Tools don't solve problems, thinking does
While modeling use cases, and in particular smart use cases, clear naming conventions can emphasis the meaning of your use cases more clearly. In general In general you might say that a use case expresses a particular action that is executed by one or more actors. Therefore it is considered good practice to name your use case after the action […]
Soms wordt ik door bedrijven of hogescholen gevraagd een mooi verhaal te komen vertellen. Vaak een goede gelegenheid om eens te sparren met developers. Zo sprak ik recent in Arnhem bij Avisi – een klein, zeer enthousiaste Java-bedrijf. En terwijl ik vertelde over agile, Smart, smart use cases, patronen en het genereren van code vanuit UML viel het me weer […]
The big question in agile projects is when to start with the design and test design for a specific work item – in my case a smart use case? In traditional waterfall styled methodologies, analysis and design for the full project will be finished even before the first line of code is ever written. In agile projects, and in our […]
Under normal circumstances Barcelona is a lovely city, where beatiful dark-haired and dark-eyed girls parade the small streets of Barri Gotic and El Raval, and tapas bars are overcrowded by locals and tourists trying to act as locals. But not this week. This week the conglomerate of Microsoft and Glasgow Rangers supporters pollutes the pavings. The latter are easy recognizable […]
Vlak voor mijn zomervakatie werd ik gebeld door collega Rob, een business consultant. “Jij moet eens met de CIO van mijn klant praten,” zegt hij. “Die is bezig om zijn hele IT-organisatie te herstructureren.” Even is het stil. Rob bouwt de spanning genadeloos op. “Hij past daarbij de lean principles van Toyota toe,” vervolgt hij, ”en die sluiten volgens mij […]
Being in a hotel room a lot sure helps you keep up with televsion shows you would otherwise skip withour remorse, for instance talk shows. Zapping through the channels I stumbled upon a stupifying interview with the Australian actor Dominic Purcell who plays one of the main characters in the television series Prison Break, that, to be quite honest, I’ve […]
Het is warm in de RAI als ik de zaal betreedt waar ik mijn verhaal over project anti-patterns ga vertellen. Het is verreweg de minst technische presentatie tijdens de Microsoft DevDays 2006 en ik verwacht dan ook een handjevol mensen. Een eerste blik in de zaal doet echter anders vermoeden. Er staan ruim driehonderdvijftig stoelen opgesteld. En dat voor een […]
On the highway on my way to Meppel to visit a customer, I passed a truck. A yellow truck. From Gentbrugge, Belgium. Although I hardly ever read the signs on trucks, passing this truck it immediately caught my eye. On the back of the truck a clear sign stated: mail me about my driving, followed by an email address, of […]
On many projects, developers are included to build their software from the ground up, layer by layer. This is argumented by the developers stating that “we really need to build the database access layer first, otherwise we are unable to realize the domain layer”. So the software is built layer by layer. There is a big risk involved in building […]
Earlier this week I had a long talk with Silvain, the software architects / lead developer on one of our agile projects – being executed using the Smart methodology (see links below). Silvain is concerned about the quality of the software architecture in his agile project. His project is implementing a large number (over 50) work processes and associated forms […]
It is quite remarkable. Over the years I have gathered a lot of experience in use case modeling. That’s where smart use cases came from – if you want to know more on those, please read the book. Along with smart use cases comes a pragmatic and easy applicable estimation technique, which I’ve called smart estimation. With this technique every […]
It’s half past five as I enter city hall in Rijswijk. I’m due at the Bouwstenenfabriek of the Department of Defence, which resides on the 9th and 10th floor. Invited along some Capgemini hot shots to give an inspiring presentation on innovative software development. At a practice meeting of one of our ASP practices. How about that. I always considered […]