Mats Helander has written an excellent article on how to manage your domain model with some intelligent design trade-offs. It’s a lengthy article that even manages to introduce AOP as well. If you start reading it and wonder where it’s going, just carry on reading…it is written in an evolutionary style. Nice article, Mats! UPDATE: I have written the Java equivalent of the listing in Mats’ article and attached it. The AOP part uses SpringFramework 2.5 and AspectJ.
Category Archives: Software Development
Get Cooking with JRuby on Rails
Some of the companies that I interact claim that they will never switch to Ruby on Rails (or just plain ‘ol Ruby) for that matter. But with JRuby reaching 1.0 status (and currently on 1.0.2 with 1.1b1 already released) this changes the situation somewhat. Now it is possible to develop Rails apps and run it on your Java infrastructure that make use of native JDBC connections and a whole bunch more.
Pre-requisites
Since we want to run a Ruby on Rails app on a Java application server, we need to have a Java web container such as Tomcat, Jetty or Glassfish. In my case, I’ll be dropping the app into into a Glassfish domain. I guess that this should work just fine for Tomcat as well, but I have not verified this as yet.You also need a database and I will be using MySQL. If you are going to use another database, you need to make sure that the ActiveRecord-JDBC adapter has been developed for the DB. ActiveRecord is the ORM for Rails apps. Currently, there are ActiveRecord-JDBC adaptors for HypersonicSQL, Derby, MySQL and PostgreSQL. This is true for version 0.6 of ActiveRecord-JDBC. For other adapters, you will need to specify a proper JDBC URL in your application’s database configuration file, config/database.yml. This will make a lot more sense once you finish this exercise.All of the above (except or ActiveRecord, of course) should be stock standard goodies on any self-respecting Java development box. With this place, let’s get cooking.
Install JRuby
Download the JRuby bin distribution from the JRuby downloads page. At the time of writing this, 1.1b1 has been released. I am currently using the 1.02 release. Unzip/untar the file to somewhere convenient, add an environment variable JRUBY_HOME to point to the extracted directory, and add JRUBY_HOME/bin to your path.
/> cd ~/tools /> tar xzvf jruby-bin-1.02.tar.gz
/> export JRUBY_HOME=~/tools/jruby-1.0.2
/> export PATH=$PATH:$JRUBY_HOME/bin
You can verify your JRuby installation with:
/> jruby -v
ruby 1.8.5 (2007-11-01 rev 4810) [i386-jruby1.0.2]
You will notice two versions being reported. The first tells us that the ruby implementation is version 1.8.5 and the second tells us that it is running on jruby 1.0.2 on i386 platform. If you are new to ruby, then you need to know that there are different implementations of ruby, with the definitive one called MRI (Matz’s Ruby Implementation – Matz is the original author of ruby). JRuby is an attempt at a complete port of MRI to Java, aiming to eliminate all dependencies on C libraries. This is one of the significant points about JRuby: it is pure Java.
Install RubyGems
The closest Java equivalent of RubyGems is Maven or Ant+Ivy. Gems is a library and dependency management tool for ruby. On a native ruby install, you would have to download and install RubyGems, but JRuby already has RubyGems rolled in. Take a peek at JRUBY_HOME/bin and you should see an executable file called gem. So, nothing more to do here. What the heck, let’s verify that RubyGem is working.
/> jruby -S gem -v
0.9.4
If $JRUBY_HOME/bin is first in your path, then you can try /> gem -v. The -S tells jruby to run the command that follows from $JRUBY_HOME.For the ruby folk, you should realize that JRuby has rolled in RubyGems version 0.9.4 which is as fresh as it comes.The closest Java equivalent of RubyGems that I can think of is perhaps Maven or ANT+Ivy. But RubyGems takes the prize hands-down for its absolute simplicity. Install rake and Rails below and see what I mean.
Install Rake
Rake is a really good build tool for ruby (i.e a make for ruby, hence the goofy name). Once you start writing rake build scripts, you will wonder why one earth you thought ANT is nice. Anyway, let’s install rake.
/> jruby -S gem install rake
Install Rails
Now that you’ve seen the goodness of RubyGems, install Rails and the ActiveRecord for JDBC.
/> jruby -S gem install rails -v 1.2.6 -y --no-rdoc --no-ri
/> jruby -S gem install activerecord-jdbcmysql-adapter --include-dependencies
We are deliberately installing Rails version 1.2.6. Rails 2.0.1 was released in early December 2007 and I have not taken 2.0.1 for a drive under jruby yet. So, we’ll stick to version 1.2.6 which is still great.
Get MySQL Ready
We’re heading for the home straight with all this setup and configuration nonsense. Just a couple of things to do.
- Copy the MySQL JDBC driver to
$JRUBY_HOME/lib. - Create a MySQL database called
testapp_development. Rails apps require three databases; one for development (suffixed_development), one for unit testing (suffixed _test and is wiped clean with every test run) and one for production (suffixed _production). For this exercise, we will just use the development database with full rights given to the MySQL userrootwith no pasword.
Create the Rails App
Now the fun starts! Finally!The next command will create a directory with the same name as your application. So, change to a directory that will contain your rails applications. In my case, I keep my applications in ~/projects/jruby.
/> cd ~/projects/jruby
/> jruby -S rails testapp
Now you should have a directory called testapp. Let’s see if our app works. Yes, in rails-land, the app can already be fired up!
/> cd ~/projects/jruby/testapp
/> jruby script/server
This fires up webrick, a built in http server with ruby support built in. Just point your browser to http://0.0.0.0:3000 and you should see the Rails happy page. Kill webrick by hitting CTRL+C.
