Opinions needed.. (no, really! :))
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Okay, so I'm working with a team that's (relatively) young and like to do things "the right way". This means Agile (naturally!), unit tests written up front, acceptance tests (Gherkin) too.. The problem is that very little gets delivered. In the last two week sprint, 160 points were promised but only 40 delivered. Same in the previous sprint. There's a bit of worry as they're working on a mission critical project that needs to be delivered in a couple of months. Personally, I think they're missing one major point mentioned in the Agile manifesto, in that.. > We are uncovering better ways of developing software by doing it and helping others do it. > Through this work we have come to value: > > Individuals and interactions over processes and tools > Working software over comprehensive documentation > Customer collaboration over contract negotiation > Responding to change over following a plan > > That is, while there is value in the items on the right, we value the items on the left more. We're ending up with the situation that writing tests and refactoring is taking the bulk of the time. Things are being (IMO) over-tested and (also IMO) and there's an over-reliance on unit/acceptance testing to pick up all defects - real bugs are being missed and picked up at the point of actual system testing (or even worse, demo). On top of that, we've got developers going in changing working code simply because they think it should be done differently (in their opinion, better). And, if there's a complex way to write simple code you can bet this team will find it.. Has anyone else run into this? What was done to get the team focused on the important deliverables? I would like to understand how we can get away from delivering tests but very little product every two weeks.. :wtf:
Ah, I see you have the machine that goes ping. This is my favorite. You see we lease it back from the company we sold it to and that way it comes under the monthly current budget and not the capital account.
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Okay, so I'm working with a team that's (relatively) young and like to do things "the right way". This means Agile (naturally!), unit tests written up front, acceptance tests (Gherkin) too.. The problem is that very little gets delivered. In the last two week sprint, 160 points were promised but only 40 delivered. Same in the previous sprint. There's a bit of worry as they're working on a mission critical project that needs to be delivered in a couple of months. Personally, I think they're missing one major point mentioned in the Agile manifesto, in that.. > We are uncovering better ways of developing software by doing it and helping others do it. > Through this work we have come to value: > > Individuals and interactions over processes and tools > Working software over comprehensive documentation > Customer collaboration over contract negotiation > Responding to change over following a plan > > That is, while there is value in the items on the right, we value the items on the left more. We're ending up with the situation that writing tests and refactoring is taking the bulk of the time. Things are being (IMO) over-tested and (also IMO) and there's an over-reliance on unit/acceptance testing to pick up all defects - real bugs are being missed and picked up at the point of actual system testing (or even worse, demo). On top of that, we've got developers going in changing working code simply because they think it should be done differently (in their opinion, better). And, if there's a complex way to write simple code you can bet this team will find it.. Has anyone else run into this? What was done to get the team focused on the important deliverables? I would like to understand how we can get away from delivering tests but very little product every two weeks.. :wtf:
Ah, I see you have the machine that goes ping. This is my favorite. You see we lease it back from the company we sold it to and that way it comes under the monthly current budget and not the capital account.
Simple: toss out agile and do it properly. Oh, and fire all the script-kiddies and get some real coders in. :-)
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Simple: toss out agile and do it properly. Oh, and fire all the script-kiddies and get some real coders in. :-)
Hire some goons to have a talk with the worst offender every week?
The language is JavaScript. that of Mordor, which I will not utter here
This is Javascript. If you put big wheels and a racing stripe on a golf cart, it's still a fucking golf cart.
"I don't know, extraterrestrial?" "You mean like from space?" "No, from Canada." If software development were a circus, we would all be the clowns. -
Simple: toss out agile and do it properly. Oh, and fire all the script-kiddies and get some real coders in. :-)
Agile - an MBA's idea of how programming should be done.
