Random Thoughts on Software...

Management Tips - A Hebrew Podcast on Management and Leadership

2012-07-03T00:02:00.001+03:00

As promised, today we (Lior Cohen and I) have announced our new podcast in Hebrew on Management and Leadership.

In this podcast we will try to provide tips, tools and best practices from our experience as well as from the experience of other prominent leaders in the Israeli work space. I believe there are many tales about managers and management. Without going into too much details, we believe that management is a skill you need to grow slowly and gradually (the same way as you grow your technology skills for example). It is a long way to go... A well skilled manager works hard every day to "clean" the way for his team members in order to allow THEM to do what they know best (like delivering software for example).

My hope that this podcast will help everybody, who wants to learn and to grow these skills.
My personal believe is that this podcast isn't only for managers.
Since one of the keys of good management is creating a highly gelled and efficient environment - I hope that others will contribute (and listen) as well.

I will be happy to hear you feedbacks (or questions or management dilemmas).

You can find the podcast here: www.mngttips.com.

API Best Practices

2012-05-27T12:37:00.000+03:00

During our last Software Craftsmanship meeting I have delivered a short (about 14 min) talk on API best practices (in Hebrew).

You can find it here:

New web site for the Israeli Software Craftsmanship Group

2012-05-22T23:37:00.000+03:00

A new web site that summarizes all the events of the Israeli Software Craftsmanship Group (#SCISR) can be found here: http://bit.ly/scisr (or http://israel.softwarecraftsmanship.org).

The site contains an information about upcoming events (home) and an option to register to them.
In addition the site summarizes (events tab) all the major events we had and includes all the materials, like slides and recordings, from the meetings.

Your are welcome to register to the events RSS (also please check our Linkedin group, if you aren't registered there yet)

Giving a talk on Fostering Software Craftsmanship (Building Successful Teams)

2012-05-03T11:10:00.000+03:00

I will be giving a talk on Fostering Software Craftsmanship (Building Successful Teams) on May the 7th at the Hub Tel - Aviv.

During the last years I've been asked several times on the topics of the talk. Since the session is usually about an hour and so, needless to say that I am only scratching the surface. There is definitely more into that. I only provoke initial thoughts on our profession both from a personal and a team view perspectives.

I will be more than pleaced if you continue to be in touch, reaching for questions, suggestions or taking more personal involvement in the Software Craftsmanship community (here and here)

In addition, in the following days I will announce a new podcast that I intend to record.
This podcast will be connected to some topics I am mentioning in the talk, but obviously will deal with more broader issues and more deeply.

I'll post the details soon!

From Manual to Automated QA

2012-03-05T11:32:00.000+02:00

Here is (and also below) a short lecture (In Hebrew) I gave during the Agile Practitioners 2012 conference.
The lecture summarizes the lessons we learned at PicScout (also here) while introducing more and more automation to our QA team.

Tenth Software Craftsmanship In Israel Meeting

2012-02-03T01:23:00.000+02:00

On our tenth Software Craftsmanship meeting I was very excited to host Corey Haines.

Corey flew to Israel on Tuesday just to conduct 2 code retreats on Wednesday and Thursday so obviously he was a bit tired when we gathered for the meeting. Corey gave a short talk, concentrating on reminding us what is the value for the business that we should provide.

Here it is:

After the talk we broke into pairs in order to hand interpreter a Piet language. Piet is a stack based language whose programs are bitmaps that look like an abstract art. In our exercise we needed to hand interpreted the "Hello World" program which looks like that:

This really makes you to appreciate your compiler (or interpreter)!

Personally, I had lots of fun and my hope is that Corey will visit us soon again.

Two Code Retreats & 10th Software Craftsmanship Meeting with Corey Haines

2012-01-05T19:53:00.000+02:00

I am very happy to announce a few very interesting events, coming at the end of this month:
Code Retreat with Corey Haines:

Corey Haines is a Journeyman who went for an year of pair-programming tour.
Corey is highly involved with the Software Craftsmanship movement and is a frequent speaker on various conferences on the matters of code quality, skills and professionalism.

We will host 2 code retreats events on January the 25th and January the 26th (These are the same events, so please register only to one of them).
The details and the registration can be found here: Code Retreat - Take I, Code Retreat - Take II.
*** The number of seats is VERY limited ***
Please hurry up to register and if you know that you cannot attend, please remember to release the place for somebody else to attend.

