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"Just in Time! Applying Lean Principles to Agile Practices" : Attend the latest Web seminar brought to you by StickyMinds.com and Better Software magazine *

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The first day of the Agile 2008 Conference was fabulous!  I’m working with five other great people including my wife, Melanie, my father, Garry, and three good friends: Paul, Travis and Laila.  We have set up a beautiful booth designed by my brother, Alexei Berteig.  Working at the booth has been a tiring yet exhilarating experience.  Before the conference we received Boothmanship Training from The Portables.  The people at The Portables have been excellent and I highly recommend them to anyone embarking on a booth display at a conference.

Today I delivered the first of my two presentations at the conference.  The thirty minute experience report: “Extremely Short Iterations as a Catalyst for Effective Prioritization of Work” was well received.  There were about 25 people in attendance and despite the short time for questions, there were some good ones.  I enjoyed delivering the presentation and it was filmed for later publication on InfoQ.  I also received highly positive feedback after the talk.  On Thursday, I am giving a much more substantial presentation titled “Meta-Agile: Using Agile Methods to Deliver Agile Training“.  This will be a three hour workshop in two parts: a 90 minute presentation, and then a 90 minute participatory patterns workshop.  If you are a trainer or coach, I highly recommend attending this one!

I also ran into many friends… too many to list, in fact.  It is surprising to me to see how many people I know in this community.  There are over 1500 people at this agile conference, and I can’t walk more than 20 steps without running into someone I know.  One other really cool thing is that everyone is commenting on how much they like the notebooks that were included in the conference bag - highly popular.  In fact, three people have commented that it was the only useful thing in the bag… which is actually a bit of an exaggeration since the conference program was also in the bag and I suspect that it might be just a wee bit more useful :-)  Nevertheless, the feedback has been great.

Come check us out at our booth if you are at the conference - it’s unmistakable - strong red backdrop with the Berteig Consulting logo across the top.  We also have a great raffle so be sure to drop off your raffle entry which is found in your notebook pocket.

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This post is a little geeky and technical and product-related for AgileAdvice, and is a shameless self-promotion. Nevertheless, since testability, test-driven-development, and incremental design are non-exclusive sub-topics of Agile, I though I’d report this here anyway.

Many developers use the Dependency Injection and Inversion of Control (IoC) patterns through such IoC containers as Spring, Hivemind, Picocontainer, and others. They have all sorts of benefits to testability, flexibility, etc. that I won’t repeat here, but can be read about here, here, and here. A great summary of the history of “IoC” can be found here. J2ME developers, however, especially those on limited devices that use the CLDC configuration of J2ME, cannot use the substantial number of IoC/DI containers out there, because they nearly all rely on reflection. These also often make use of APIs not present in the CLDC - APIs which could not easily be added. Lastly there’s a tendency among developers of “embedded software” to be very suspicious of complexity.

In working out some examples of DI as part of a testability workshop at one of my clients, I whipped up a quick DI container, and being the freak that I am, hardened it until it was suitable for production, because I hate half-finished products. So allow me to introduce the Israfil Micro Container. (That is, the Container from the Israfil Micro project). As I mention in the docs, “FemtoContainer” just was too ridiculous, and this container is smaller than pico-container. The project is BSD licensed, and hosted on googlecode, so source is freely available and there’s an issue/feature tracker, yadda yadda.

Essentially I believe that people working on cellphones and set-top boxes shouldn’t be constrained out of some basic software design approaches - you just have to bend the design approach to fit the environment. So hopefully this is of use to more than one of my clients. It currently supports an auto-wiring registration, delayed object creation (until first need), and forthcoming are some basic lifecycle support, and a few other nicities. It does not use reflection (you use a little adapter for object creation instead), and performs quicker than pico-container. Low, low overhead. It’s also less than 10 classes and interfaces (including the two classes in the util project). It’s built with Maven2, so you can use it in any Maven2-built project with ease, but of course you can always also just download the jar (and the required util jar too). Enjoy…

P.S. There are a few other bits on googlecode that I’m working on in the micro-zone. Some minimalist backports of some of java.lang.concurrency (just the locks), as well as some of the java.util.Collections stuff. Not finished, but also part of the googlecode project.