And a + for you."The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." - Albert Einstein
"If you are searching for perfection in others, then you seek disappointment. If you are seek perfection in yourself, then you will find failure." - Balboos HaGadol Mar 2010
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Okay, so I'm working with a team that's (relatively) young and like to do things "the right way". This means Agile (naturally!), unit tests written up front, acceptance tests (Gherkin) too.. The problem is that very little gets delivered. In the last two week sprint, 160 points were promised but only 40 delivered. Same in the previous sprint. There's a bit of worry as they're working on a mission critical project that needs to be delivered in a couple of months. Personally, I think they're missing one major point mentioned in the Agile manifesto, in that.. > We are uncovering better ways of developing software by doing it and helping others do it. > Through this work we have come to value: > > Individuals and interactions over processes and tools > Working software over comprehensive documentation > Customer collaboration over contract negotiation > Responding to change over following a plan > > That is, while there is value in the items on the right, we value the items on the left more. We're ending up with the situation that writing tests and refactoring is taking the bulk of the time. Things are being (IMO) over-tested and (also IMO) and there's an over-reliance on unit/acceptance testing to pick up all defects - real bugs are being missed and picked up at the point of actual system testing (or even worse, demo). On top of that, we've got developers going in changing working code simply because they think it should be done differently (in their opinion, better). And, if there's a complex way to write simple code you can bet this team will find it.. Has anyone else run into this? What was done to get the team focused on the important deliverables? I would like to understand how we can get away from delivering tests but very little product every two weeks.. :wtf:
Ah, I see you have the machine that goes ping. This is my favorite. You see we lease it back from the company we sold it to and that way it comes under the monthly current budget and not the capital account.
The real answer could/should be dogfooding[^]. Make the developers use the thing themselves. It may be that the product / project is so overly boring that no one really uses it anyways so the devs descend into tweaking algorithms which are interesting to devs. Somehow transform them into thinking about actually using the product and how important the final result it. This may work. Edit My point here is that the problem you are describing is that there is no "product owner" / visionary who is really driving things.
My book, Launch Your Android App, is available at Amazon.com (only $2.99USD over 350 pages). Get my Android app on Google Play and F*orget All Your Passwords.
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Agile - an MBA's idea of how programming should be done.
And a + for you."The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." - Albert Einstein
"If you are searching for perfection in others, then you seek disappointment. If you are seek perfection in yourself, then you will find failure." - Balboos HaGadol Mar 2010
W∴ Balboos wrote:
Agile - an MBA's idea of how programming should be done.
It's too bad it has descended into that. I often talk about he _heart_ of Agile as it is defined by one of the two original "creators" of the Agile methodology in the following book: Scrum: The Art of Doing Twice the Work in Half the Time[^] It's really a great read and if you were to read it I believe you'd find, as I did, that Agile is a set of processes pulled together into a methodology that explains how real work is done. But, alas, it is described in so many places so poorly.
My book, Launch Your Android App, is available at Amazon.com (only $2.99USD over 350 pages). Get my Android app on Google Play and F*orget All Your Passwords.
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Simple: toss out agile and do it properly. Oh, and fire all the script-kiddies and get some real coders in. :-)
That was my recommendation, but that's off the table. These guys won't let go of Agile (I'm not against Agile, btw, but these guys are fanatics of [their interpretation of] Agile).. I tend to concentrate on getting finished products out fast with as few bugs as possible (while accepting that it's impossible to avoid 100% of bugs). Unit testing gets added for complex functionality but ignored for standard run-of-the-mill stuff.. has anyone seen any articles promoting rapid application develop (but without 3rd party frameworks) over Agile? I'm really looking for some evidence/white papers covering different ways of running the project - something that can possibly be enforced on the team, considering their poor performance so far.. One other issue, I'm an old-time coder (44 years old, started coding when I was 8), not a great people person.. (many of you may be surprised to hear that one! :laugh:) - these guys wear ties, have all the business spiel, great talkers and presenters.. makes it difficult to convince the guys higher up..