10th SCISR Meeting

As you already guessed, Corey will be the key speaker on our next meeting.
The meeting will take place on Thursday, January the 26th.
The agenda and the time frames will be posted separately.
Please follow up the registration page; I will update the agenda, the location and the time frames once it will be decided.
(Please note, that there are some difficulties to find a big place to host the event. If you have suggestions, please feel free to contact me).

Agile Practitioners

For ones who are interested, Corey (and for the due diligence me and other group members too) will give a talk on Agile Practitioners conference on January the 31st.
More details can be found here on the conference's page.

Sponsorship

If you are interested in those events (and you should be ;)), I am still seeking for sponsorship to help me with the logistics of hosting Corey in Israel.
If you would like to propose some sponsorship, hosting the 10th meeting, taking Corey out or giving him a tour to Kibbutz :) please feel free to contact me.

Ninth Software Craftsmanship Meeting

2011-12-22T12:06:00.000+02:00

Our ninth #SCISR meeting took place on this monday.

I really enjoyed the mingling, the discussions and the energy in the air. This time we had an open panel with Ran Tavory, Elad Sofer and Lior Schejter talking about their experiences in Software Development.
I will post a detailed post about the meeting, but for now you can find below the recording of the session.

Software Craftsmanship in Israel Group Meeting #9 (Hebrew) by urilavi

Software Craftsmanship and Apprenticeship Patterns with Ade Oshineye

2011-11-17T10:58:00.000+02:00

During the Google Developer Day in Israel I met Ade Oshineye the co-author of the Apprenticeship Patterns for an informal talk on his book.

Unfortunately, my battery didn't allow me to record a longer session, but we did cover among others what is Software Craftsmanship, how Ade and Dave started to write the book and whether we can define mastership patterns...

In addition, after the recording we had a great time in continuing the discussion on various topics that deserve their own blog post.

You can view the short video here:

It's Alive

2011-10-28T00:21:00.002+02:00

I and my friend are both in the process of building our houses (I actually already moved in, but the process never ends ;)).
Needless to say, that we invested a lot of energy (and money) to oversee the construction.

Somehow, during one of our talks, we touched a very interesting observation. We both hired an architect (a real one, not a software architect :)) and we both benefited from the great ideas these architects brought to the table.

You see, the house I am building is just a simple 5 rooms apartment, which will stay for me the same 5 rooms apartment regardless where the kitchen will be located. However, just from a quick glance at the sketches, my architect is able to spot things, that usually would take me a long time to identify and to appreciate as a better utilization of the space and the structure.

The interesting thing is that the same process happens to me while working with code.
Somehow the code becomes alive when I am looking at it.

These aren't just simple assignments or method calls. These aren't just simple lines of code.
When I read and write software (*) I see relations and responsibilities...
I see "real" interactions between objects trying to talk together in order to accomplish a task.
It is quite amazing, as sometimes I am able to "visualize" the code in front of me: It forms a story.

By AllOfUsAreLost

Usually I can follow the story by spotting who said what to whom; As all great stories I can spot the places where somebody said too much or tipped something to somebody he shouldn't. Following the plot, I can identify the core characters (the must components); Without them there is no point in the story at all. Watching the interactions enables me to visualize different abstraction levels; Those in turn will reveal the required actions on the core (or other) characters.

Definitely, I can continue on and on with the analogy.
Yet, I am not the first one to point about the relation between writing in general and writing (constructing) software.

If you really want to become a great programmer you should read (and write) code as a story; Visualize and watch the plot!

(*) The reading is intentionally before the writing

Fostering Software Craftsmanship (or How to Build Successful Teams) - Hebrew

2011-10-21T22:28:00.000+02:00

Last month I presented a short lecture about Fostering Software Craftsmanship (or How to Build Successful Teams) to one of the top notch technological units in IDF.

The lecture is a hybrid of management and engineering skills.
It focuses on the dissonance between the needed software engineering skills in the industry and what happens in the reality. The main idea in the talk is that using Software Craftsmanship principles as individuals and as TEAMs makes it possible to create high quality groups that produce great products.

The lecture is in Hebrew and I hope that you will find it interesting...

