NimblePros news and events RSS feed

Hudson Software Craftsmanship 4/2012

Thu, 12 Apr 2012 11:58:38 GMT

The next Hudson Software Craftsmanship meeting is April 18, 2012 and will take place at Henning Software's offices, located here:

102 First St, Suite 211

Hudson, Ohio 44236

If you plan on coming, please register here so we plan for the right number of people. Registration is FREE.

You can park on First Street, or between the meeting location and the library (off of library street). The First Street entrance is just south of the Tomato Grill restaurant.

Bring a laptop with your development tools of choice to use during coding exercises, if you can.

The meeting doesn't technically start until 6:00 PM, but people can arrive as early as 5:30 PM.

Software Engineering 101 - Cleveland 2011

Fri, 29 Jul 2011 15:23:58 GMT

This is a one-day, FREE event designed to improve your software development skills. Rather than focusing on introductions to new technologies or tools, this conference will help you get better at your craft. The morning sessions will focus on fundamental principles, patterns, and practices of software development, and the afternoon will be spent on practical exercises that put these fundamentals into action. While the sessions will mostly make use of .NET and Visual Studio, these topics apply to any language or platform.

Agenda - Friday, 7 October 2011 (subject to change)

08:30 - 08:45 Welcome (Announce Prizes/Sponsors)

08:45 - 09:15 Tasty Nuggets for Daily Development - Nuget and Mercurial (presented by Kevin Kuebler)

09:20 - 10:20 Test the Rainbow - Introducing Different Types of Testing (Presented by Todd Ropog)

10:20 - 10:30 Break and Snack

10:30 - 12:30 Hands on Exercises

12:30 - 1:30 Lunch (not provided)

1:30 - 2:30 SOLIDifying Existing Code - SOLID + Refactoring (Presented by Steve Smith)

2:35 - 3:15 If You Keep Mocking Me, I May Get Testy - Advanced Testing including Mocks (Presented by Brendan Enrick)

3:25 - 4:45 Hands on Exercises

4:45 - 5:00 Conclusion/Evaluations/Prizes

If possible, bring your own laptop for use in the hands on sessions, with your choice of development and testing tools installed. We will have prepared material for Visual Studio 2008/2010 and C#, but other environments are welcome. If you cannot bring a laptop, don't worry - we'll be pairing together so as long as half the attendees have laptops, it will be fine.

This event is being modelled after last year's SWE101 event and other recent successful events in Columbus and Nashville, and is being organized by NimblePros and HudsonSC.

Event Resources

Software Engineering 101 Slides and Demos

The Nimble Team Room: The Heart of an Agile Workspace

Thu, 02 Jun 2011 12:17:14 GMT

At a recent Hudson Software Craftsmanship meeting, the group was discussing how teams can transition to agile. To kick off this discussion, we asked, "What does agile look like? If you were to walk into an agile team's team room, what kinds of things would you be able to observe that would indicate they were practicing agile methods?" One of the first answers was, "The fact that they have a team room is a huge indicator!" Team rooms are a big part of being able to communicate and work together as a team, and teamwork is extremely important if agile is to be successfully used for a project.

Although there are many components of an Agile space, the piece that is literally at the heart of an effective Agile workspace is the team room. This is the room where the developers spend most of their working hours, and it is an area that NimblePros put a lot of thought into when we were designing our new office space.

The most basic component of this space is the room itself. It should be large enough to hold your entire team, and should be largely free of any fixed constraints like walls or large pieces of furniture that limit movement of people or placement of desks and chairs. This can actually be accomplished with a little effort and creativity in nearly any setting; throw out the cubicles, clear out the room, and gather your team. We've made this work ourselves in less than ideal circumstances in previous spaces - even a few small offices linked together will do in a pinch. Fortunately, we have created a large center room in our new building that is designed just for this purpose.

Location is another important consideration. The team room is where the developers will be working most of the time, but it is not ideal for taking phone calls or for working on solo tasks like writing proposals. For those tasks, the team should have separate offices available. These spaces may be shared in most cases, and should be convenient to the team room to ensure that the entire team is in close contact throughout the day. This absolutely includes managers; there is no greater barrier to communication than distance, and too often managers and other staff locate their offices in corner towers far from the team that they are supposed to be managing. In our case, we are in a one-floor building, so corner tower offices weren't an option anyway. However, we did make a concerted effort to locate ALL of the offices around the perimeter of the team room to ensure that ALL members of the team were communicating and collaborating throughout the day.

Collaboration really is the key, and nothing discourages collaboration more than the wrong furniture. The wrong furniture makes it hard to gather around a single workstation, or to sit side-by-side to review a document or a bit of code. The worst furniture is the "L" or "U" shaped desk, which are specifically designed for an individual to conveniently access all areas of the workspace from a fixed point. At NimblePros, much of our programming is done in pairs, so having the right desks was critical. We love our Balt Flipper training tables for this - not only are they a simple design that easily accommodates two developers as well as multiple monitors and keyboards, they are also on wheels and fold down. This means that we can easily reconfigure our space and even move furniture to different rooms to accommodate our ever-changing project needs. Again, it's all about being Nimble.

