Clarke Ching - Split Infinitives and Beyond.

TDD for managers and students!

I had a fun day today at Glasgow Caledonian University.   I’m midway through the a series of 10 lectures on Agile Software Development to 4th year Software Engineering students. 

Todays 2 lectures were on XP and TDD.

Now, I really wanted to demonstrate TDD rather than to just talk about it, but I don’t have any recent coding experience.  I don’t have an IDE either.  I don’t have java or any xUnit setup.

So I improvised.

I used Excel to build a Roman numerals function in VBA.  I used Excel itself to hold my test data (I’ve shown a snippet next, with the PASS and FAIL highlighted in Red and Green using conditional formatting) and I built the function up from scratch using my understanding of TDD (write a test, run it, fix it, refactor, etc).

Wow!  It was an exhilarating experience.  I haven’t coded in over half-dozen years and I don’t know bugger all about VBA but I was able (after a quick practice at the weekend) to build the function from scratch, complete with tests.  And, boy do the tests help.  Wow, what a learning experience. 

Here’s the finished code, which may or may not be a bit ugly – I don’t know – but my tests all passed.

Public Function d2r(i As Integer)
d2r = m(i, "c", 100) + m(i, "xc", 90) + m(i, "l", 50) + _
      m(i, "xl", 40) + m(i, "x", 10) + _
      m(i, "ix", 9) + m(i, "v", 5) + _
      m(i, "iv", 4) + m(i, "i", 1)
End Function

Public Function m(ByRef i, roman, dec) As String
Dim st As String
st = ""

While i >= dec
    st = st + roman
    i = i - dec
Wend

m = st

End Function

Anyway, I’m sharing this for two reasons.

• First, if you’ve never done TDD because you feel like a techie dinosaur then please give it a go using excel.  I did it in front of 25 really bright young things and survived.  In fact, although I was nervous to start with, after a while – as I built up my safety-net of tests – I soon felt like I could fly.   In fact, it was a joy.
  
• Second, if you want to convince a manager about the joys of TDD then sit them down at Excel – it is already on their PC and it’s quite possible that they’ve already got some familiarity with VBA when they’ve tinkered with writing macros – and follow my example.  Try it at home first though … there are a few little Excel things you need to figure out so you don’t look too dopey.

What a blast!

"The Goal" - the easy way

Here’s a nice, concise, free, chapter-by-chapter summary of Goldratt’s “The Goal”. 

In fact, take I look at the whole site.  It’s called The Management and Accounting Web and is developed by James R. Martin, Professor Emeritus at the University of South Florida.  He has prepared and collated a whole lot of top-notch TOC stuff, including a 28 page summary of The Haystack syndrome, Goldratt’s hardest book, that I’ll read on the train this morning.

New TOC simulation games

John Tripp is my local TOC consultant here in Scotland. 

He sold me my first pack of TOC books and he put together the charming and free TOC “Case Coil” case study.  And now he’s just released two new Theory of Constraints simulators / games.  One for operations and manufacturing at £25 (+ VAT) and one for project management £49 (+VAT). 

I haven’t used either yet but I’m happy to recommend them based solely on the quality of the Case Coil case study.  Go take a look.

Wow! Mike Cohn's new Scrum diagram

Wow, Mike Cohn has hired a graphic designer to rev up the scrum double loop diagram.  He has made it publicly available in several different sizes. 

Good work mike.

UK surgeon uses TOC approach to DOUBLE CAPACITY and ELIMINATE WAITING LISTS

Chopped, reordered and pasted from the October 23 Sunday Times (print version):

 A SURGEON in the National Health Service has more than doubled his work rate by introducing a French-style “production line” under which he carries out overlapping operations in different theatres.

 John Petri, a consultant orthopaedic surgeon, introduced the system after finding himself frustrated at spending time “drinking tea” while patients were being made ready for operations at his Norfolk hospital.

The results:

• Trial figures show that over 50 operating sessions, Petri performed 270 major and minor operations using the dual theatre system. Two colleagues using the traditional single theatre approach together performed only 225 operations.
• Petri can now operate on patients within two weeks of their first consultation. “I don’t drink tea between operations any more. My waiting list is zero,” he said.
• At present the 1,530 NHS orthopaedic surgeons each have about 140 patients waiting three to nine months for surgery.

How did he do this?  It looks like he either knowingly or intuitively used TOCs process of on going improvement (aka POOGI or The 5 focusing steps). 

First, he has identified himself – or sugeons ingeneral - as the current system constraint:

• “It took me some time to understand how the British system worked but I could not understand why it had waiting lists. When I asked, people would talk about resources. What I saw was that surgeons spent chunks of their time idle waiting to operate,” he said.
• “If you were running a factory, you wouldn’t allow your most important and most expensive machine to stand idle. The same is true in a hospital.”

Second, he’s figured out how to exploit himself as the constraint – i.e. how to make him as efficient as possible:

• He operates on one patient while the next is prepared in a second theatre. Petri moves on to the second patient while leaving a junior to finish the first. By the time the second operation is nearing completion, a third patient is waiting for him in the original theatre.
• The system enables him to perform as many as five hip and knee replacements in a single shift, compared with one or two typically carried out by surgeons who use one theatre. They have to stop and wait after each operation for the next patient to be prepared.
• He now operates for five hours at a time instead of the standard 3½-hour session.

Third, he’s subordinated  the other resources in the process to make sure he is  as busy as possible:

• Petri convinced anaesthetists and theatre staff to change the way they worked but was unable to persuade fellow surgeons to join the initiative.
• He uses two anaesthetists so there is always another patient waiting for him and the gap between operations is the five minutes that it takes to scrub himself down. He believes the system has reduced the time he is idle by between 40% and 60%.