The Code Room Event (SCISR)

2011-05-16T12:24:00.000+03:00

I am happy to announce the first Software Craftsmanship in Israel Code Room event to be held in Google Israel which kindly volunteered to host us. (Many thanks!)

The Code Room

Have you ever wanted to code with the bests of the bests?
Have you ever wanted to learn from the real professionals how to choose the right architectures & designs?
Have you ever wanted to rub your elbows with the great developers?

Now you have the chance!

The code room meeting is all about coding a small project together.
The purpose is to enrich the participants with different programming approaches and styles (architecture, design, clean code, unit testing and etc...).

The session will be divided into several acts:

Act I - Choosing the Architecture
Act II - Choosing the Design and the Programming Environment
Act III - Implementation
Act IV - Presentation (if the time permits)

Hurry up, there is only 50 places!!!

Please bring your laptops with your favorite programming environment set-up.

----

Here you can find a short movie that demonstrates how much fun we had :)

Good Values Pay Off

2011-04-28T09:19:00.001+03:00

(Cross post from IRefactor)

To simply put, we have been acquired!
For the past couple of years we have been working hard to enhance our technological solutions, the de facto: scalable, near exact match, visual search engine. Using this visual search engine as a backbone, allowed us to envision and to develop many of our great products.

Not surprisingly, PicScout not only became the market leader in the image copyright solutions, but also provided unique solutions in the terms of crediting every image on the web.

On a personal note; Serving as a VP R&D during this time, building the architecture, driving the technology and working with the greatest team ever - was remarkable and enjoyable. I am happy to be a part of a great team where professionalism matters and which employs many of the Software Craftsmanship values, I so deeply encourage!

A few moments ago, we have officially announced that we (PicScout) have been acquired by Getty
Images.

I am sure that our unique technological value will continue to benefit to the world of images.

Cloud "Aware" Architecture

2011-03-31T14:29:00.000+02:00

Below is a short talk I gave at the CloudCon 2011.

The subject is scalable and cloud "aware" architecture.

What should I learn in my CS degree?

2011-02-25T14:40:00.000+02:00

My strongest believe is that everyone who devotes his life to Software Engineering, should have a CS degree.

Why? Well, it's a different question, so I would postpone my answer for now.
Instead, in the following post I would like to emphasize the subjects (and hence the tools) one should acquire during his studies.
These tools are essential in creating a "shared" language between us the engineers.
These tools are essential in being the solid ground of our day to day architectural and lingual abstractions.
These tools are essential in being the means of our research capabilities, logical deduction, advantages and disadvantages of each method we apply and etc...
In my opinion, those are the topics one should concentrate on:

Data Structures - Any course that involves Data Structures, from basic to more complex Data Structures.
Algorithms - Graph Algorithms, Dynamic Algorithms, Greeding Algorithms, Aproximate Algorithms, Computational Geometry and etc...
Operating Systems - Everything that involves Operating Systems from theory to practice. If there is a lab on OS, take it!
The importance of understanding the bits and bytes of the biggest abstraction we work against every day is priceless.
Artifical Intelligence - Searching techniques, Logic deduction, Decision tees, Learning technique such as Markov Chains, Neural Networks, Bayesian Networks and etc...
Programming Languages - No, it isn't "Programming in Java"; These courses involve the principles of Software Languages, which are crucial for identifying the right tools for the job.
Imperative and Declarative Languages; OOP, AOP, Functional and Logical Languages; The more principles you learn (and the more languages you see) the more you will understand how to apply these languages and when.

In addition, I recommend taking a few "narrowing" courses, courses that are deepening your expertise in a specific field.
Some examples are: Natural Language Processing, Computer Vision or Distribute Programming.
It's worth noting that, in my opinion, practical principles of "constructing" software should be learned differently.
Those skills are better acquired by enrolling into an apprenticeship program, by reading classical books and essays, by rubbing elbows with others or by deliberately practicing.
If you are interested in such practical experience, please apply for the Mentorship/Apprenticeship program we enrolled in our Software Craftsmanship Group.

One small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind

2011-02-24T20:51:00.000+02:00

(Cross post from IRefactor)

Lately I had a lot of thoughts about how to introduce a change within an organization.