There are a few other details that really help to bring the space together. The lighting, which mimics natural light, reduces glare and improves developer happiness - no coding away in dark caves here! The floor is a hard laminate, which assists in easy movement of chairs and other furniture. For those times when people want to work standing up, we've put in a counter that is the perfect height and size to accommodate a row of laptops. And, of course, no space would be complete without copious white boards (although we're still getting those into place, since they require a bit more commitment and handyman skills than some of our other furnishings).

We're pretty pleased with the space - it's a joy to work in (really!), and it does a great job of supporting the Agile development style that NimblePros is known for. The rest of the office is pretty cool as well, and we'll share some more details in upcoming newsletters and on our site. In the meantime, though, if you are in the Hudson, Ohio area and would like to drop in for a tour, we'd love to have you!

Hudson Software Craftsmanship 6/2011

Fri, 20 May 2011 13:06:12 GMT

The next Hudson Software Craftsmanship meeting is June 15, 2011 and will take place at Henning Software's offices, located here:

102 First St, Suite 211

Hudson, Ohio 44236

If you plan on coming, please register here so we plan for the right number of people. Registration is FREE.

You can park on First Street, or between the meeting location and the library (off of library street). The First Street entrance is just south of the Tomato Grill restaurant.

Bring a laptop with your development tools of choice to use during coding exercises, if you can.

The meeting doesn't technically start until 6:00 PM, but people can arrive as early as 5:30 PM.

Hudson Software Craftsmanship 5/2011

Thu, 05 May 2011 09:40:55 GMT

The next Hudson Software Craftsmanship meeting is May 18, 2011 and will take place at Henning Software's offices, located here:

102 First St, Suite 211

Hudson, Ohio 44236

If you plan on coming, please register here so we plan for the right number of people. Registration is FREE.

You can park on First Street, or between the meeting location and the library (off of library street). The First Street entrance is just south of the Tomato Grill restaurant.

Bring a laptop with your development tools of choice to use during coding exercises, if you can.

The meeting doesn't technically start until 6:00 PM, but people can arrive as early as 5:30 PM.

Hudson Software Craftsmanship 4/2011

Wed, 23 Mar 2011 09:25:17 GMT

The next Hudson Software Craftsmanship meeting is April 20, 2011 and will take place at Henning Software's offices, located here:

102 First St, Suite 211

Hudson, Ohio 44236

If you plan on coming, please register here so we plan for the right number of people. Registration is FREE.

You can park on First Street, or between the meeting location and the library (off of library street). The First Street entrance is just south of the Tomato Grill restaurant.

Bring a laptop with your development tools of choice to use during coding exercises, if you can.

The meeting doesn't technically start until 6:00 PM, but people can arrive as early as 5:30 PM.

Hudson Software Craftsmanship 12/2010

Thu, 18 Nov 2010 13:43:54 GMT

The next Hudson Software Craftsmanship meeting is Wednesday, December 15, 2010 and will take place at Henning Software's offices, located here:

102 First St, Suite 211

Hudson, Ohio 44236

If you plan on coming, please register here so we plan for the right number of people. Registration is FREE.

You can park on First Street, or between the meeting location and the library (off of library street). The First Street entrance is just south of the Tomato Grill restaurant.

Bring a laptop with your development tools of choice to use during coding exercises, if you can.

The meeting doesn't technically start until 6:00 PM, but people can arrive as early as 5:30 PM.

CodeMash 2011

Fri, 29 Oct 2010 11:13:47 GMT

CodeMash is a unique event that will educate developers on current practices, methodologies and technology trends in variety of platforms and development languages such as Java, .NET, Ruby and PHP. Held January 12-14, 2011, at the lush Kalahari Resort in Sandusky, Ohio, attendees will be able to attend a world-class technical conference amid Ohio's largest indoor waterpark. Nobody will frown if you show up in shorts, sandals, and your loudest t-shirt. You might even win a prize for doing so.

The Software Craftmanship session will be presented by Brendan Enrick and Steve Smith (a co-founder of NimblePros). Join your peers and fellow craftsmen in a variety of coding kata and exercises designed to improve your skills as a software developer. Experienced developers from all backgrounds are welcome, as are beginners.

Hudson Software Craftsmanship 11/2010

Wed, 20 Oct 2010 14:40:46 GMT

The next Hudson Software Craftsmanship meeting is November 17, 2010 and will take place at Henning Software's offices, located here:

102 First St, Suite 211

Hudson, Ohio 44236

You can park on First Street, or between the meeting location and the library (off of library street). The First Street entrance is just south of the Tomato Grill restaurant.

Bring a laptop with your development tools of choice to use during coding exercises, if you can.

The meeting doesn't technically start until 6:00 PM, but people can arrive as early as 5:30 PM.

Hudson Software Craftsmanship 10/2010

Thu, 30 Sep 2010 08:36:27 GMT

The next Hudson Software Craftsmanship meeting is October 20, 2010 and will take place at Henning Software's offices, located here:

102 First St, Suite 211

Hudson, Ohio 44236

You can park on First Street, or between the meeting location and the library (off of library street). The First Street entrance is just south of the Tomato Grill restaurant.

Bring a laptop with your development tools of choice to use during coding exercises, if you can.

The meeting doesn't technically start until 6:00 PM, but people can arrive as early as 5:30 PM.

