Five for Friday – February 14, 2025

It’s Thursday night, and I have just returned home from STAR East. Lee Copeland said that he thought it was the best STAR conference ever, and I know many who agreed with him. As for me, I had a great time, but was a bit too distracted from trying not to suck at my keynote…

I recently re-read (skimmed) Steve McConnell’s Software Estimation, Demystifying the Black Art. When I met with Microsoft Press to pitch HWTSAM, they gave a hot-off-the press new copy, and while some of the book feels “old school”, it’s still filled with foundational estimation knowledge. I work at home, and absolutely need a quiet PC –…

When I was 9 years old, I’d play pick up soccer at recess. A couple of kids – the “leaders” would pick teams, and then we’d play. Since we were kids, the leaders of the teams were sometimes the best players, but usually the loudest kids. Leadership was short-lived, but effective for the purpose. I…

When I’m interviewing experienced candidates (for any software role), one question I frequently ask is, “What’s your super power?” I like hearing answers like, “I can learn new things really quickly”, or “I’ve found over 1000 security bugs”, or even “I’m a batch file (or other language) wizard”. Recognizing super (or special) powers in yourself…

Last night I dreamt about the worst presentation ever. Sometimes I was presenting, sometimes I was watching, but it was frighteningly bad. Fortunately, my keynote this morning went well – and now that it has, I’ll share what happened (including some conscious editing to make sure I cover all of the bases). It begins… Moderator:…

The days are all blurring together – but I still found some things worth sharing. I’m presenting at the Online Test Conference – it’s free, it’s well run, and it’s happening May 19th-21st.. Gregory Paciga had a nice post recently on naming tests – Don’t “check” or “verify” in your tests I stumbled across Deadlock…