Ah, I see you have the machine that goes ping. This is my favorite. You see we lease it back from the company we sold it to and that way it comes under the monthly current budget and not the capital account.
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W∴ Balboos wrote:
Agile - an MBA's idea of how programming should be done.
It's too bad it has descended into that. I often talk about he _heart_ of Agile as it is defined by one of the two original "creators" of the Agile methodology in the following book: Scrum: The Art of Doing Twice the Work in Half the Time[^] It's really a great read and if you were to read it I believe you'd find, as I did, that Agile is a set of processes pulled together into a methodology that explains how real work is done. But, alas, it is described in so many places so poorly.
My book, Launch Your Android App, is available at Amazon.com (only $2.99USD over 350 pages). Get my Android app on Google Play and F*orget All Your Passwords.
Another "Alas": Writing a book, declaring a manifesto, and selling a bill of goods will not fix something that's innately broken.
"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." - Albert Einstein
"If you are searching for perfection in others, then you seek disappointment. If you are seek perfection in yourself, then you will find failure." - Balboos HaGadol Mar 2010
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Agile - an MBA's idea of how programming should be done.
And a + for you."The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." - Albert Einstein
"If you are searching for perfection in others, then you seek disappointment. If you are seek perfection in yourself, then you will find failure." - Balboos HaGadol Mar 2010
W∴ Balboos wrote:
Agile - an MBA's idea of how programming should be done.
Agreed.. some parts are useful, the bits that work are common sense.. the rest can easily be binned.
Ah, I see you have the machine that goes ping. This is my favorite. You see we lease it back from the company we sold it to and that way it comes under the monthly current budget and not the capital account.
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The real answer could/should be dogfooding[^]. Make the developers use the thing themselves. It may be that the product / project is so overly boring that no one really uses it anyways so the devs descend into tweaking algorithms which are interesting to devs. Somehow transform them into thinking about actually using the product and how important the final result it. This may work. Edit My point here is that the problem you are describing is that there is no "product owner" / visionary who is really driving things.
My book, Launch Your Android App, is available at Amazon.com (only $2.99USD over 350 pages). Get my Android app on Google Play and F*orget All Your Passwords.
raddevus wrote:
there is no "product owner" / visionary who is really driving things
Yes, you are correct.. the devs are left to decide for themselves what is or isn't important. There have been (so far) no repercussions for failing to meet deadlines.
Ah, I see you have the machine that goes ping. This is my favorite. You see we lease it back from the company we sold it to and that way it comes under the monthly current budget and not the capital account.
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Another "Alas": Writing a book, declaring a manifesto, and selling a bill of goods will not fix something that's innately broken.
"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." - Albert Einstein
"If you are searching for perfection in others, then you seek disappointment. If you are seek perfection in yourself, then you will find failure." - Balboos HaGadol Mar 2010
There's a process to everything. Many people (developers) have no real process. THey just write code. Just writing code is terrible. The book attempts to explain a process that a real person(s) can use to create a product, not just code. Those of us, like yourself, who have a process that actually creates valuable products have no need of such a thing and consider the writers of such processes as snake oil salesmen (and many are).
My book, Launch Your Android App, is available at Amazon.com (only $2.99USD over 350 pages). Get my Android app on Google Play and F*orget All Your Passwords.
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That was my recommendation, but that's off the table. These guys won't let go of Agile (I'm not against Agile, btw, but these guys are fanatics of [their interpretation of] Agile).. I tend to concentrate on getting finished products out fast with as few bugs as possible (while accepting that it's impossible to avoid 100% of bugs). Unit testing gets added for complex functionality but ignored for standard run-of-the-mill stuff.. has anyone seen any articles promoting rapid application develop (but without 3rd party frameworks) over Agile? I'm really looking for some evidence/white papers covering different ways of running the project - something that can possibly be enforced on the team, considering their poor performance so far.. One other issue, I'm an old-time coder (44 years old, started coding when I was 8), not a great people person.. (many of you may be surprised to hear that one! :laugh:) - these guys wear ties, have all the business spiel, great talkers and presenters.. makes it difficult to convince the guys higher up..
