08 August 2003

Agile development = being ready to ship at any time? Darren Hobbs sez that agile means being ready to ship (literally, shrinkwrap and shelve up) whatever work you've done at any point throughout the project. Guards against the risk of the project being cancelled, though arguably if something is ready to go at all times and that thing meets some of the project goals, the project probably won't get whacked. Also: possible risk of not making sufficient progress in fear of breaking the product? Looking at "agile" as it relates to the team rather than the project itself, the other "thing" that is ready to ship when a project is whacked is the team, what it has learned (individually and collectively), and its willingness/interest in going on to the next project and doing good. Not that these are necessarily all positive values: disillusionment and fear of failure are big risks in teams that have had projects cancelled. See also the Agile Alliance, and its manifesto: 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. Worth reading. 4:54:56 PM     comments

New desktop and mobile keyboards: ugly but ergonomic? Softava's Q12 seems to be the first cousin of Unitap and Fastap before it. Looks like it has privileged button and keypress simplicity at the cost of requiring great digit precision [via MobileBurn] Fingerworks seems to move mouse gesturing away form mouse-and-screen, and place it on the keyboard [via DarrenHobbs] 1:40:25 PM     comments