Setting up VisualSVN Server

Fri, 02 Jul 2010 09:25:50 GMT

VisualSVN Server is a great free tool which sits on top of Subversion (SVN) and makes its installation and management a breeze. Subversion's UI is a command line UI, and VisualSVN provides a management UI. It also handles the installation of the server, which can run on your computer as a Windows Service.

Get VisualSVN Server

VisualSVN Server is available freely and has a downloadable install file.

Install VisualSVN Server

The install of VisualSVN Server is a matter of clicking next a bunch of times while making only a couple of simple changes when necessary.

Feel free to read about the product you're installing and then click "Next".

Carefully read through the license agreement and then click "Next".

Here you want the first option, which will install both the Server and the GUI application to manage it. The second option, which installs only the management console is intended to be put on another machine so you can remotely manage things. This is a great idea if you're installing VisualSVN on a remote server. Once things are set up you can run this installer on your local machine to manage SVN locally.

Location - the install location of VisualSVN Server.
Repositories - the location where all of your repositories are stored. This should probably go on a data drive as this is the revision history of all of your source code and could grow large if your projects are large.
Server Port - choose any port you like. The default, 443, is a standard secure port, however, you can use any port you like.
Use secure connection - I recommend this. Unless you have a reason to not use a secure connection it is better this way. (If you don't have a signed certificate you'll get a warning when you first connect to the server informing the connecting user that the certificate is not signed.) Once they accept it they never see the warning again.
Authentication - up to you which you want to use. For this tutorial I will use Subversion authentication to demonstrate it, but the Windows authentication will work well if you would prefer that.

If you're sure you got everything set up correctly, hit "Install".

Watch the progress bar.

Congratulations! You have a Subversion server installed. Let the installer start VisualSVN Server Manager, so you can start adding users, groups, and repositories. Click "Finish".

This is the management console of VisualSVN.

Create Users

Now that you have your server set up, you can start creating users. This will show how to set up subversion users.

You want to start by right-clicking on the "Users" folder and selecting "Create User..."

This window will be shown and you can easily create users from this.

Create as many users as you want.

Create Groups

With our users created we can create groups in which we will put those users.

Simply right-click on the "Groups" folder and select "Create Group..."

This window is designed to let us name our group and add new members to the group. We can change membership in the group later, and we will add our user to this group by clicking the "Add..." button.

In this window we have a list of all of the users and groups in the system. For now there is only one user, so we can select the user and click "OK".

When we return to the previous window we can click "OK" again and our group will be created.

Create Repositories

Repositories are the places where we will be storing our source code in Subversion. We will need to create at least one of these before we can begin using Subversion.

Right-clicking on the "Repositories" icon will bring up this context menu in which we want to select "Create New Repository..."

Give your repository a name. I recommend giving it the name of a project. Create the default structure. It is a very effective structure and is also widely known and recognized. If you are unfamiliar with the structure you can find plenty of information about it. To get you started, put your source code in the trunk.

Setting Repository Permissions

Permissions in VisualSVN are configured using a familiar windows-like interface.

The first step is to selection the location you want to set the permissions of and right-click and select "Properties..." Here I have selected my "Nitriq" repository for which to configure permissions.

From here you can customize the permissions any way you like. I recommend adding individuals and groups which are allowed access to this repository and give them "Read / Write" Permission. Then select "Everyone" and assign "No Access", you can get simpler or more advanced depending on your needs.

Next Steps

Now that you have VisualSVN Server installed you can continue adding users, groups, and repositories and add as many permissions as you like.

From here you'll want to connect to the source control system using a subversion client program. There are plenty of free ones available. I recommend TortoiseSVN.

Read my article on Setting up a TortoiseSVN Client to learn how to connect to a Subversion Server.

Setting up the TortoiseSVN Client

Fri, 02 Jul 2010 08:44:37 GMT

Tortoise SVN is a freely downloadable client used to access Subversion source control repositories. The tool integrates into the Windows shell, which makes it a breeze to use. It uses visual clues to let you know which files are new, changed, and unchanged from the latest version you have obtained from the source control server.

Get TortoiseSVN Client

The first step is to download TortoiseSVN. If you're on a 64-bit computer you can use the 64-bit client. If you're on 32-bit or if you're unsure, then just get the 32-bit client.

Install TortoiseSVN Client

The install of TortoiseSVN is simple and is just a matter of clicking "Next" a bunch of times.

Feel free to read about the wizard you're about to run and then click "Next".

Carefully read through the End-User License Agreement, and then accept the terms and click "Next".

The install size of this application is so small that there is not really a need to make any changes here. I removed the GB dictionary, but it makes almost no difference. Click "Next".

If you're ready to install, just click the "Install" button.

Sit and wait for the install to complete. It doesn't take very long.

And you're done! The installer is complete.

Sadly, the shell integration in TortoiseSVN will require that you restart the computer.

Check Out Source Code

In Subversion the term for getting source code the first time from source control is called checking out the source code. Now that you've restarted your computer you should see new options in the context menu in Windows Explorer.

From this context menu you just need to select "SVN Checkout..."

This is the checkout window. It looks a bit complicated. For now just focus on two fields.

URL of repository - this is where you put the location of the code you want to get.
Checkout direction - this is the location on your local computer where you want to store the files locally.