Ah, I see you have the machine that goes ping. This is my favorite. You see we lease it back from the company we sold it to and that way it comes under the monthly current budget and not the capital account.
Brent Jenkins wrote:
One other issue, I'm an old-time coder (44 years old, started coding when I was 8), not a great people person.. (many of you may be surprised to hear that one! :laugh: ) - these guys wear ties, have all the business spiel, great talkers and presenters.. makes it difficult to convince the guys higher up..
Then let your bosses decide wether they want to believe their talk or their results - and then they must act accordingly.
The language is JavaScript. that of Mordor, which I will not utter here
This is Javascript. If you put big wheels and a racing stripe on a golf cart, it's still a fucking golf cart.
"I don't know, extraterrestrial?" "You mean like from space?" "No, from Canada." If software development were a circus, we would all be the clowns. -
That was my recommendation, but that's off the table. These guys won't let go of Agile (I'm not against Agile, btw, but these guys are fanatics of [their interpretation of] Agile).. I tend to concentrate on getting finished products out fast with as few bugs as possible (while accepting that it's impossible to avoid 100% of bugs). Unit testing gets added for complex functionality but ignored for standard run-of-the-mill stuff.. has anyone seen any articles promoting rapid application develop (but without 3rd party frameworks) over Agile? I'm really looking for some evidence/white papers covering different ways of running the project - something that can possibly be enforced on the team, considering their poor performance so far.. One other issue, I'm an old-time coder (44 years old, started coding when I was 8), not a great people person.. (many of you may be surprised to hear that one! :laugh:) - these guys wear ties, have all the business spiel, great talkers and presenters.. makes it difficult to convince the guys higher up..
Ah, I see you have the machine that goes ping. This is my favorite. You see we lease it back from the company we sold it to and that way it comes under the monthly current budget and not the capital account.
A slavish adherence to any process or set of rules will always end in disaster. What many people fail to see is that agile is a set of guidelines, not a be-all and end-all prescription for success. I always try to hire people that are smarter than me (not hard, I have to say) and that have at least 10 years of experience and never have more script-kiddies than experienced people - the kids should be learning, not be the teachers (that isn't always the case, of course). The youngsters always want to use the latest, greatest thing. Without experience or guidance they really have no idea what they are doing. By all means use agile, but adapt it to your team, not the other way around.
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raddevus wrote:
there is no "product owner" / visionary who is really driving things
Yes, you are correct.. the devs are left to decide for themselves what is or isn't important. There have been (so far) no repercussions for failing to meet deadlines.
Ah, I see you have the machine that goes ping. This is my favorite. You see we lease it back from the company we sold it to and that way it comes under the monthly current budget and not the capital account.
They're coding for code-sake! :laugh: Too bad the final product isn't just a set of algorithms you're selling. :laugh: :laugh:
My book, Launch Your Android App, is available at Amazon.com (only $2.99USD over 350 pages). Get my Android app on Google Play and F*orget All Your Passwords.
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Okay, so I'm working with a team that's (relatively) young and like to do things "the right way". This means Agile (naturally!), unit tests written up front, acceptance tests (Gherkin) too.. The problem is that very little gets delivered. In the last two week sprint, 160 points were promised but only 40 delivered. Same in the previous sprint. There's a bit of worry as they're working on a mission critical project that needs to be delivered in a couple of months. Personally, I think they're missing one major point mentioned in the Agile manifesto, in that.. > We are uncovering better ways of developing software by doing it and helping others do it. > Through this work we have come to value: > > Individuals and interactions over processes and tools > Working software over comprehensive documentation > Customer collaboration over contract negotiation > Responding to change over following a plan > > That is, while there is value in the items on the right, we value the items on the left more. We're ending up with the situation that writing tests and refactoring is taking the bulk of the time. Things are being (IMO) over-tested and (also IMO) and there's an over-reliance on unit/acceptance testing to pick up all defects - real bugs are being missed and picked up at the point of actual system testing (or even worse, demo). On top of that, we've got developers going in changing working code simply because they think it should be done differently (in their opinion, better). And, if there's a complex way to write simple code you can bet this team will find it.. Has anyone else run into this? What was done to get the team focused on the important deliverables? I would like to understand how we can get away from delivering tests but very little product every two weeks.. :wtf:
Ah, I see you have the machine that goes ping. This is my favorite. You see we lease it back from the company we sold it to and that way it comes under the monthly current budget and not the capital account.
