Solarized

So this is the simulation that I use in my Agile Testing class, as well as in other contexts where I want to teach lessons about increasing Agility. The mechanics of the simulation itself are very general: the simulation models the organization of...

Lately, we’ve been exploring ways to offer web apps that perform like native apps on mobile devices. For this short sprint we targeted mobile WebKit browsers—especially the default browsers on iOS and Android—because of their widespread use and ex...

I’m going to list assumptions your systems probably make about names. All of these assumptions are wrong. Try to make less of them next time you write a system which touches names.

Some people, when confronted with a problem, think "I know, I'll use a queue." Now they have an unbounded number of problems.

Networked message queues like ActiveMQ, RabbitMQ, ZeroMQ, and a host of other Java inspired software tumors ar...

Our new scope-based authorization gem for Ruby on Rails has been released. This might one day replace Aegis as our standard authorization solution.

User Stories should describe what a user wants the system to do. Purely technical tasks should usually be implemented as part of a User Story. But, sometimes there are technical tasks which cannot be directly linked to customer value. Things like ...

Choosing the right product to develop is crucial. Great execution is also very important. But if you develop a product that no-one wants or no-one is prepared to pay for, then you are going to fail, no matter how well you execute it. You can often...

Most web applications contain several examples of state machines, including accounts and subscriptions, invoices, orders, blog posts, and many more. The problem is that you might not necessarily think of them as state machines while designing your...

We recently added custom fields to Highrise which allow you to keep track of extra details beyond standard contact information like phone, email, address, etc. After the launch, we had a “looking back” conversation to see what lessons could be lea...

A common question in IT departments is whether to provide a capability by building custom software or by buying a package. If the business process you are supporting is part of your competitive advantage you should build custom software, if not yo...