This is an example connection to a repository called Nitriq. Here I am connecting directly to the root of the repository called "Nitriq" on my SVN server "benrick-VPC".

This is a common message if you used a secure connection on your Subversion server. Since it can't validate the certificate it is just giving this warning. Since I know that the connection is safe I will just say "Accept permanently".

Now we need to give our username and password. I recommend saving the authentication since SVN has a handshake it does. If you don't save the password you might get stuck typing it more than once. That's usually annoying.

After authenticating you'll get messages like these, which will inform you of the changes made to your directory. These are just folders, but if there were files they would have been obtained as well.

When you first check out a repository from Subversion you will see the files have been obtained. Notice here the green icons. These indicate that I have no local changes. We'll see a few more icons later.

Making Changes and Committing Changes

Now that we have the files we need to see how to add new files and make changes to existing files. When we send our changes to the source control server that is called a "Commit" to the source control repository.

Here I have created five new text documents. These files all have blue question mark icons. This indicates that these files are in a subversion folder and are not yet versioned by SVN. In order to get them into SVN I will either need to add them manually or I can do that when committing my changes.

By right-clicking, I open this context menu and select the "SVN Commit..." option.

In this window I will check the box next to each file I want to commit the changes of. Since these are non-versioned files it will add them into source control and send the updates to the server. I will also fill in a message in the "Message" text box.

After committing a window like this one will appear displaying the actions taken by TortoiseSVN.

Now that I have no changes, these files display with the green checkmark icons indicating that I haven't made any changes.

Next I will make a change to one of the documents by adding in some text and saving the file.

This new red exclamation point indicates that I have pending local changes which need to be committed to the source control repository. I will now need to commit these changes.

After selecting "SVN Commit..." from the context menu again, I will see this window again, but now it is displaying the modified file. From here I can add in a message describing the change I've made and click "OK".

TortoiseSVN will again bring up this window and display the steps it has taken to commit the changes.

Updating Local Copy

In order to keep up-to-date with the changes made by other developers, we will need to get the latest changes from the source control repository. In order to do this we will "Update".

Updating from SVN is as easy as another context menu. When you want to get others' changes to the source code you right-click and select "SVN Update", which will recursively get you the latest version of the source code starting from the folder on which you clicked.

When the update is finished you will get a message in this window saying "Completed". Now you're ready to make changes as you like with your local copy. Remember that others will not get your updates until you commit them to the source control repository.

Source Control Setup

Thu, 01 Jul 2010 16:34:08 GMT

The Basics

Source control systems, also known as version control systems or revision control systems, serve a few valuable purposes in software development: they're a centralized storage location that provides easy access to the code, they provide detailed version history, they maintain file integrity in case of individual corruptions, and facilitate the integration of separately developed software. These tools are a must have asset for all software development projects with at least one developer.

The freedom provided by these systems allows developers to take greater chances, and to also keep code cleaner. You don't need to save old code; source control does that. You don't need to worry about deleting things; source control has a copy. You don't need painfully merge your changes with someone else's; modern source control systems handle this. You don't need to inform everyone of the changes you made; they can see them in the revision history along with your comments describing the changes.

Rather than continuing to herald the great benefits of source control, I'll show how easy it is to set up a source control setup that works effectively for any size project or team.

Most source control systems involve client computers connecting to a central source control server, we will need to look at both setting up the server and the client.

There are plenty of source control systems on the market today, more than I could possibly name here. One of the most flexible and widely used source control systems is called Subversion (SVN). It is a free source control system, which can be set up and running within 15 minutes. I recommend setting up VisualSVN as your first source control system as it is free and has an easy-to-use installer.

You can read my articles on Setting up VisualSVN Server and Setting up the TortoiseSVN Client.

Repositories

Source control repositories are created in a source control system and are the highest level of grouping done on a source control system. These are usually a one-to-one mapping with a project. This scheme will work for nearly all development teams. If you will have more than a couple dozen projects you might want to make your repository be a group of projects (based on client perhaps).

If I were to set up Nitriq in source control, I would create a Nitriq repository and would set permissions to allow the Nitriq development team access to the code.

Repository Structure

The structure in which we store our files and folders is very important, and there are some standards which will guide us towards effective structures. At the root most level of our repository we want to have three folders: trunk, tags, and branches. This is a highly recognized highly accepted standard. I would recommend against deviated from this without a very good reason.

Trunk

This is the main portion of the repository. The current state of the project will always be in the trunk. If anyone wants to get the latest version of the application, this is where it is.

Branches

As we want to try something new, we branch out. We create copies of the trunk and put them here in the branches folder. These give us the opportunity to try new things or just work separately from others. The uses of branches changes depending on the size of your team as well as your process. Regardless of that though, all teams should be using branches at some level.

What to Store in Source Control

Everything that can go in source control should go in source control. The main things you want to avoid are files that are created when building your project. Those files usually don't go in source control. This will include most "bin" and "obj" folders.

Keep your documentation in source control. Remember that documentation changes while the app changes, so this keeps each version of the documents with the correct version of the code.

Referenced assemblies you might be using should also be in source control. This might include your unit testing framework or the charting controls that you purchased from your favorite component vendor. Keeping these in source control allows you to maintain the correct versions of the controls with the correct versions of the source code just like with the documentation. This is also useful for deploying to testing, staging, and production environments and when adding new team members.