For a while now I am giving some talks about leading a software development team, focusing each time on a different facet, such as: Quality, Architecture, Recruitment Process and etc...
(I have combined some of those thoughts into a short lecture, which I entitled Fostering Software Craftsmanship (Building Successful Teams) and it is given as a part of the IL Tech Talks).

But here is a phenomena, I encounter each time.

Most of the audience understand the importance of the concepts, but really struggle with introducing them to their organization.

Martin Deutsch

Writing Unit Tests will lengthen my development time!
How much time should I "reserve" for doing Refactoring?
How do I explain to my manager that Refactoring is important?
Code Reviews are difficult, because people have different tastes!
Code Reviews are taking too long! We will not be given the time to do it, ever!
Continuous Integration will take a few weeks to accomplish. I won't be given any time to do it in the near feature!
Those concepts are great, but the time to do them should be allocated by the management.
...

I am sure we all heard those sayings. Heck, we even have given those once! (No... Not really :) )

Though I have a lot to say and comment about each and every one of the above statements - there are some broader aspects I must cover first.

We all hate changes, don't we? Doing Unit Tests, investing our time in Refactoring (or Builds) - those are just an extra activities that we have never done (or done correctly).
One should really invest his own time in order to polish those activities and doing so is just recognizing that we need to change. As humans, we find it extremely difficult to accept changes.
Jack Welch understood it perfectly, but nevertheless he succeeded to introduce a lot of changes to GE. Jack Welch found the change to be exciting, daring and imaginative.
GE success can be rooted to its ability to change and to change fast.

However, applying change in the simplest way doesn't work.
We cannot accept the change all at once. Evolution takes its time; Therefore, in order to accept the change we also should adapt one step after another.
(It's really like Refactoring Steps: One small change at a time, compile and test).

Sometimes it takes years to introduce all those concepts to your teams:
Start by a simple task, like code conventions or source control layout, then teach unit tests and invest in teaching code smells, continue by applying rigorCode Reviews and etc... and etc...

Doing everything in one big bang just doesn't work. I have seen several teams that got introduced to Scrum or TDD in a matter of weeks. Those are big changes to somebody who didn't evolve to the "right" point. Needless to say that the failures that those teams experienced were so discouraging that till now some of those Software Engineers hate TDD and claim that Unit Tests (even not TDD) are plain waste of their time.

You shouldn't be surprised that applying all the great concepts to your organization will take years.
One step after another; One small step for a Software Engineer, one giant leap for an Organization.

Close-up of Astronaut?s Foot on Lunar Surface - NASA Images

Seventh Software Craftsmanship Meeting

2011-02-24T20:00:00.001+02:00

I am very excited to announce the 7th SCISR meetup.

How to utilize efficiently Programming Languages?

Lectures:

-Dynamic languages seem to be more concise and less verbose than their Static counterparts.

However, using Dynamic languages efficiently requires a different approach.

During the first part of our meeting Reuven Lerner will demonstrate the differences between Dynamic and Static languages and present the right approaches to utilize the full power of a Dynamic language.

-While general purpose languages can solve any problem, the creation of special-purpose languages for expressing problems and solving a particular problem domain is highly efficient.

During the second part of our meeting Dror Helper will explain and demonstrate what are Domain Specific Languages (DSLs) and how they can be used to solve problems in a particular domain.

Hands On:

In the hands on part we will exercise writing DSLs.

Please bring your laptops (with the environments set-up) to the meeting.

Time frames:

Lectures:

18:00 - 18:25 - Gathering

18:25 - 18:30 - Short Intro

18:30 - 19:00- Static vs. Dynamic Languages

19:00 - 19:05- Break

19:05 - 19:35 - Domain Specific Languages (DSLs)

19:35 - 19:50 - Break + Giveaways

Hands On:

19:50 - 21:00- Implementing DSL

Giveaways:

We have great giveaways to give during the meeting. DON'T miss them :)

Food:

Although we are plaining to have basic food, please also bring something with you for the group.

(Thus we will be able to support the event with the user generated food).

Please register here.

Software Craftsmanship - Meeting 6

2011-02-24T19:36:00.001+02:00

Chronicles of the 6th Software Craftsmanship (SCISR) meetup.

This time, we discussed and practiced my own very beloved technique - called Refactoring.