If you are Agile then this should be brought up and addressed in the sprint retrospective meeting.
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raddevus wrote:
there is no "product owner" / visionary who is really driving things
Yes, you are correct.. the devs are left to decide for themselves what is or isn't important. There have been (so far) no repercussions for failing to meet deadlines.
Ah, I see you have the machine that goes ping. This is my favorite. You see we lease it back from the company we sold it to and that way it comes under the monthly current budget and not the capital account.
How about appointing a team leader, a real taskmaster who - does the sprint planning and prepares tasks - assigns the tasks - whacks them over the head when they complain about their tasks - whacks them over the head if they take too long - whacks them over the head when they mess with sometthing that's not their business - whacks them over the head if they have too many ideas - whacks them over the head for nothing once in a while, just to keep them on the edge
The language is JavaScript. that of Mordor, which I will not utter here
This is Javascript. If you put big wheels and a racing stripe on a golf cart, it's still a fucking golf cart.
"I don't know, extraterrestrial?" "You mean like from space?" "No, from Canada." If software development were a circus, we would all be the clowns. -
How about appointing a team leader, a real taskmaster who - does the sprint planning and prepares tasks - assigns the tasks - whacks them over the head when they complain about their tasks - whacks them over the head if they take too long - whacks them over the head when they mess with sometthing that's not their business - whacks them over the head if they have too many ideas - whacks them over the head for nothing once in a while, just to keep them on the edge
The language is JavaScript. that of Mordor, which I will not utter here
This is Javascript. If you put big wheels and a racing stripe on a golf cart, it's still a fucking golf cart.
"I don't know, extraterrestrial?" "You mean like from space?" "No, from Canada." If software development were a circus, we would all be the clowns.- owns a large, heavy ClueBat.
Bad command or file name. Bad, bad command! Sit! Stay! Staaaay...
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Okay, so I'm working with a team that's (relatively) young and like to do things "the right way". This means Agile (naturally!), unit tests written up front, acceptance tests (Gherkin) too.. The problem is that very little gets delivered. In the last two week sprint, 160 points were promised but only 40 delivered. Same in the previous sprint. There's a bit of worry as they're working on a mission critical project that needs to be delivered in a couple of months. Personally, I think they're missing one major point mentioned in the Agile manifesto, in that.. > We are uncovering better ways of developing software by doing it and helping others do it. > Through this work we have come to value: > > Individuals and interactions over processes and tools > Working software over comprehensive documentation > Customer collaboration over contract negotiation > Responding to change over following a plan > > That is, while there is value in the items on the right, we value the items on the left more. We're ending up with the situation that writing tests and refactoring is taking the bulk of the time. Things are being (IMO) over-tested and (also IMO) and there's an over-reliance on unit/acceptance testing to pick up all defects - real bugs are being missed and picked up at the point of actual system testing (or even worse, demo). On top of that, we've got developers going in changing working code simply because they think it should be done differently (in their opinion, better). And, if there's a complex way to write simple code you can bet this team will find it.. Has anyone else run into this? What was done to get the team focused on the important deliverables? I would like to understand how we can get away from delivering tests but very little product every two weeks.. :wtf:
Ah, I see you have the machine that goes ping. This is my favorite. You see we lease it back from the company we sold it to and that way it comes under the monthly current budget and not the capital account.