Good grief. Well, best I can figure out Google sites will not allow "everyone" to edit. So...try this: http://agile2008toronto.pbwiki.com/ And the Invite Key

Hi, There is an unofficial wiki for Agile2008 attendees: http://sites.google.com/site/agile2008toronto/Home Any use you can devise. Fully public, as best I

The Agile Maturity Model at Agile Philly on Tuesday August 5th 6:30 in Downtown Philly at RTTS That time of the month - Time to RSVP for this month's Agile

Hello all, Hope your summer is going great! I wanted to let everyone know about some upcoming courses being offered in August! There is a wide variety

Just a quick reminder that the next Seattle Scrum meeting is this Thursday, July 31st at Qpass' Seattle offices. Tom Perry will be talking about "Swarming -

Sounds like a great presentation.wish I could be there! I send my regrets, I'll be out of town for client engagement. Till next time, ~ ellen

................Agile Bazaar July 31 Meeting................ Topic: "Test Driven Development for Data Management projects using FIT4Data" by Adrian Mowat

Interested in becoming a Certified Scrum Master?
Come to my next workshop!

Welcome back to yet another week at www.implementingscrum.com.Or, for some people this weekend, welcome for the first time.  Thank you Liz, you rock.I figured I’d spend tonight reminding myself where I have been since starting this blog, and where it will be going in the future.

Hopefully this will be of use for both new and regular readers.First, the story of the Chicken and Pig.  Read more here.  And here if you speak more than just English.

Even if you are not a techie, some of these stories and cartoons at the blog may help tell good stories.

One of the most popular on the site is here.  I do not know why, but can imagine some.  Whatever .

If you just like looking at cartoons, check out here.  There is a thumbnail of all cartoons every created on this site.  Just click and enjoy.

Rinse and repeat.

So that gives a good tour of what the site is today.

I’d recommend coming back in the next few weeks.  Subscribe now.

Because things are about to change.

There will be a new look and feel to the site.

The site is moving to a dedicated server — faster cartoon loading for you.

You will get more for your money.

OK.  Well.  The site is still free.

And no advertisements (hopefully that will continue!).

Even if you are not a geek — tell your friends.  Or just have fun reading about geeks (that would be me and people I work with).

And strange things that happen in our world.

And.

I promise Tony will be back to work on new comic strips soon.  Really. I promise.

Like when my parents come to visit — I know they really just come to see my kids.  Just like the cartoons are the lifeblood of this site.  I appreciate knowing that and providing those and my blog entries as a bonus (smie).

Have a great weekend (or welcome to Monday) and happy surfing!

If you or your friends [or enemies] have not signed up for FREE updates to this blog, please Subscribe to Implementing Scrum via Email!

Gotta run… Please send comments, questions, criticisms, ideas, or whatever here.

You can also enter The Forum to discuss this entry and other Scrum topics. Thank you!

Originally Published:
July 25, 2008

These are posted now on the front page: http://agile-carolinas.pbwiki.com/FrontPage Regards, Joe Joseph Little Agile coach, MBA, CST Kitty Hawk Consulting,

Hi all,

Happy start of the new week!

Scott Ambler and I have put together a survey that will collect some additional data that he will present at the Agile 2008 conference next month. Please take the survey and pass it on to any local lists or contacts you have.

The cool thing about the outcome of this — and other data we collect — is that it is shared for all to use and analyze as you want.

Here is more info:

====

We have put together a survey exploring the adoption rate of various Agile
practices and of the 12 agile principles. The survey is posted at
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=4FN_2bty_2bYE0Mhb7yQPZKWtg_3d_3d
and will take 5 minutes to complete.

It will run until August 2 2008.

As with other surveys the results will be posted online at
www.ambysoft.com/surveys/. We’re taking an open approach to this survey in that the source data, with the exception of identifying information to protect people’s privacy, will be posted online. We’re sharing the data with the community so that everyone may analyze it for their own purposes — you won’t have to rely on us to analyze it for you. We’ll also post the original questions as they were asked as well as a slide deck summarizing our analysis. All of these assets can be used free of charge. Scott will also be sharing the results at the forthcoming Agile 2008 conference, www.agile2008.org, here in his home town of Toronto the first week of August.