My rule is that if it's required to run my code and is not my operating system, browser, runtime, or IDE then it needs to be in source control.

Clean Out Your Closets with Source Control

Thu, 01 Jul 2010 16:29:41 GMT

My DVR is full of shows about how to straighten up my house and office, and I have a pile of books here about how to take control of clutter…. If only they all were organized! I feel so overwhelmed!

Actually, things aren't quite that bad around here, but the sentiment above is a really common one these days. Every day we are being bombarded with STUFF - things that have to be looked at, sorted, and acted upon, and it is really easy to feel overwhelmed. And it isn't just physical stuff - we all have our little digital repositories of photos, records, and files that we might need - someday.

"Some day" and "just in case" clutter can be a serious issue though. We don't like to get rid of it, because Murphy's Law says that if we do, we will need it next week. But we often lack a way to deal with it, and so we are paralyzed, do nothing, and it continues to accumulate until we couldn't find the item that we needed even if our lives depended upon it.

For many businesses, this clutter takes the form of old code. Managers and developers are always concerned that they may, someday, need to roll back the system to some specific version that was in place in August 2005. What's more, "that code cost money to develop, so it must be valuable and we don't want to throw it away." And so the files accumulate, often with no real rhyme or reason, and typically with only a half-hearted attempt at organization.

In the worst cases, the old code is just left in the application and commented out. That is a disaster, and that code really DOES cost you real money. It slows down your development process today and it may make it nearly impossible for any work to be done at a later date. In not-quite-as-bad cases, the code is stored away somewhere in a file repository, where it collects in some state of chaos that prevents it from being useful "some day," even if it is needed.

There is a better way, however, and that is Source Control. Source Control takes care of your "just in case" code, and it does so in such a way that that you can actually find the files that you need later. Sounds great, right? If you want to read more about how to implement this best practice in your development environment, please read Brendan's article, Source Control Setup. This really is one of those solutions that pays for itself in a short period of time.

And if you still feel a little overwhelmed, don't panic. NimblePros offers full set-up and mentoring on Source Control solutions for companies that want to ensure that they are on the right track. (Just don't ask us to organize your storage closet.)

Software Engineering 101 - Cleveland

Thu, 01 Jul 2010 16:00:26 GMT

Agenda - Friday, 16 July 2010 (subject to change)

08:30 - 08:45 Welcome

08:45 - 09:45 Principles of OOP

09:50 - 11:05 SOLID Software Development

11:10 - 12:30 Software Testing

12:30 - 13:30 Lunch (not provided)

13:30 - 16:00 Hands-On Exercises / Practical TDD

If possible, bring your own laptop for use in the afternoon's session, with your choice of development and testing tools installed. We will have prepared material for Visual Studio 2008/2010 and C#, but other environments are welcome. If cannot bring a laptop, don't worry - we'll be spending the afternoon pairing together so as long as half the attendees have laptops, it will be fine.

This event is being modelled after recent successful events in Columbus and Nashville, and is being organized by NimblePros and HudsonSC.

This event also serves as a great kick-off for the Cleveland Give Camp, which takes place the weekend of 16-18 July and begins at 5pm.

Update: The Software Engineering 101 slides and demos from the event are now available for download.

Steve Smith did two videos of the greed kata: one in which Steve performs the Greed Kata without using TDD and one in which Steve solves the Greed Kata using TDD.

Thank you sponsors!

Hudson Software Craftsmanship 6/2010

Thu, 10 Jun 2010 10:46:50 GMT

Our next meeting is Wednesday, 16 June 2010. Show up between 5:30 and 6pm (or a bit later if that's when you can make it). It starts at 6:00 and goes until 8:00pm.

The Hudson Software Craftmanship User Group (HUDSONSC) is a non-profit association of people who are improving their skills as software craftsmen. We gather on the third Wednesday of each month in Hudson, Ohio at Henning Software's offices, 102 First St, Suite 211 Hudson, Ohio 44236), and look forward to seeing you at the next meeting.

Congratulations to Jim Arthur

Wed, 14 Apr 2010 18:07:01 GMT

Thank you to all who participated in our free Zune contest. Our winner is Jim Arthur.

Say Hello at one of our upcoming events

Wed, 14 Apr 2010 16:04:59 GMT

We'd love to meet you at one of our upcoming events!

You can find us at Hudson Software Craftmanship on the third Wednesday of every month. Join us on Wednesday, April 21st at Henning Software in Hudson, OH for lighting talks, code katas, and pizza. Get the address and more info about the group here.

And if you are looking for a great one day conference, check out the Stir Trek conference in Columbus, OH on May 7th. Where else will you get the opportunity to hear about cutting edge technology AND see Iron Man 2 in the same venue? They are hosting a number of notable speakers from the developer community, including our founder, Steve Smith, and it is sure to be a fabulous program!

We'd love to meet you at one of these events. If you have an opportunity to go, please say, "Hi".

FREE Download Nitriq Code Analysis

Wed, 14 Apr 2010 15:55:32 GMT

Nitriq Code Analysis is a powerful tool for analyzing your .NET code. The provided LINQ queries and any custom written ones can be used to perform advanced code analysis easily. Hierarchical query results, code visualization, and intelliprompt make Nitriq easy to understand and use.

