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Originally Posted by DavidJames ...
"Xtreme" - cue rant about trying to make developing sexy, grrr...
In my experience, the only way to get effective code development is to get effective code developers. Adopting a faddish programming method is about as effective as adopting a faddish business method. Anyone remember Business Process Re-engineering? ... |
I worked for a leading software house which ran courses for senior programmers and analysts. I worked on a new course which was basically a rip-off of Yourdon, Weinberg et al , rejigging and renaming their key concepts. I was so disgusted at this faddish process that I asked for my name to be removed from the credits. I did later run into a senior programmer from ICI who said that it was the best course that he had ever done. Sometimes hype does have something to back it.
My first experience of programming development methodology was to attend the first public lecture given by Michael Jackson, (not that one) on structured programming (JSP). That was the single most valuable event in my programming career, and using that methodology got me the job developing that course. I was pleased to see his name associated with Agile and Xtreme.
Methodologies can make a difference. One coding contract I had was estimated to take 8 months, but I was given 6 months to do it. After three months I had not written a single line of code for the program, but had spent that time redesigning the program using JSP (not what I was there for!) and creating the test data. I finished on time, with only two errors found in several thousand lines of code. (one punch girl error, a total one column out of alignment.)