We’re not going to bribe you with promises to win a book or a gift certificate. Instead, we’re asking you to give back to the community by spending a few minutes to share your agile experiences with the IT community. The results of this survey will be a shared asset that we can all take advantage of.

Thank you very much for your attention, and we sincerely hope that you will choose to take a few minutes of your valuable time to fill out this survey. Our apologies if you have received several copies of this email.

- Scott Ambler and Mike Vizdos

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I recently started writing a book review on Crystal Clear: A Human-Powered Methodology for Small Teams by Alistair Cockburn. Check out the first part of my review. I have read Chapter 1 entitled Explained (View from the Outside). It was a very interesting chapter that set Crystal Clear as the answerer to Alistair Cockburn. It made many aspects of the Crystal family clear in my mind. I enjoyed the questions, and the answers were insightful and helped me to put the ideas into a whole picture.

At the moment I am reading Chapter 2 entitled Applied (The Seven Properties). Frequent Delivery, Reflective Improvement, and Osmotic Communication made sense to me and aligned somewhat to my own beliefs. When I started reading the fourth property, Personal Safety, certain parts seemed fine, while others set off warning bells. I believe that the purpose of any team is to progress. This is achieved through trust, respect and unity.

Cockburn says “Once personal safety and amicability are established, a useful, playful dynamic may emerge. People may wage competition with each other. They may argue loudly, even to the verge of fighting, without taking it personally. In the case where someone does take it personally, they sort it out and set things straight again.” - page 31.

The statements above concern me. Cockburn addresses trust by saying that people will not take it personally. Respect is lost because they “… May argue loudly, even to the verge of fighting”. I would be unable to say that I respect someone if I yell at them or even raise my voice. Now unity is completely destroyed. For some reason our society and many societies around the world not only condone competition, it is seen as a way to judge attributes of excellence in an individual. This is not a good sign for our progress towards unity in human civilization.

I agree that being polite and not stating one’s opinion is harmful for trust. However, it is preferable to use consultation instead of competition. Imagine that a team is encouraged to compete with itself to achieve better results. Would there not be feelings of resentment or heightened levels of stress? Now imagine a team that is encouraged to consult and raise the team together without focusing on individual success. Would not this team feel excited to be around each other? Would they become fast friends and grow as a unit? Would family members of the team be enthusiastic to be included in picnics and socials?

Now the big question:
What is better, individual success or team unity that add value to not only the team but all who interact with them?

I will continue to read this book and post my reviews. I find it interesting that this book has helped to see the confusion that is happening all around the world in terms of progress, success, and human development.

I welcome any comments on my posts.

Topic: Swarming - The Birds and the Bees and Agile More and more teams find themselves working in an incredibly chaotic environment. How the team reacts to the

Presentation by Niel Nickolaisen: Wherefore Art Thou Business Value? Location: Bridgwater, NJ Time: September 10, 2008 at 7:00 PM For more information and to

. ABOUT NET OBJECTIVES Company

Hiya,

Wow what a day. What a week.

I finished up Day Two of the Vancouver CSM class yesterday. And wow… the changes that I see coming to Vancouver just based on the people leaving that class. Awesome people.

Today I played the plane game and landed in Phoenix tonight. 108 degrees when I landed. H.O.T. 104 when the sun was going down. Let’s hope the room is air conditioned for the next two days!

As you noticed, there are no videos that I promised on Monday night. I am hoping I can take 4 more videos tomorrow and put together a good show for you tomorrow night. We’ll see how it works and how the participants think about showing up on youtube and the net.

Until then…. Have a great evening or day!

Thank you!

- mike vizdos
www.michaelvizdos.com
www.implementingscrum.com

p.s. And remember… If you or your friends [or enemies] have not signed up for FREE updates to this blog, please Subscribe to Implementing Scrum via Email!

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