As others have said, throw out Agile (and unit testing, huge waste of time mostly.) The problem with sprints is that they are essentially developer driven. Go back to good 'ol management 101: 1. Here's the features we need 2. Here's the timeline and dependencies for each feature (remember Ghantt charts?) 3. Missing the deadline will result in reprimand, pay reduction, or being terminated. It's time for the kiddies in diapers learning to ride bicycles with training wheels to grow up. ;) Marc
V.A.P.O.R.ware - Visual Assisted Programming / Organizational Representation Learning to code with python is like learning to swim with those little arm floaties. It gives you undeserved confidence and will eventually drown you. - DangerBunny Artificial intelligence is the only remedy for natural stupidity. - CDP1802
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Okay, so I'm working with a team that's (relatively) young and like to do things "the right way". This means Agile (naturally!), unit tests written up front, acceptance tests (Gherkin) too.. The problem is that very little gets delivered. In the last two week sprint, 160 points were promised but only 40 delivered. Same in the previous sprint. There's a bit of worry as they're working on a mission critical project that needs to be delivered in a couple of months. Personally, I think they're missing one major point mentioned in the Agile manifesto, in that.. > We are uncovering better ways of developing software by doing it and helping others do it. > Through this work we have come to value: > > Individuals and interactions over processes and tools > Working software over comprehensive documentation > Customer collaboration over contract negotiation > Responding to change over following a plan > > That is, while there is value in the items on the right, we value the items on the left more. We're ending up with the situation that writing tests and refactoring is taking the bulk of the time. Things are being (IMO) over-tested and (also IMO) and there's an over-reliance on unit/acceptance testing to pick up all defects - real bugs are being missed and picked up at the point of actual system testing (or even worse, demo). On top of that, we've got developers going in changing working code simply because they think it should be done differently (in their opinion, better). And, if there's a complex way to write simple code you can bet this team will find it.. Has anyone else run into this? What was done to get the team focused on the important deliverables? I would like to understand how we can get away from delivering tests but very little product every two weeks.. :wtf:
Ah, I see you have the machine that goes ping. This is my favorite. You see we lease it back from the company we sold it to and that way it comes under the monthly current budget and not the capital account.
Whomever is responsible for the 'team' or 'project' needs to define priorities and timelines. If they are not being met, a determination needs to be made as to why and what the consequences are of not meeting the timelines: the project is not completed which results in lost revenue which can result is staff reduction for example. If that person is you, address it with your management and ask what 'corrective' actions can be taken.
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A slavish adherence to any process or set of rules will always end in disaster. What many people fail to see is that agile is a set of guidelines, not a be-all and end-all prescription for success. I always try to hire people that are smarter than me (not hard, I have to say) and that have at least 10 years of experience and never have more script-kiddies than experienced people - the kids should be learning, not be the teachers (that isn't always the case, of course). The youngsters always want to use the latest, greatest thing. Without experience or guidance they really have no idea what they are doing. By all means use agile, but adapt it to your team, not the other way around.
Agreed, but I also like the "latest and greatest" thing.. it's more about using it as intended and where it makes sense.. for example, I quite like Angular 2 - myself and another long term developer (from my team) created a working demo app for these guys. The Angular TS code was hand-crafted (very lightweight) with a simple ASP.NET web API back-end, and successfully integrated with a 3rd party system.. But these guys got their hands on it, deleted and refactored code, insisted on using Angular CLI which has led to them breaking pretty much everything, and they now need PowerShell scripts to be able to deploy anything to Azure (yes, really!).. it's a mess and doesn't work, but it's now sort of testable.. :laugh:
Ah, I see you have the machine that goes ping. This is my favorite. You see we lease it back from the company we sold it to and that way it comes under the monthly current budget and not the capital account.