Ahhh, but he wasn’t always the constraint, it looks like it was once theatre space.  Petri persuaded his boss to spend some money to 4) ELEVATE the previous constraint.  This was enough to give the theatres spare capacity so that Petri himself was the constriant.

•  He persuaded his chief executive to carry out a trial of his “dual operating” idea in 2001 and to build a new theatre.

And, other hospitals will perhaps have different constraints:

• Anne Moore, of the Royal College of Surgeons, said lack of resources meant “dual operating” was not always viable: “There is nothing to stop surgeons operating Petri’s system. In America surgeons move between as many as 12 theatres but in the UK there are not enough anaesthetists, theatres or other staff to make it work.”

But, perhaps that’s not the biggest problem:

•  Petri’s initiative has been welcomed by his hospital managers who believe it could become a model to cut NHS waiting lists. It is being shunned, however, by his colleagues some of whom, he believes, may be deterred by “the sheer hard work” involved in the new system.

Doctors, afraid of hard work?  Hmmm, I doubt many of them are afraid of hard work … it takes a lot of work to become a doctor …. perhaps there’s something else going on?

•  There could be drawbacks for surgeons employing Petri’s methods. As his NHS waiting list has been cut, so the incentive for patients to employ him privately has diminished.
• He estimates that his private income has fallen 10% in the past year and he expects it to fall further next year.
• Petri said: “I care about my private practice but I care more about people who have no money getting their operation tomorrow and not having to wait a year.”
• A survey by the British Medical Association found that one in eight consultants earned at least £100,000 a year from private practice.

User Stories

[quoted with permission:]

Think of "user stories" as having two parts– users and stories.

Think then about who your users are and make a list of them. For a travel site this may be "Frequent Flyers" and "Vacation Planners" and so on. For each user role (e.g., Frequent Flyer) then think about the "epics" or big stories or goals that the role has (book a flight, check my mileage, upgrade a flight, etc.) Just think of 3-7 or so per user role. Then for the most important epics (those you're likely to do soonest) work to split those into smaller stories--perhaps "book a flight with a credit card" and 'book a flight with frequent flyer miles" etc.

Use this template for stories:
As a <user role>, I want to <goal> so that <reason>.

For example,
As a frequent flyer, I want to check my mileage account so that I know I got
credit for my most recent flight.

Strive for stories that are:
Independent (of each other)
Negotiable (have some "wiggle room")
Valuable (to users or customers, not technologists)
Estimatable (not very precisely but generally)
Small (Not all stories but the ones you'll do soon)
Testable

Remember this through the acronym INVEST.

A lot more could be said but that's enough to hopefully get you started.

Regards,
Mike Cohn
Author:
    Agile Estimating and Planning
    User Stories Applied for Agile Software Development
www.mountaingoatsoftware.com

clark ching vs. clarke ching

How come http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q=clark+ching finds my home page – even though my name is spelt wrong (clark = clarke).

 

 

XPDay2005 - Making More Money using agile software development.

Yipee!  The XPDay 2005 (London) website has started accepting registrations. 

This years conference is in London on Monday 28th & Tuesday 29th November.  Tim Lister is one of the keynote speakers – which is cool because he’s co-author of one of my favourite books.  He’s also running a masterclass with the intriguing title  “Risk Management With Your XP Goggles On”

I’m thrilled to add that the conference committe has given me one of the first sessions to talk about  Making More Money: An Introduction to Agile Software Development which will be most useful for anyone new to agile and anyone wanting to “sell” agile to their customers, sponsors, managers, staff … anyone really. 

XPDay2005 - Making More Money using agile software development.

Yipee!  The XPDay 2005 (London) website has started accepting registrations. 

This years conference is in London on Monday 28th & Tuesday 29th November.  Tim Lister is one of the keynote speakers – which is cool because he’s co-author of one of my favourite books.  He’s also running a masterclass with the intriguing title  “Risk Management With Your XP Goggles On”

I’m thrilled to add that the conference committe has given me one of the first sessions to talk about  Making More Money: An Introduction to Agile Software Development which will be most useful for anyone new to agile and anyone wanting to “sell” agile to their customers, sponsors, managers, staff … anyone really. 

ScrumMaster training in Edinburgh - 24th and 25th of November, 2005

Hi everyone,

 

It was a only a few years ago, while researching Agile methods for my MBA dissertation, that I stumbled across the Scrum agile development methodology.  By pure luck I was just in time - by a few days - to join one of Ken Schwaber's early Scrum Master training sessions, held right here in Edinburgh.  I remember thinking at the time that I learnt more about managing projects and leading people during those 2 days than I learnt during the first 2 years of MBA - and for less than 10% of the cost.  A couple of years later I'm still hooked on Scrum and I still think it will change the world, but I struggle to recall much of use from the MBA.

 

So ... I'm delighted to announce, on behalf of AgileScotland, that Boris Gloger and Jens Ostergaard will facilitate Scrum Master Certification Training on the 24th to 25th November in the Abby Business Centre on Princes Street in Edinburgh.  They will also be running an open Scrum-related evening session.

 

Boris and Jens are two of only a few certified ScrumMaster Trainers in the world, both having been trained by Scrum co-founder Ken Schwaber.  They have been using Scrum in various projects and teams and have facilitated Scrum Master Certification Training sessions in Europe, Australia and the USA.  During the course they will share their experiences about estimating, planning, running cross-functional teams, scalling scrum, implementing Scrum in hostile environments ... and a whole lot more.

You can find more details about the course and booking instructions at: http://www.scrumeducation.com/scrumedu/Class/id~10.    The 2 day course costs 1000 euros (about £690).

 

If you are interested in attending the course then please send me a quick note - with absolutley no obligation - just to give us an idea of numbers and make planning easier. 

 

Clarke Ching

AgileScotland

www.clarkeching.com