Nick Xidis

I don’t know why we’re still working hard at coding and debugging, IBM solved all these issues is the 1954 FORTAN specification.

“Since FORTRAN should virtually eliminate coding and debugging, it should be possible to solve problems for less than half the cost that would be required without such a system.”

Maybe we should dump all this new stuff and go back to FORTRAN. Or even better, realize that language choice is only one tool choice that developers make on the path to delivering for a customer. Like a choices between tools, it’s about making sensible trade off between tools. There aren’t and never will be magical tools that solve problems and make everything easy. Software is hard and complex because is serves people and people are hard and complex to serve well. If you’re looking for magic stop and start paying attention to the people your suposed to serve with your talent and tools.

Silicone, gallium arsenide and some other materials can be combined, “doped”, with other elements that make them carry some extra, or a few less, electrons. When these differing charges are placed next to each other, there is a slight difference in their electrical charge that forms the electrical barrier. To the flow of electrons it is equivalent of those spikes in the road at the exit to paid parking lots that let you go out, but make it unpleasant difficult to go the other direction. By running a electrical current across the barrier, an additional charge can be built up that last for a very short period of time. By repeatedly reading and refreshing this charge at the junction between materials can give the illusion of “remembering” it’s state as long as there’s power to keep the read/refresh cycle going. What’s amazing is that these junctions can be made unbelievably small, sometimes just a few atoms wide, so that billions of them can fit in a space almost too small to see. Because the can have two states, charged or not, we use them in groups to represent binary numbers like 1001 (9) or to do binary math like, 1+1=10. These little junctions can do some even more clever things, in some cases they can give off light when an electrical current is pass thought them, enter the light emitting diode (LED). By using the stored numbers to control the brightness of millions of red, green, and blue LED’s your brain can be fooled into seeing color, line, texture and even motion. And that is, very likely, what’s making it possible for you to read this. The silicone, electrical charges, currents and even the light are real and they were all made by very real people. Everything that your brain is seeing on the screen right now is an illusion. Software development is all about creating illusionary environments that make life easier, faster or more convenient. We are so stunningly good at crafting illusions and using them, that it’s not easy to remember it’s not real.

People are real and they come with all kinds of interesting quirks and challenges. They change their minds, get happy or sad, and each has a unique perception of the world around them. Believe that each person comes equipped with intelligence and free will to make choices. Not just choices on what to do but, how to react to the world around us. We tend use these choices to tailor our life experiences to match our perceptions about the world around us. Because each perception is unique, built on a lifetime of experiences, prejudices and even fantasy, we all react to our world in different ways. The most difficult challenge of software development is to craft a computer generated illusion that matches a person’s or group’s perceived idea about a real world experience in a way that makes the experience better. The value created by the improved experience is the economic engine that makes all software work possible.

So software is all about human interaction with the software we create and, even more importantly, the personal interactions we have with users, business sponsors and each other. A focus on where value creation really happens would help each of us to align our thoughts and behaviors in executing our craft. All of the human interactions involved in software development either create or destroy value. We need to be careful with what we create. We also need to remember That the personal interactions, not just the software, has the potential to create or destroy value. Indeed, the act of software creation is a performance art that’s all about improving human interactions. Whether in the software crafted or your personal behaviors, every interaction counts and will either create or destroy value.

Despite what vendors would have you to believe, the latest tools don’t create any value in themselves. Tools are only valuable in and to the extent they help us craft better illusions or have better human interactions.

I was surprised when on a call with Diego Lo Giudice of Forrester on Agile Software Development a few weeks ago how little thought I’d given agile practices and how much my attitude had changed. I was also taken back a bit about how our company, se2, had changed in it’s agile implementation.

It wasn’t that I had moved away from it in our work, quite the contrary I think we’re much stronger now. It was just that Agile wasn’t the primary actor on the stage. Agile techniques had moved to the background on a stage where teams were delivering software. I clearly remember having study groups to review agile books, lengthly debates on what was or wasn’t agile, and tempers flaring as non-agile practices were intruding into our work space. There were clear lines drawn between the agile and non-agile people with everyone, internal or external, clearly labeled as true believer, heretic, or (even worse) something in between. There was also a intense focus on evaluating techniques and tools to determine if the were or could be made “agile”. If not, they would need to be quickly jettisoned or at very least hidden from view. I was certainly in the lead of the band of heros or nuts, depending on your point of view, that was very serious about changing the way we worked. I’m not sure you can ever really make a change without quite a bit of passion and perhaps being somewhat a zelot.

So what has changed? Almost ever where you got, teams are doing agile without thinking about it. Sprints happen across the organization as a very matter of fact event, no fanfare it just gets done. Our focus, in many ways, has shift from ourselves and our work to our customers and their needs, this is a good thing. I’m becoming more convinced that technologists that are inwardly focused, the default mode for introverts, are something of a menace to their organizations. Our real purpose is to use the tools, talents and materials in our stewardship to bless others. We have been given the gift to work at the center of an industry whose capabilities are exploding at the same time when costs are plummeting. By way of example, look at the cost of sequencing the human genome, since 2008 it’s dropped by something like a factor of 10,000

Human Genome Sequencing Cost Dropping

If the same thing happened in automobiles, you’d be able to drive a Lexis for less than you’re paying for a meal a Taco Bell. We are part of unique time and we’ve been given the opportunity to have a disproportionate impact on our organizations and the world. I think it’s time we focus on serving not just polishing our tools.

As I though about this change and it’s impact early this morning, I had the thought that it might be helpful to look back at the Agile Manifesto. I’d been living it but, it had been a long time since I read it (yes, it’s on the wall behind my desk and I still han’t looked at it). Published in 2001, yes a decade ago, it was the document that started it all in earnest. Here’s what it says,

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.

I think what I’d like to do is take each of the four key concepts and, over next few weeks, post on what I think they mean now, as compared to my early agile experiences. It’s a little hard to fathom that it was almost a decade ago that I started trying XP with small teams sequestered in a conference room. A lot has changed since then, mostly my attitudes, but also how the world reacts to agile.

Dispersion of Innovation

In the early decade when I started, we were clearly in the Innovators area, boldly dashing where angels fear to tread. But, now I’m guessing we are more toward the Majority segments. A 2008 survey found, “69% of respondents indicated that their organizations are doing one or more agile projects.  Of those that hadn’t yet started, 15% believed their organizations would do so within the next year”. A lot more people and organizations are comfortable with agile and the Laggards are starting to think it through.

I’m also starting to wonder where we go next, agile techniques have allowed us to make a big leap forward. Improvements of 6 to 10 times in productivity were not unheard of as agile was adopted. Where will the next leap come from, not sure yet?