The lingua franca of software development is without doubt English. For all of us not being born in the English speaking part of the world, it means that we have to use a second language for communication about programming. Using a second language is always less natural than the native language. When I’m writing this… Continue reading On English
Category: Software Development
Programmer Time Translation Table
An experienced project manager I used to work with claimed that he took the programmers’ time estimates, multiplied by pi and converted to the next time magnitude to get the true number. 1 day converts to 3.14 weeks. He had learned the hard way that programmers are bad at estimating times. To get a more… Continue reading Programmer Time Translation Table
Impossible to Read MS License Agreement
I don’t like reading license agreements. I doubt any programmer does. Even though I don’t like it, I usually quickly skim through the agreements to check that I don’t inadvertently approve something that I shouldn’t. Today I installed the .NET Framework 4 Update 3, to get support for workflow state machines. During installation I found… Continue reading Impossible to Read MS License Agreement
Problem Solving by Failing
The project runs on smoothly, until one day, you see a problem rising. Maybe it’s something that is clear to someone technically oriented but harder to spot for project management. Maybe it’s something that you have experience of and recognize earlier than anyone else. The first reaction in this case is often to try your… Continue reading Problem Solving by Failing
Have a Shrink on the Team?
Many aspects of development of customer-specific systems are more related to people and relations than technology. I’m fairly sure that I can handle the technology, but people can be really challenging. What about bringing a people specialist – a shrink – on the team? When I was still studying I imagined that the job as… Continue reading Have a Shrink on the Team?