During the session Itay Maman demonstrated a real life project that he needed to refactor for his company.

On the first part of our meeting, Itay refactored a very lengthy method in the CustomAction class, called actionPerformed.

Here is the initial code of that method.

You can watch the session here, where Itay demonstrated his approach and the refactoring steps he applied.

On the second part of the meeting, we practiced by refactoring the same code, but this time without the unit tests.

If you are familiar with Refactoring, then you should know that it is totally incorrect to perform it without the "safety net", i.e. unit tests.

However, Itay's genius idea, just proved to all of us that changing the code without having the confidence of "not breaking" the system (i.e. unit tests) is very hard and almost impossible.

As usual, I had a great fun. My hope that the community will continue to grow!

Sixth Software Craftsmanship Meeting

2011-01-11T00:53:00.001+02:00

Our six meeting will deal with a Software Engineering technique called: "Refactoring".
This is one of my favorite techniques, which is usually misunderstood and overlooked (e.g. Refactoring != Rewriting).

So, here are the details:
Subject: "Refactoring Workshop”

We will refactor several real life examples in pairs (or triples).
Also, we will be demonstrated with the techniques to create a better code.

Please bring your laptops (with the environments set-up) to the meeting.

Time frames:

18:00 - 18:25 - Gathering / Mingling
18:25 - 18:30 - Short Intro / Explaining the meeting's set-up
18:30 - 19:30 - Refactoring I (60min)
19:35 – 19:45 - Break + Giveaways
19:45 – 20:45 - Refactoring II (60min)
20:45 – 21:00 - Wrap-up + Giveaway

Giveaways:

We have great giveaways to give during the meeting. DON'T miss them :)

Food:

Although we are plaining to have basic food, please also bring something with you for the group.
(Thus we will be able to support the event with the user generated food).

You can register here.

Code Smells

2011-01-03T16:09:00.001+02:00

(Cross post from IRefactor)

If you like practicing in identifying code smells, then you can find below a short class called
TimerManager.

public class TimerManager
{
    public delegate void TimerCallback(object data);
    private static readonly object _sync = new object();
    private readonly Dictionary<int, Timer> timers = new Dictionary<int, Timer>();
    private readonly Dictionary<int, TimerCallback> callbacks = new Dictionary<int, TimerCallback>();

     public void SetTimeout(TimerCallback timerCallback, int snooze)
     {
            var timer = new Timer(snooze);
            lock (_sync)
            {
               timers.Add(timer.GetHashCode(), timer);
               callbacks.Add(timer.GetHashCode(),
               x =>
               {
                  lock (_sync)
                  {
                     var t = timers[x.GetHashCode()];
                     t.Stop();
                     t.Close();
                     timers.Remove(x.GetHashCode());
                     callbacks.Remove(x.GetHashCode());
                  }
                  // invoke function provided by caller
                  timerCallback(null);
                });
            }
            timer.Elapsed += timer_Elapsed;
            timer.AutoReset = false;
            timer.Start();
      }
}

Here are some Code Smells, that can be identified:

TimerManager (a weak smell) - Everything that is called a manager alerts me a great deal.
Usually managers are God objects, have low cohesion and high coupling and violating too much
OO principles...
It doesn't necessary mean that the same happens here, but it should be noted and then verified in the code.
TimerCallback should be generic or restricted by a Data Type.
It's better to specialize the TimerCallback with more concrete type parameter. Having said
that, it might be that the author wanted to use the built in TimerCallback in .NET.
In such a case the declaration is redundant.
static _sync object.
The class has only instance members, besides that _sync object; Will it make sense to do the following?

TimerManager timerManager1 = new TimerManager();
timerManager1.SetTimeout(...);
... 
TimerManager timerManager2 = new TimerManager();
// here timerManager2 will block on the same object as the timerManager1
timerManager2.SetTimeout(...);

Both Dictionaries are just plain procedural programming definitions; It is the same like having 2 arrays aligned by their indexes as both the dictionaries will be accessed by the same index (an int). Behold, as one mistake (accessing the wrong index) can lead this code to an undefined behavior.
GetHashCode shouldn't be used to identify uniquely an object.
Let me repeat again... GetHashCode mustn't be used to identify uniquely an object...
GetHashCode's implementation is needed for collections (and Equals, see below).
Sometimes the same result of the hash code will put two different objects in the same hush bucket - which means those are not unique identifiers!!!
Once implementing GetHashCode, the Equals method should be implemented as well.
Consider the follwoing code:

t.Stop();
t.Close();

One should be familiar with the tools at the hand.
Close() does what Stop() do and more... Calling Stop() and then Close() just makes the method a little bit longer without any effect.
When in doubt, consider to take a few moments just to review the provided API.
Redundant Remark.
The remark repeats the code, doesn't bring anything informative enough and affects the length of the method.
It can be safely removed.