Learn more or download it free today!

Customer Collaboration

Wed, 14 Apr 2010 15:33:38 GMT

Every software development project requires some level of customer involvement. Without the customer there is no reason to develop the software in the first place. The Agile Manifesto describes the agile customer relationship as, "Customer collaboration over contract negotiation".

The manifesto prioritizes different aspects of software development. In this case we're defining our relationship with customers. The customer should be involved daily in the decision-making of the project. As each aspect of the application is completed, the customer should be there accepting that it functions as desired. When the team has a question, the customer should be there to answer that question. Never guess or assume what the customer wants.

A more traditional approach to software development is to negotiate with the customer in advance to find out exactly what the end result should be, and then go and complete the project and return with the finished result. The painful part is how well this comic explains those types of projects.

With agile we avoid this by having the customer involved through the entire process. It seems crazy to a lot of people at first, but the customer should be in the same room as the developers. Take the steps required to get a customer on-site if at all possible. This will make the project run much more smoothly when all questions can be asked when answers are needed. The customer knows that everything is done the way it should be done.

Planning Sessions

Teams often have scheduled planning sessions where they decide what needs to be worked on, how much can be completed in the time span, and in what order everything will be completed.

Bring the customer in for your planning session with the collection of user stories ordered by business value. (This allows you to focus on customer priorities not the teams guesses.)
Have the customer briefly explain each story to make sure you have an understanding of what needs to be accomplished. (This gives the team the chance to ask the customer questions.)
Create a time estimate for each one through discussion. (This lets the customer know why something takes as long as it does.)
Choose how many of the stories you can complete in the time frame based on previous velocity. Everyone needs to commit to getting it all done.(The customer can now plan based on your estimate.)

Day-to-day Development

As you complete a story, make sure that you discuss the story with the customer. Show what you've accomplished, and make sure it is as the customer expected. If it isn't you can find out what needs to change and change it. Imagine waiting a week to find out that what you've done is wrong. Then you have to dive back into it. If you could fix it now, it would be faster and easier.

Not sure what the customer meant when writing one of the stories? Ask for an explanation.
Need to know how to handle an edge case? Ask.
Have a great idea for something? Tell the customer immediately; work on it later.

As teams move towards agile, they rediscover why they got into software development. Stressful customer relationships are not why any of us got into development. We are challenged every day by the software, not by figuring out what the customer wanted. Let the customer figure that out. Your job is making great software.

Agile Customer Service

Wed, 14 Apr 2010 15:31:51 GMT

As a small business owner as well as a consumer, one of my biggest interests is customer service. Sure, customers will judge you on price and craftsmanship. But more than anything else, the thing that will differentiate you from other companies is your excellent customer service and good communication skills.

One of the beauties of the agile process is that it is all about delivering exactly what the customer wants. Because the customer is involved in the process at every iteration, the customer is able to guide the project with their own vision. It isn't about what the developer thinks the customer wants (or in the worst case, what the developer wants), but rather how the customer envisions the end result.

This level of involvement also lends itself well to changes in the project. It is very difficult to predict every possible need of a system while it is on the drawing board, so most software projects are bloated with unnecessary and unused "just in case" features. However, by developing in small, usable increments, the developer team can use real world feedback to determine which features are actually needed by system users. Often, this allows the team to add options which were not even part of the initial project plan. Projects developed agilely have a lot less buyer remorse, with fewer regrets of "what might have been."

However, in order to develop a successful agile project, developers also need to learn to communicate with their customers.

The ability to speak and write clearly is an obvious advantage, but one that is too often overlooked in software development. Traditionally, developers have been tasked to write code; client communication was limited to project managers or a few senior people. However, in order for agile development to work, every developer must be able to communicate clearly with the client and with other team members. This limits miscommunications (remember the children's game of Telephone?), and also decreases the time taken up waiting for a response to be passed through long and convoluted channels. (That is not to say that every developer will be communicating with every customer on a regular basis; it is still helpful to have some designated points of contact. However, the fewer artificial barriers that are constructed, the more effective the relationship with the client will be.)

Listening is an even more important component of communication. Developers need to take input from the customer on a regular basis, and to learn that the customer's feedback has substantial value. Many times, the customer is not technically adept (which is why they outsourced the project in the first place), and they may not know exactly what they want. However, they DO know the problem that they want to solve, and it is the responsibility of the project manager or developer to meet that objective. This means being able to communicate effectively, to ask critical questions, and to allow the customer to determine what is really important in the end product. It also means respecting the customer, which is at the very heart of good customer service.

At NimblePros, we place a special emphasis on communication skills when we are recruiting new team members. We expect that our developers will have excellent technical skills. However, if they cannot communicate clearly, they cannot put those skills to their full use. Developers who are good communicators, on the other hand, are better at understanding the client's needs as well as better able to work in the team environment.

Fortunately, just like technical skills, communication skills can be learned and honed over time. There are a variety of resources available dealing with this topic, from books and videos to coaches and seminars. In our office, we also encourage our team to participate in user groups and conferences; practice is the very best way to become more confident and comfortable in your ability to communicate.

Yet another tenant of good communication skills is to be brief. And so, until next month, happy coding!

