Dan Croak: Agile Principles in Practice - Part 3: Decide as Late as Possible

This post on "Agile" continues a mini-series on misunderstood terms in technology. Previous terms were the cloud and NoSQL.

Why Agile?

We want to make software that is valuable for people cheaply and efficiently. Ideally, the process is also pleasant for the participants.


 
Agile development achieves that goal. Agile teams build stuff customers want. They do it faster with fewer wasted cycles. Developers have more fun and write cleaner code. They do it at a constant pace that can be sustained forever.

Principles

The Agile Manifesto kicked off the movement with some lofty phrases like "people over processes". It proposes that we value "working software", "customer collaboration", and "responding to change" over some other stuff.

 

Sounds good, if a little vague. Getting a little more specific, the following subset of principles offered by the Poppendiecks in Lean Software Development are a helpful grouping:

  1. Eliminate waste (click to read)
  2. Deliver as fast as possible (click to read)
  3. Decide as late as possible (Today)

Principles are meant to be universal. The above list should apply to the software team of any entrepreneur reading this. (Editor’s Note: this is the 3rd and final part of Dan Croak's series on Agile)

Dan Croak: Agile Principles in Practice - Part 2: Deliver as Fast as Possible

This post on "Agile" continues a mini-series on misunderstood terms in technology. Previous terms were the cloud and NoSQL.

Why Agile?

We want to make software that is valuable for people cheaply and efficiently. Ideally, the process is also pleasant for the participants.

 

Agile development achieves that goal. Agile teams build stuff customers want. They do it faster with fewer wasted cycles. Developers have more fun and write cleaner code. They do it at a constant pace that can be sustained forever.

Principles

The Agile Manifesto kicked off the movement with some lofty phrases like "people over processes". It proposes that we value "working software", "customer collaboration", and "responding to change" over some other stuff.


Sounds good, if a little vague. Getting a little more specific, the following subset of principles offered by the Poppendiecks in Lean Software Development are a helpful grouping:

  1. Eliminate waste
  2. Deliver as fast as possible
  3. Decide as late as possible

Dan Croak: Agile Principles in Practice - Part I: Eliminate waste

This post on "Agile" continues a mini-series on misunderstood terms in technology. Previous terms were the cloud and NoSQL.

Why Agile?

We want to make software that is valuable for people cheaply and efficiently. Ideally, the process is also pleasant for the participants.


Agile development achieves that goal. Agile teams build stuff customers want. They do it faster with fewer wasted cycles. Developers have more fun and write cleaner code. They do it at a constant pace that can be sustained forever.

Dan Croak: What is NoSQL?

Some of the most misused and misunderstood terms in technology today are Web 2.0, the cloud, Agile, NoSQL, and HTML5. Today, I'd like to describe where NoSQL came from and how it applies to internet startups in Boston.

NoSQL Summer

The first thing to know is that there is a bi-weekly NoSQL reading group every other Thursday at the Microsoft NERD Center. The next event is July 29th. We read the academic research papers on different techniques, eat dinner together, and discuss the papers, whiteboarding with a gorgeous view of Boston.## SQL

 

Developed in the 70s and relying heavily on mathematical theory to work efficiently, SQL is a language for talking to relational databases. SQL databases have worked so well that they've become the de facto standard for storing data, particularly on the web. You've no doubt interacted with thousands of web applications that used a SQL database.

Boston MySQL Meetup Group

General Information
Location: 
Boston, MA
Come to a local MySQL Meetup to talk about the world's most popular open source database, get great tips and share new ideas. All levels of experience welcome!
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