// invoke function provided by caller
timerCallback(null);

Thanks to Aviv the following is of course another smell: passing null to the callback function (i.e. declaring the parameter in the callback and eventually passing null).

timerCallback(null);

TechEd 2010 Thoughts

2011-01-02T23:10:00.001+02:00

TechEd Eilat 2010 is long over... And with all the hassle of day to day work and other obligations only now I have found a few minutes to write my thoughts.

As everybody who has previously attended such a venue would tell you, Microsoft really knows how to set-up and orchestrate such a huge event. It is really impressive to see...

Instead of summarizing the events from each and every day I have decided to draw a different perspective and to provide some analysis (which of course reflects my and my thoughts alone) on Microsoft's behavior and its future roadmap...

Here are some facts that I have learned:

Windows OS:

Windows 7 is considered to be a very good operating system.

Microsoft revealed that in 2010 over 240M licenses were sold, almost 88% of the business are moving to Windows 7 and their projection for 2011 is ~409M in licenses.

The adoption of Windows 7 is important because most of the users/businesses previously voted by not upgrading to Vista operating system. Being able to move the users to Windows 7 is important in order to minimize the risk that the users will stay with an old platform and thus (potentially) will be more open to move to other browsers and operating systems. Therefore Microsoft can rest in piece for now, as its clients starting to upgrade to their best OS (till now) which of course opens different perspectives and deepens the control of the IE (Internet Explorer) browser.

And while talking about the browser...

HTML 5/Silverlight:

After having the web filled with rumors that Microsoft is killing Silverlight and the official blog post by Bob Muglia, Jason Zander specified in his opening talk that Silverlight should aim for the following scenarios: a. Business Applications b. Devices (Windows Phone 7) c. Streaming Media. He also emphasized that as Micrsofot were always good in supporting standards, Internet Explorer 9 fully supports HTML 5.

Looking into the future it's actually not surprising. Our web browsers can be safely considered as the next operating systems. Our work routine is around a browser, not only by browsing web sites, but also by utilizing them as applications for news, newspapers, eBooks reading, e-commerce, banking, development and etc... Therefore it is very important to Microsoft to be as much compatible to the standards, especially when Silverlight didn't provide the expected adoption rates.

Jason mentioned that the IE team has rebuild the JavaScript Engine and improved speed, GC and its interop with the DOM. Everyone who is familiar with the speed comparisons between the browsers will say that it was a necessary step in order to allow the IE to compete with others. Just a thought here, how about releasing the JavaScript Engine as an open source :) ?

Azure:

Finally a cloud; Microsoft invests a lot of effort in Azure. It starts in investing a lot in explaining why PaaS (Platform as a Service) is a better choice for developers than IaaS (Infrastructure as a Service), continues with providing very good tools for developers (about that in a moment) and finishes with demos and facts about the ease and speed of the development on Azure.

One of the really good demonstrations was a demo of how to develop one application and deploy it on Web (ASP.NET MVC), Windows Mobile Phone 7, Kinect and Azure. Microsoft has been known for years for their top-notch development tools which easily integrate one with another. By allowing developers to deploy the application into the cloud (Azure) in a minimum effort, Microsoft's assures better chances of adoption.

All in all, I had a great time.

Thanks to Microsoft for inviting!

Fifth Meeting of the "Software Craftsmanship in Israel" Group

2010-11-20T23:31:00.001+02:00

Our 5th meet-up is rolling out (on 15.12.2010) and I am very excited as this time there are plenty of surprises :)

First, we have a lot of cool giveaways to give during the meet-up (A hint is here).

