2009 by marco · Comments Off
Filed under: Softskills, Software development 
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I recently played the ballpoint game for the first time and was impressed… … how clearly it demonstrates the different phases of a team going through the ‘storming, norming and performing’-phases for everyone – even for management spectators. … how the iteration-rhythm helps to keep focus and increase the team performance to a very high and predictable level. … how easy it [...]

Robert Lefkowitz, Exceptional Software Explained: Embrace Error

October 29, 2009 by marco · Comments Off
Filed under: Software development, Videos 
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It is not brand new but still a very interesting talk: Robert Lefkowitz on open source software development methodologies with lots of nice anecdotes. Watch the 21min video: http://oscon.blip.tv/file/1108217/ Or listen to the audio: http://itc.conversationsnetwork.org/shows/detail3995.html

Consistent Development Environments using VirtualMachines

July 30, 2009 by marco · 2 Comments
Filed under: Linux, Software development, Tools 
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As a development team we always run into situations where we have trouble setting up a proper development environment for each of the team members to get going or add new staff on the go. It annoyed me every time since it causes a lot of unnecessary communication and friction. I often heard of virtualization [...]

Generalizing Specialists, Agile Heros

March 25, 2009 by marco · Comments Off
Filed under: Industry Terms, Software development 
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Inspired by the Podcast ‘Tips and Advice – Manifesto for Agile Software Development‘ in which Bob Payne and George Dinwiddie discuss the points made in the Agile Manifesto and talk about agile environments and mechanics. If you would like to discover the power of agile teams you should definitely check this one out! They also [...]

Frameworks…

March 13, 2009 by marco · Comments Off
Filed under: Articles, Software development, Tools 
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Find out interesting thoughts and experiences about the selection and usage of a frameworks for your projects in this set of slides ‘Living with Frameworks‘ by Stuart Herbert, Technical Manager at www.gradwell.com. You will learn about: How frameworks save you time (=money) and ensure quality but can also waste resources if applied in another way the [...]

Software Development Myths

November 28, 2008 by marco · Comments Off
Filed under: Software development 
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There is no doubt: The environment in which software is designed, produced and maintained has fundamental impact on what comes out below the bottom line for all players playing in this game. I have learnt that there is little in software development, you can do intuitively right the first time – even if you have [...]

The Bus Factor

September 1, 2008 by marco · Comments Off
Filed under: Industry Terms 
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This term simply stands as a reminder for, how many people need to get hit by a bus to leave you without anybody being familiar with one of your mission-critical applications. If the number equals one, you might re-consider your strategy… Don’t forget, there are also more common ways for developers to go somewhere else [...]

Survey 2008: ‘State of Agile Development’

September 1, 2008 by marco · Comments Off
Filed under: Articles, Software development 
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VersionOne have published their 3rd Annual ‘State of Agile Development’ survey: Results are available on this page or as pdf. Overview of topics covered: State of agile methods. Mix of participanting companies. Reasons for adopting agile methods. Concerns against it. Practices applied. Reasons for failures. Where agile creates value. What tools are used.

Make Your Projects Transparent

August 12, 2008 by marco · Comments Off
Filed under: Links, Software development 
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As projects and teams I am working on get more interwoven and organizational issues and management processes are gaining more and more traction on the 3 project dimensions time, budget and quality, I was thinking about what I would do as a manager in charge to let steam off the many issues we were facing [...]

The Chicken and Pig Analogy

August 12, 2008 by marco · 3 Comments
Filed under: Industry Terms, Software development 
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If you engage in agile development methods, sooner or later you will come accross the ‘Chicken and Pig’ analogy. It’s purpose is to depict the different levels of commitment of project stakeholders. It summs up like this: A chicken and a pig decide to start a restaurant. The chicken suggests to serve bacon and eggs. [...]