Cheap Code Is More Expensive

Wed, 14 Apr 2010 13:49:27 GMT

(Or "Why Not to Have Your Neighbor's Nephew Write Your App")

Every business has made this mistake at some point: You need an application to do something. Let's say you want to track orders more effectively. Off the shelf software is too limited, so you decide the only option is to have someone write it. You mention the project to your neighbor, and he tells you about his sister's kid who is a computer wiz. He's in college, says your neighbor, so he will work for cheap, and it would be a great opportunity for him. Sounds perfect, you say, and work begins….

This scenario is pretty typical in small businesses. And it isn't always an unmitigated disaster - there are a lot of talented students and freelancers who can write some pretty effective code. Especially in these economic times, cheap is a word that is hard to ignore.

The problem with this scenario is that the payment for this code doesn't come until much later, and it doesn't come cheap at all.

Let's say that the application works well at the start. But then you want to modify it. Is the kid still around to make changes? Does he remember what he did? Can anyone figure out what section of code does what, and what the interdependencies are? What if performance is an issue? At this point, it will cost less to rewrite the whole thing from scratch, rather than trying to work with a tangled mess of legacy code that no one can follow, much less modify.

Poorly written code is expensive. Its real cost is in future time and money.

Cheap code, that is, code that is poorly written and that comes with a significant future cost of time and money, can significantly damage a business when the bill comes due.

The cost may be obvious, in terms of increased maintenance expenses. It takes longer to fix bugs and make minor alterations. These are costs that your company may even "budget" into the initial development, and you might find these to be acceptable when you look at the "bottom line."

Unfortunately, the real cost is generally unseen, and that is opportunity cost. While your competitors are innovating and working on new products and services, you are mired down in minor updates to poorly written legacy code. You can't figure out how to add a new product to your website, let alone track the current production in the system on the new widget line. And that doesn't even touch on the headaches in shipping… And the list goes on and on.

Next time, we'll talk a little more about how to make your code "be all that it can be." But for today, just remember this:

Well written software is an investment. It gives your company a competitive edge. And that is an opportunity that you can't afford to lose.

Integrate Early and Integrate Often

Tue, 13 Apr 2010 14:14:41 GMT

As an industry we've come to realize that waiting until the last minute to integrate is a bad idea. With deadlines looming we can't afford to spend a lot of time trying to get all of the pieces playing well together. An unexpected issue can derail a project after months of development. If only someone had tried putting all of the pieces together sooner this could have been handled well in advance.

So how do we avoid waiting until the last minute? Integrating our work is a difficult, long task. If we did it earlier we'd have to do it multiple times.

This source of pain has caused many teams (including mine) to turn to continuous integration. Using continuous integration means that every piece of code added in to the system is immediately integrated into the rest of the system.

Adding continuous integration to your software development process is a great way to mitigate the pains of integration. Making integration a daily part of your development keeps every change as small as possible allowing the process to be far less painful. There is also no surprise at the end since you've been keeping everything integrated all along. You're also automating the process, so developers need not spend time integrating the code by hand.

If you haven't heard of unit testing or test driven development then you've mastered the art of avoiding current software buzz. I will propagate this buzz further by mentioning that unit testing should be a part of everyone's integration process.

Let me now take this opportunity to give a brief overview of the process we use:

All of our source code is stored in SVN repositories.
We use a continuous integration server which will begin building, testing, and deploying our application with every commit. We've used CruiseControl.NET and Team City, and I would recommend either one of these two.
Each project has build scripts written in NAnt. These scripts are what the continuous integration server use to build the software.
Our source code is tested using NUnit, and these tests are run when builds are triggered on the continuous integration server.
We automate our database changes using Tarantino, so that our testing environments are kept up to date even on the integration server.

This process allows us to do what we do best, write code. We don't waste time integrating, and we don't waste time worrying about integrating later. We get things done and integrated in immediately. Integrating constantly allows for instant feedback with every change.

Hudson Software Craftsmanship 4/2010

Fri, 26 Mar 2010 11:44:06 GMT

Our next meeting is Wednesday, 21 April 2010. Show up between 5:30 and 6pm (or a bit later if that's when you can make it). It starts at 6:00 and goes until 8:00pm.

Devconnections - Microsoft ASP.NET Connections

Fri, 26 Mar 2010 10:19:53 GMT

Microsoft, DevConnections Magazine, and Tech Conferences join forces to bring the launch of Visual Studio 2010 and the latest info about Silverlight 4, plus a celebration of the upcoming release of Microsoft SQL Server code-name "Killimanjaro" to Las Vegas.

Steve Smith will be giving three presentations about ASP.NET at this event.

AWF304: Pragmatic ASP.NET Tips, Tricks, and Tools

Every experienced ASP.NET developer has picked up a few cool tricks or useful tools that they put to use on every new project after they've learned them. This session draws upon the experience of many successful ASP.NET developers and distills this knowledge into a collection of tips and tricks you can start using in your work today. Some of the topics covered in this session include error handling, tracing, caching, base page classes, site layout and architecture, and data access best practices. You'll learn about highly reusable Http Modules and Handlers and a few code routines you may want to add to your personal library.

