hmmm I wonder if there is any easy way to move from my old Jroller blog to this shiny new one. Searching did not yield any promising results, looks like I have to do it the hard way, grrrrr.

After a lot of thinking and years of experience if it is one thing I have realized it is this, Behind every successful project is a set of really good people.

Software development is like running a kitchen, if you have great cooks and great helpers in your kitchen, no matter how bad the recipes are the dishes will turn out fine. If you have bad cooks no matter how good and detailed your recipes are the dishes are ruined (Read “Big Macs vs. The Naked Chef ” Joel Spolsky).

There are other factors too like using a good methodology and using the right tools, but I think these other factors just add up to 10% .

Like a real good chef a really good programmer is agile, if he finds that there is no Source control, he will just set on up on his machine (or commandeer an old machine set up Linux and SVN on it), if he finds that there is no Wiki, he will set up a TiddlyWiki, if the requirements don’t make sense he will contact the user to clear things up. If he doesn’t have the right tools he will just get it, now it will help if the right tools are already in place.

It also helps to have a good project lead who will be open to adopting new practices but that goes back to having good people on your team, after all a project lead is also part of your team right ?

Created a simple Class in ruby to help reading and writing property files

class JavaProps
attr :file, :properties

#Takes a file and loads the properties in that file
def initialize file
@file = file
@properties = {}
IO.foreach(file) do |line|
@properties[$1.strip] = $2 if line =~ /([^=]*)=(.*)\/\/(.*)/ || line =~ /([^=]*)=(.*)/
end
end

#Helpfull to string
def to_s
output = “File Name #{@file} \n”
@properties.each {|key,value| output += ” #{key}= #{value} \n” }
output
end

#Write a property
def write_property (key,value)
@properties[key] = value
end

#Save the properties back to file
def save
file = File.new(@file,”w+”)
@properties.each {|key,value| file.puts “#{key}=#{value}\n” }
end

end

1. The Psychology of Computer Programming.
2. Getting Things Done : The Art of Stress-Free Productivity.
3. The Mythical Man-Month: Essays on Software Engineering.
4. Joel on Software: And on Diverse and Occasionally Related Matters That Will Prove of Interest to Software Developers, Designers, and Managers, and to Those Who, Whether by Good Fortune or Ill Luck, Work with Them in Some Capacity (Paperback).

We have been using fit tests in my organization for some time now, I think fit test can sometimes be indispensable ,

We were designing an internal accounting system, we had a lot of complex use cases, and a lot of different scenarios. We needed repeatable tests that would test all the scenarios whenever we add new code. We also needed documentation that could explain the system flow, enter FIT tests,

We designed and developed fit tests that could reset the datbase and run a fit test and cover all the use cases, take a look at the following FIT TEST ( sorry I had to name it .html.css , else Jroller would not allow me to upload).

When you read the fit test it is almost like reading documentation, with Red and Green colors in the tables. Apart for a way to show the users how the system meets the requirements , it is also a great way to show someone new how the system flow works.

Open Source, P2P, Weblogs and Slime Mold An article by Bob Rhubart. Leaks Abstractions Levels of abstractions and leaks in abstraction,by Craig Castelaz.