Nicholas Tuck Web Developer

Dojo Code Katas

// April 8th, 2012 // No Comments » // Agile

Code Katas are a professional training practice developers use to stay in shape when it comes to programming, problem solving, tool utilization and much much more.  See a great definition and background can be found at codekata.pragprog.com.  That link has a good list of Code Katas but has not been updated in a long time.  It can be very difficult to find documentation, Katas to try, good practices, and information on Katas cousins, Rasa and Randori.  I want to help keep up and coming developers up to date with the latest knowledge I have gathered as well as give us a place to collaborate on best practices.  These are by far my innovations, these are smart practices from the greatest minds like Robert Martin and Dave Thomas, however they are too busy to be keeping up latest documentation on the open web, so I hope to help keep these practices up to date.

List of Code Katas

Here is a compiled list of different Katas for you to choose from.  Most are links to other sites, but I may repost some on my site as many sites that have these Katas are unreliable.

Bob Martin’s Word Wrap Kata Walkthrough – Bob Martin walks you through every step of the word wrap Kata, and displays how a simple choice of the what to test next can make a problem very difficult or trivial.  This should be read and practiced by every developer learning the Code Kata and Test Driven Development.

Bob Martin’s Bowling Game Kata – Bob takes us through another scenario of his classic Bowling Game example. He uses this example in many of his books focused on Agile development and best practices.  Check out the solution slides, they can be very useful.

Pragmatic Programmer Compiled List – Great list of 21 Code Katas and a perfect starting point

Test Driven Development Problems – Great list ranging in difficulty

Coding Dojo Kata Catalogue – Coding Dojo is doing a great job and spreading the word and this is their compiled list of Katas.

Project Euler Problem Set – Project Euler is of similar mindset of Code Katas but more generically for anyone (non developers) to keep their minds sharp and feed their hunger to learn.  Many of these problems can be solved using Test Driven Development which make great Code Katas

Omaha Java Users Group – Introduction to Restlet – 02/21/12 – Success

// February 21st, 2012 // 1 Comment » // java

This was my first visit to the OJUG and it was a great experience. Lots of pizza and drinks. A handful of recruiters, who if you want, you can turn the conversation about their jobs VS them trying to hire you. In fact met up with my recruiter from TekSystems while I was there, always good to see Brian.

The talk went well. Well prepared, live demos, live code (copy and paste snippets to keep things rolling). Had a couple mishaps, but that keeps us learning, and had a good conversation toward the end. I think the conversation should have continued and been encouraged but was toward the end and I think they were wrapping up.

Will definitely be going to the next one. Great meetup.

Posted my notes below. Nothing fantastic but a good reference for me to remember.

Live Mind Map
PDF Mind Map

Clean Coder – Book Notes and Thoughts

// December 28th, 2011 // 2 Comments » // Agile

The Clean Coder: A Code of Conduct for Professional Programmers is a new book on developer professionalism from the legend Bob Martin and it doesn’t disappoint. I have read many books written by Robert (Bob) Martin or from his series. I have been very impressed with the classics and was more than ecstatic when I first got wind of The Clean Coder from the top 100 Agile Books according to the Developer Zone (great living list). This is a must read for every developer in the field of software development, regardless of your level of interest. For the hard-core developers who have read many of the popular agile and Bob Martin books there is great info in here but mostly reaffirms all of those deep, gut feelings you have about how software and web development should work. A lot of times all you need is a seasoned veteran to confirm your suspicions to help you stack on the right track.

The book discusses details including professional development practices like how Test Driven Development (TDD) is a fundamental development concept like washing hands is to a surgeon; it doesn’t need defending it just is. He also focuses heavily on your interaction with other developers, and managers. Very specific about When to say no to your managers if you can’t honestly commit, how to honestly commit to timelines and your responsibility as a professional, a paid employee, to make a commitment that everyone can trust, not the one everyone ones to hear.

It was an easy read and extremely well-organized, which made it easy for me to put a thorough set of notes together. I have already reviewed these notes multiple times while sparking conversations with co-workers about the ideas Bob suggests. I hope they help you or at least gets you to buy and read the book!

Interactive Mind Map of Clean Coder Book Notes on MindMeister

PDF – Mind Map of Clean Coder Book Notes – Fully Expanded

Question: Should I embed the mind map below like I have for other notes or the link good enough so the page loads better?

Succeeding With Agile: Software Development Using Scrum – Book Notes

// October 19th, 2011 // 1 Comment » // Agile

In an effort to understand how to apply scrum after fully grasping the core concepts and ideas, I read Succeeding With Agile,  one of the top recommended scrum books.  For good reason it remains at the top of the dzone top agile book lists.  The book is great at identifying core scrum concepts and the ideal solution, some of the bad cases to expect, and the reality of applying scrum.  You often will not be applying scrum to everyone with open arms.  There are many challenges to applying and succeeding with scrum.  Mike Cohn does an amazing job detailing and suggesting many approaches.  The most obvious being, iterate toward agility.  Excercise scrum in your effort to applying scrum.

Below are my notes of the book for future reference that I wanted to share with everyone.  Please add comments and I will be happy to elaborate in the mind map and answer below.  I hope you find the notes intriguing to go read the book yourself, it is worth it!
Succeeding With Agile: Software Development Using Scrum Mind Map – Embedded below

Certified Scrum Master

// August 28th, 2011 // 1 Comment » // Agile

I recently took the Certified Scrum Master course taught by Brian Rabon, President of Braintrust Consulting. Brian is an extremely impressive learning genius. You can tell he has taught many years and prides himself on making all participants understand terminology and real life experience. All in all was a great course and would recommend his course to anyone interested in Scrum or seeking Certified Scrum Master status.

My certification can be found here: Nicholas Tuck-ScrumAlliance_CSM_Certificate

Pragmatic Thinking and Learning – Book Thoughts and Notes

// June 8th, 2011 // No Comments » // Get Things Done, non-development

Since graduating college I have mixed research of new technologies with research of being as productive as I can be. This includes development tools like IDE’s, good testing tools, and better pair programming techniques. But also I try to keep up with the popular Get Things Done (GTD) movement, most recently utilizing Spring Pad as well as better ways to exercise our brains and transform from novice to experts in our career fields (information I picked up from the book!). Pragmatic Thinking and Learning was a great book in introducing many new ideas to me as well as a great resource to start research on all those ideas.
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