Caleb Jenkins | Developing UX - Latest Comments

Re: Agile .NET Conference in Dallas this month

Stephen Britz — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 12:52:33 -0000

See you there, Mr. Man.

Re: Using RhinoMocks to Test Model View Presenter Events with Lambdas and VB / C#

Kalli — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 06:04:08 -0000

Thanks very much! (I have not found any other site where show this...)

Re: Get my first book… Real World .NET, C#, and Silverlight

Jose Luis Manners — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 17:04:22 -0000

congrats Caleb !

Re: Tulsa Tech Fest – October 7th – Top 3 reasons you should go!

Jay Smith — Sun, 25 Sep 2011 18:45:57 -0000

Caleb, thanks for putting the spotlight on the Community Leadership Town Hall. I really enjoy hosting them and the learning all that the hard working community leaders have to share.

Re: Windows Phone 7 Development with Silverlight

Alex — Wed, 21 Sep 2011 06:23:42 -0000

"Silverlight", "windows phone 7" and "world domination"... those words together don't fit :)

Re: Using RhinoMocks to Test Model View Presenter Events with Lambdas and VB / C#

Jonathan Sewell — Mon, 05 Sep 2011 05:08:29 -0000

Having to convert a project from C# to VB.NET and that mock event raising code had me stuck. Thanks for this post!

Re: 3 Fundamentals for Building Community

Robert Stackhouse — Mon, 15 Aug 2011 10:24:35 -0000

Meeting regularly isn't usually an issue (especially with vendor and speaker bureau supported groups). It needs to be done, but it isn't the chief problem. There needs to be someone to fill in for the organizer if he or she is sick or unable to convene a meeting for some other reason. This is only going to happen if you get 3.

In my experience, 2 and 3 (especially 3) are the hardest. I think part of the problem is the arrangement of most meeting spaces.

As you mentioned, round tables (having an actual round table or at least being able to arrange chairs in a circle) is a far better setup for getting people to chime in than having a speaker at a lectern looking out into an audience. We are trained in school to be quiet when we're in the audience.

Creating conversation is much more difficult than hosting a monologue. You have to really get to know people. You need them to be comfortable enough with you to relax and share their challenges with you. Most of this has to be done out of band, which is difficult with an already cramped schedule.

Beyond the informational, I don't have much faith in "talks". They may inform, but they usually don't educate.I prefer workshops for this reason. It is my feeling that people don't like raising their hand if they are going to have to speak to everyone in the room. Call it a fear of looking dumb held over from our grade school days.

I can't tell you how many times I've gotten a reply to a list serve post off-list (even when the "Reply-To" field is the email address of the list).

I was at my current job for about 4 months before a co-worker of mine started asking me questions.

I think people need to know that you (or anyone else for that matter) aren't going to make them feel dumb for asking a question in the first place.

I've said once or twice I think my greatest facility to my community is that I'm not afraid of looking foolish in looking for an answer on an email list.

Re: a new word: Dislocated

Robert Stackhouse — Mon, 15 Aug 2011 10:00:35 -0000

I think the term "dislocation" carries with it a very negative (as in "Ow! That hurts!") connotation with it.

I think the problem lies in convincing people that think distributed development (both geographical and chronological) is a good thing otherwise. The problem their is that you are asking someone to change their behavior. In order to do this successfully, you have to have the confidence of the person you are asking to change.

Making sweeping statements that "distributed is bad"—though in my experience you are correct—will just label you a zealot or a salesman in the mind of someone who doesn't want to hear what you are saying, which in turn makes it easier for you to dismiss.

Without changing their environment (asking people in their workplace to change), going distributed my be the best solution—in their view.

People tend to take the easy path when they are only looking out for their own hides.

"Agile is hard.It’s tough! Requires a lot of discipline.And thinking. Not everyone’s into this kind of stuﬀ."
–http://agilewarrior.files.word...

In order to become better business people, we've got to become better people. Altering your vocabulary is—at best—a small part of the solution.

Our culture (at a national level) fights what you and I know to be the "best" way to do things. If we get rid of the cultural evils, the business problems will come out in the wash.

Litigation and blame-fixing ought to be the first things to go.

Pressure and fear absolutely kill creativity. To do things better, people need to know they have the support of their organization; rather than being worried about whether or not this action is going to get them hung out to dry. Loyalty is a two way street.

Re: a new word: Dislocated

Ben Judy — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 08:35:18 -0000

Sounds right to me. I have yet to be a part of an Agile team that (in my opinion) adequately overcame the significant communication challenges of being dislocated. Software gets built, but the quality of the product suffers, and it takes longer.

Now, just because I haven't experienced it doesn't mean it can't happen. But in the corporate environments I've worked in, I don't think the companies have fully assessed the impact of being dislocated. It should be fairly easy to run some A/B comparisons and measure the cost vs. benefit. I suspect in many cases the money saved by fracturing a team across continents is largely offset by the reduction in product quality and the loss of time and productivity.

I imagine it would take three things to get it right: very strong leadership; the right kinds of communication tools; and a team with a pervasive, persevering devotion to collaboration.

Re: a new word: Dislocated

CuriousAgilist — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 08:34:01 -0000

So which Trekky solution to "dislocation" will research provide first: the "Holodeck" or the "the transporter"? My money is on a minimally-viable-product version of a Holodeck. While video conferencing or Skype may be the best we can today (within a limited budget) I don't think it passes the minimally-viable-product test.

Re: Speaking at the Dallas Tech Fest!

Anitha — Tue, 19 Jul 2011 14:41:09 -0000

We would like to get started with TDD, since its not being implemented full-fledged. My vote is for "
Coding Naked – Practical steps to moving towards & embracing TDD".

Re: Taming the Legacy Code Beast

Caleb Jenkins — Mon, 18 Jul 2011 12:22:35 -0000

Hey Robert - Thanks! I have not looked st Slidecast, but I do have a goal of capturing a couple of talks this year with Camtasia and getting those posted. Thanks for the encouragement to keep that goal in sight!

Re: Taming the Legacy Code Beast

Robert Stackhouse — Mon, 18 Jul 2011 08:49:32 -0000

I appreciate the fact that you share your slides on slideshare. Have you ever tried their slidecast feature? I'm really more interested in what you have to say than looking at your slides.

Re: Time for a blog refresh

Robert Stackhouse — Wed, 06 Jul 2011 10:06:45 -0000

It seems a little too vanilla. For someone with your personality, or for a UX person in general, the theme should really say, "This is Caleb Jenkins site." The design isn't evocative. It isn't playful. It doesn't make me think, "Hey Caleb, good to see you again." You aren't wearing your site.

There is also a lot of clutter down the right. Are all the badges really necessary? Could those just go hide on your "About" page? Personally, I don't care that you're a MVP (that moniker doesn't carry a lot of weight with me, but that's another conversation). Your writing speaks for itself. Anyone can read your blog and say, "That Caleb Jenkins, he knows his stuff." I would also put the SlideShare thing-a-ma-jig at the top rather than at the bottom.The main page looks more like a commercial website than a blog, but that may be what you are going for. Maybe a "Top Five" box with a tab for each of the five would be better? I had to scroll 3/4 down the page to find this post once on the main page, and it is your 3rd most recent.

The readability might be improved, but I don't recall readability being a problem with the old theme.What is your goal in a redesign? To aid in navigation? You may be helping your reader find your most visited content, but you are hiding your new stuff under a basket. Maybe this is applicable here: http://www.alistapart.com/arti...

I don't mean to sound harsh, but I think you can do better.Kudos on trying out a new theme. I've been rather lax in that department.

Re: 10 practices that every developer needs to start right now

Robert Stackhouse — Fri, 17 Jun 2011 10:43:57 -0000

Perhaps you should put a static link up to this post in your site nav? Took me a while to find it this time.

Re: Incredible Pizza

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Re: Improving Elsewhere – this is my last week with Improving Enterprises

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Re: 3 Reasons Microsoft Needs an Open Source Officer

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Re: Tweaking my site

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Re: Tips for presenting… from SlideShare

Robert Stackhouse — Wed, 20 Apr 2011 11:17:37 -0000

The spelling fairy thinks you mean "Than[k] you."

For the record, I just call it like I see it. You're welcome anyway. ;)

Re: Help a brother out – It will be good for you

Caleb Jenkins — Mon, 11 Apr 2011 11:13:01 -0000

Robert - We had people in our class that traveled from New Jersey, Atlanta, Florida, Montana, Chicago, Detoit, Tulsa, Houston, OK City... No matter how long that 3 hour drive from College Station to Dallas takes, I'd highly reccomend the Pathways Core Training. Seriously, completely worth it.

I'd be happy to talk with you in more depth if you are interested and serious about making your life better, call me any time. Also, note: there is nothing religious about Pathways, they are a secular organization. I think of them as teaching you how to be a better you. If you are a spiritual person, then that get's better too, but that is not the focus.

Re: Help a brother out – It will be good for you

Robert Stackhouse — Mon, 11 Apr 2011 10:34:10 -0000

Don't beat yourself up for what you didn't know in the past. It doesn't help anyone and is a waste of time and energy.

I'm glad you were able to find something that helped you to make what seems like a positive life change that you are happy about.

Wish I could find a secular group that did something like this. Hard bet in College Station, Texas though :(.

Re: 10 practices that every developer needs to start right now

Robert Stackhouse — Mon, 11 Apr 2011 10:28:53 -0000

Nevermind: http://www.slideshare.net/cale... .

Guess blog sidebars can be effective after all.

Re: 10 practices that every developer needs to start right now

Robert Stackhouse — Mon, 11 Apr 2011 10:25:25 -0000

Didn't you do a talk on this in Houston recently?

Could you throw your slides up on Slideshare or Presi and embed them on this post?

Re: SOLID: Software that works.

Robert Stackhouse — Wed, 16 Mar 2011 10:53:35 -0000

Trying to do DI without an IoC container would be pure madness.

What I meant to say was that, if we weren't already doing DI (with a framework as you put it), the learning curve is so steep that I'm not sure we'd have been able to implement it. The theory is simple. It's the implementation that's a PITA.

Configuring containers (or ORMs for that matter), especially in XML is a huge pain in the head. Fluent interfaces will at the very least break sometimes at compile time letting you know that since you've updated a class/constructor/property/method definition you also need to update your IoC configuration.

I haven't been doing web stuff for a while now, but when I was, it felt like I spent half my life in config files. Yikes! Aren't the Alt.Net/Castle worshipers supposed to prefer convention over configuration? What happened to that idea?