AMV305: Applying SOLID Principles to Your ASP.NET MVC 2 Application

Do your larger applications suffer from code rot to the point where there are parts of the application that everyone is afraid to touch? Would you characterize your app's architecture as "elegant" or is it a "big ball of mud?" In this session, learn how to apply various OOP best practices such as Robert Martin's SOLID principles to keep code simple and maintainable. The session introduces a simple ASP.NET MVC application which doesn't follow best practices and gradually refactors it as each principle is introduced, resulting in much cleaner, more maintainable code. No prior experience with ASP.NET MVC is expected, and most of the principles discussed apply equally well to non-MVC or even non-web applications as well.

AMV306: What's New in ASP.NET MVC 2?

In this session, Steve will quickly highlight the new features available in ASP.NET MVC 2. ASP.NET MVC offers a new way to develop ASP.NET applications that allows for finer control of the application's behavior and greater separation of concerns within the architecture. ASP.NET MVC 2 builds on this platform by adding several new features, such as Areas, which can be used to break apart a large site into several deployable subsections. Another much-anticipated new feature centers on validation, and the new version includes support for model validation providers which can be used as-is or swapped out with a custom implementation, and client side validation support using jQuery. The new release also includes templated helpers and strongly typed UI helpers, which can make it much quicker to create views for displaying and capturing data.

Stir Trek

Fri, 26 Mar 2010 10:00:46 GMT

Stir Trek is an opportunity to learn about the newest advances in web and mobile development. There will be 20 sessions, in four tracks, so you'll be able to pick the content that interests you the most.

Steve Smith will be speaking from 3:00-4:00PM about ASP.NET 4.0.

In addition, the day will include lunch, a raffle with some significant prizes, and a private screening of the new IronMan 2 movie, which opens in theaters the day of this event.

Hudson Software Craftsmanship 1/2010

Thu, 17 Dec 2009 11:48:55 GMT

Our next meeting is this Wednesday, 20 January 2010. Show up between 5:30 and 6pm (or a bit later if that's when you can make it).

The Hudson Software Craftmanship User Group (HUDSONSC) is a non-profit association of people who are improving their skills as software craftsmen. We gather monthly in Hudson, Ohio at Henning Software's offices, 102 First St, Suite 211 Hudson, Ohio 44236), and look forward to seeing you at the next meeting.

It starts at 5:30 and goes until 8:00pm.

CodeMash 2010

Thu, 17 Dec 2009 11:26:34 GMT

CodeMash is a unique event that will educate developers on current practices, methodologies and technology trends in variety of platforms and development languages such as Java, .NET, Ruby and PHP. Held January 13-15, 2010, at the lush Kalahari Resort in Sandusky, Ohio, attendees will be able to attend a world-class technical conference amid Ohio's largest indoor waterpark. Nobody will frown if you show up in shorts, sandals, and your loudest t-shirt. You might even win a prize for doing so.

Hudson Software Craftsmanship 12/2009

Fri, 06 Nov 2009 11:03:02 GMT

Due to travel on the part of both Henning Software and NimblePros people who coordinate the group, there will be no meeting in November. The next meeting of Hudson Software Craftsmanship will be on 16 December 2009. As usual, arrive between 5:30 and 6pm and we'll get started at 6.

Hudson Software Craftsmanship

Wed, 05 Aug 2009 13:12:57 GMT

We're excited to have our first meeting scheduled for 19 August 2009 at 5:30pm. The meeting will take place at Henning Software's offices. Don't forget to register and reserve your seat if you're planning to join us.

Microsoft PDC

Mon, 22 Jun 2009 08:08:51 GMT

PDC09, Professional Developers Conference, will be held in Los Angeles from November 17-19, 2009. We will be attending, however our plans for speaking haven't been finalized yet.

Cleveland .NET SIG

Fri, 19 Jun 2009 14:49:14 GMT

Just because you use ASP.NET MVC doesn't mean you get the benefits for free. You still need to write code that follows best practices. This presentation goes through a Robert Martin's SOLID principles of Object Oriented Programming, with examples of violations of these principles in a simple ASP.NET MVC application. The principles are then applied, resulting in a much more elegant and maintainable application.

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CodeMash 2011

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Hudson Software Craftsmanship 10/2010

Setting up VisualSVN Server

Get VisualSVN Server

Install VisualSVN Server

Create Users

Create Groups

Create Repositories

Setting Repository Permissions

Next Steps

Setting up the TortoiseSVN Client

Get TortoiseSVN Client

Install TortoiseSVN Client

Check Out Source Code

Making Changes and Committing Changes

Updating Local Copy

Source Control Setup

The Basics

Repositories

Repository Structure

Trunk

Tags

Branches

What to Store in Source Control

Clean Out Your Closets with Source Control

Software Engineering 101 - Cleveland

Hudson Software Craftsmanship 6/2010

Congratulations to Jim Arthur

Say Hello at one of our upcoming events

FREE Download Nitriq Code Analysis

Customer Collaboration

Agile Customer Service

Cheap Code Is More Expensive

Integrate Early and Integrate Often

Hudson Software Craftsmanship 4/2010

Devconnections - Microsoft ASP.NET Connections

Stir Trek

Hudson Software Craftsmanship 1/2010

CodeMash 2010

Hudson Software Craftsmanship 12/2009

Hudson Software Craftsmanship

Microsoft PDC

Cleveland .NET SIG