Second, the meet-up's title is: “All you need is… Code” and its format is slightly different:

We are going to discuss different SW principles: DRY, TDD, Code Reviews and etc...
The demonstrations will be done in 3-4 different groups. Each group will discuss a different SW principle.
Each 30 min, after sounding some music the participants will exchange their groups.

Each principle will be demonstrated either by doing pair programming/kata or by a code demonstration.

We are going to cover the following topics*:

1. DRY
2. TDD
3. Code Reviews in Practice
4. TBD (still under discussion)

Remarks:

* Please bring your laptops (with the environments set-up) to the meeting.
** Code Reviews group will provide an option to review YOUR code...

Together we will review participants' code, identify code smells and provide solutions for cleaner and better implementation...

Please don't hesitate to bring your code base with you...

Time frames:

18:00 - 18:25 - Gathering / Mingling
18:25 - 18:30 - Short Intro / Explaining the meeting's set-up
18:30 - 19:35 - Round I (30min + 5min break + 30min)
19:35 – 19:45 - Break + Giveaways
19:45 – 20:50 - Round II (30 min + 5 min break + 30min)
20:50 – 21:00 - Wrap-up + Giveaway

Giveaways:

We have great giveaways to give during the meeting. DON'T miss them :)

Food:

Though, we are plaining to provide food - you are more than welcome to bring more food for the benefit of all (user generated food).

The meeting will take place here.

Please register here.

Mentorship - The First Impression

2010-11-09T01:56:00.001+02:00

On our 4th Software Craftsmanship meet-up I have introduced the Mentorship / Apprenticeship program.

Since then, I have received 2 great apprentices to mentor.

In the following series of posts I would like to summarize our mutual experiences (questions, debates and learning processes) for the benefit of the community.

During the first meeting we discussed the following topics:

Introduction:

We talked about each others experience: what we learned from that experience and what we didn't :) [A hint: We all learned that we want to become software craftsmen :)]

What does Software Craftsmanship stand for?

I reviewed the basic Software Craftsmanship ideals and values and we discussed their impacts on our professional lives. [An example for such a value is: Deliberate Practice]

What are the objectives of the Mentorship program?

Each apprentice prepared a list of his objectives and after a short review, we discussed how to meet them. [An example for an objective is: Enhance Unit Test Knowledge]

Paradigms and Principles:

I prepared a list of paradigms and principles that each apprentice should learn. We reviewed the list and the reasons why those paradigms/principles are important. [Some examples of the principles: Refactoring or OO Design Principles]

Information Exchange:

We exchanged our RSS feeds in order to enrich our learning sources.

Misc:

We discussed miscellaneous issues that varied from development, career paths and social media. [For example, we discussed whether a software engineer should have a blog and if yes, then what to post about]

All in all those were very nice first meetings... Now we are looking forward to sink our teeth into some Object Oriented Principles/Code Smells and Unit Tests. Each apprentice will review (on his own time) an open source project which we will analise together later on, in order to demonstrate and learn the principles.

I am guest of Microsoft at Tech-Ed 2010 Eilat

2010-11-05T12:11:00.001+02:00

I was announced that I was selected to be a guest of Micorosft at Tech-Ed 2010 (Eilat) as 1 of the 10 bloggers of the community.
Cool!!!
Thanks a lot guys :)!!!

Software Craftsmanship - Meeting 4

2010-11-05T11:25:00.001+02:00

Boy, I had so much fun during our 4th meeting...

There were more than 80 people, deeply concerned about our profession and eager to learn best patterns & practices.

In the first part we had 3 lectures: Code Reviews (Tools & Processes) - Ran Tavory , Structure 101 - Eran Harel and Legacy
Code & Unit Tests - Uri Lavi.

In the second part Aviv
Ben-Yosef & Yoni Tsafir demonstrated pair programming (Randori Style) while solving the Bowling Kata exercise.

Watching this great audience was very satisfying and I received a lot of positive feedback, that will also improve our next sessions.

During the meeting I have also introduced the Mentorship/Apprenticeship program.

Today, a few weeks after the meeting, I can proudly say that I mentor two great
apprentices.

Though we only started the process, I expect that the mentorship program will bring the change to our community and
will create more professionals and software craftsmen.

Below you can find the lectures and the source code of the Kata:

The Bowling Kata source code in Java.

The Game class:

The Game tests: