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I, Programmer

I, Programmer

When I started in IT the roles were clearly separated. Business Analysts wrote requirements, Systems Analysts defined systems, Architects designed them, Programmers wrote the code and then spent weeks of their life engaged in the soul-crushing activity known as integration. In some organisations Testers would test the software and write reports. Cross-disciplined Analyst-Programmers were a rare and valuable commodity.

Over the last decade or so we have seen a shift towards “generalising specialists”, programmers who, as well as designing and building great software, can understand a business domain, design a user interface, participate in and automate some of the testing and deployment activities, and who are sometimes even responsible for the health and wellbeing of their own systems in production.

To succeed in this new world requires more than “3 years of C# programming”. The modern developer needs to be constantly reinventing themselves, learning, and helping others to do the same. In this session, Dan explores some of the skills and characteristics of the modern programmer, and suggests some ways you can grow them for yourself.

Daniel Terhorst-North
PRO

March 12, 2015
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Transcript

  1. I, Programmer
    Dan North
    @tastapod

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  2. The Old Testament

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  3. In the beginning…
    1844: All the code in the world

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  4. In the beginning…
    1844: All the programmers in the world

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  5. 100 years later…

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  6. Necessity is the mother of invention…
    1944: Programmers hack on a Colossus Mk 2

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  7. People begin to specialise…
    1960s: Debugging a “WITCH” mainframe in academia

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  8. Then we get commercial…
    1974: Writing business software on an IBM S/360

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  9. There are Commandments…
    You shall have a Business Requirements Document
    You shall have a System Design Specification
    You shall have a Detailed Functional Specification
    You shall program in the manner of the Specification
    You shall have no other Specification before me
    Analysts shall Analyse, Architects shall Design
    Programmers shall Program, Testers shall Test

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  10. And more Commandments…
    You shall complete a Formal Change Request
    You shall provide Release Documentation
    You shall not release to Production yourself, lest you incur
    the wrath of the Support Engineers
    You shall not hack on that which is in Production*

    * more of a guideline really

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  11. The New Testament

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  12. Then comes a new Covenant…
    2001: Programmers drafting the Agile Manifesto, Utah
    The Agile Manifesto
    We are uncovering better ways…
    Individuals and interactions over processes and tools

    Working software over comprehensive documentation

    Customer collaboration over contract negotiation

    Responding to change over following a plan

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  13. The teachings of the prophet Bezos
    All teams shall expose Service Interfaces
    Teams shall only communicate through Interfaces
    There will be no other form of communication
    You shall do this in the manner of your choosing
    All services shall be designed for external use
    There will be no exceptions
    …as revealed to us by his servant Yegge

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  14. The Book of Revelation

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  15. I, Programmer

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  16. You, Programmer
    You are
    …a programmer
    …working in a team
    …building a product
    …on a platform
    …in a department
    …in an organisation.

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  17. …a programmer
    learns the language
    learns the libraries
    monitors the alternatives
    learns the toolchain
    engages with the community

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  18. You, Programmer
    You are
    …a programmer
    …working in a team
    …building a product
    …on a platform
    …in a department
    …in an organisation.

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  19. …working in a team
    understands the process
    understands the roles
    collaborates with others
    …all the others!
    contributes to the team’s health

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  20. You, Programmer
    You are
    …a programmer
    …working in a team
    …building a product
    …on a platform
    …in a department
    …in an organisation.

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  21. …building a product
    understands the business objective
    studies the domain
    knows the stakeholders
    …all the stakeholders!
    contributes to the product

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  22. You, Programmer
    You are
    …a programmer
    …working in a team
    …building a product
    …on a platform
    …in a department
    …in an organisation.

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  23. …on a platform
    understands the path to production
    cares about runtime concerns
    values automation
    …not all the automation!
    contributes to the platform

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  24. You, Programmer
    You are
    …a programmer
    …working in a team
    …building a product
    …on a platform
    …in a department
    …in an organisation.

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  25. …in a department
    understands the wider context
    makes local trade-offs
    shares their knowledge across teams
    …all their knowledge!
    contributes to the department

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  26. You, Programmer
    You are
    …a programmer
    …working in a team
    …building a product
    …on a platform
    …in a department
    …in an organisation.

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  27. …in an organisation.
    projects the organisation’s values
    cares about organisation’s reputation
    shares their knowledge externally
    …all their knowledge!
    contributes to the organisation

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  28. You, Programmer
    You are
    …a programmer
    …working in a team
    …building a product
    …on a platform
    …in a department
    …in an organisation.

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  29. Thank you
    Dan North

    @tastapod

    http://dannorth.net

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