Link up to your database
Edit the file config/database.yml and change it as follows. Note that the line socket: /tmp/mysql.sock must be removed.
development:
adapter: mysql
database: testapp_development
username: root
password:
and
production:
adapter: mysql
database: testapp_development
username: root
password:
YML files are files that store configuration using YAML, which is a ” is a straightforward machine parsable data serialization format designed for human readability”.Now, let us inform the Rails app that we are using ActiveRecord-JDBC. Add the following to the file config/environment.rb just before the line Rails::Initializer.run do |config|.
if RUBY_PLATFORM =~ /java/
require 'rubygems'
RAILS_CONNECTION_ADAPTERS = %w(jdbc)
end
Create a table (the Rails way)
Sure, we can write a simple SQL script to create the table we want, but for fun, let’s do it using some Rails sugar. You can keep your app running in webrick and still do the this. Just open up another command or shell, switch to your project directory and get going. This is one of the nicest bits of Rails – you can do most things without a restart of your application server.
/> jruby script/generate migration AddGadgetsTable
This should have created a file db/migrate/001_add_gadgets_table.rb. Open this file and edit it as follows.
class AddGadgetsTable < ActiveRecord::Migration
def self.up
create_table :gadgets do |table|
table.column :name, :string, :null => false
table.column :color, :string, :null => false
end
end
def self.down
drop_table :gadgets
end
end
After saving the file, run the following command to create the table. Actually, we’re migrating our existing database to version 001! Database refactoring is a definite goal of Rails. It may not be perfect, but it is certainly better than maintaining a bunch of SQL files.
/> jruby -S rake db:migrate
Even if you’ve never seen ruby before, the above is certainly readable and you can easily understand that we intend to create a table called gadgets with two columns name and color. Actually, there are more than these two columns. Have a look at the table structure and check that a primary key colum id has been added as well.
Generate Scaffolding to maintain the table
I know, I know, I know! Code generation for anything but the most trivial of code can be dramatic for newbies but real code takes a lot more effort. The point here is just to get some Rails code up and running so that we can deploy it in a Java application server. So, please bear with me.
/> jruby script/generate scaffold gadget
Fire up webrick and visit the URL http://0.0.0.0:3000/gadgets. You should see a page with an empty list of gadgets and CRUD links.
Get ready to WAR
We need a few additional rake tasks to be able to build a WAR for our Rails application. The Goldspike plugin for Rails does just that. Let’s install the Goldspike plugin.
/> jruby script/plugin install
svn://rubyforge.org/var/svn/jruby-extras/trunk/rails-integration/plugins/goldspike
All that’s required is to add the WAR dependency on the MySQL driver. What’s great about Goldspike is that we can declare Maven dependencies. Great combination: RubyGems for Ruby-land and Maven for JRuby-land! Open the file vendor/plugins/goldspike/lib/war_config.rb and add the following line to the list of # default java libraries block.
add_java_library(maven_library ('mysql', 'mysql-connector-java', '5.0.5'))
Build the WAR
Now build the WAR using rake.
/> jruby -S rake war:standalone:create
If you look in the root of your application directory, there should be a file testapp.war
Drop it into Glassfish
Start your Glassfish domain, log in to the Glassfish admin console and click the Deploy Web Application link. Browse to the testapp directory and select the testapp.war file. If the app is not enabled, then select testapp, and click Enable.
See it in action
Point your browser to http://localhost:8080/testapp. You should see the Rails happy page, and http://localhost:8080/testapp/gadgets has the CRUD for our Gadget object.As easy as pie! And just as nice!
Treading into OSGi
On my current project, the number of JavaBeans / Spring Beans is becoming a bit too much to handle. What’s becoming quite painful is that there is a significant number of combinations and dependencies between beans, and between the various web applications that we are rolling out. Simply including a few “common” JARs in multiple WAR’s is not good enough anymore.Modularity and dynamic modules has always been painful in Java, mostly due to its ridiculous class loader. But OSGi seems to offer significant improvements in this area. The possibilities of having classes “plugging” into each other, resolving versions, etc., all dynamically is terribly exciting and, at the same time, frightening.Nevertheless, I will be venturing into OSGi land and will blog my experiences and hopefully provide a some simple HOWTO’s and tutorial style posts.
The optimistic concurrency gotcha
In my current project, I have a group of about 7 budding young developers none of whom have done any significant web development. This includes hitching up to a database and using object relational mappers. The one thing that always gets first-timers is stateless nature of the web. And the first solution they come up with is session based statefulness which eventually leads to a scalability bottleneck. The ripple effect of lack of state is that you need to have optimistic concurrency at the data access level. Now most of us just assume that our OR Mapper will solve that for us. And, yes, they do offer optimistic concurrency out of the box, be it with a version column or without. But Mats Helander makes a strong point that optimistic concurrency in most (maybe all) OR Mappers actually kicks for really short durations (milliseconds). In that case, you might as well be using good old fashioned database transactions. Mats suggests that a way to solve the problem is to store original values in the view. Check out Mats’ post and you’ll see why you should be storing, at the very least, your Hibernate version column/property on your view as well.
Not everything has to be Object Oriented
For some time now I have been wondering whether we have become completely obsessed with object oriented analysis and design. Hence my step into the world of functional programming. This led me first to Haskell and also Erlang. Interestingly, Niclas Nilsson has posted a thought provoking piece on InfoQ which asks whether Erlang is the next Java. Also, check out the comment on Scala which is now on my radar as well. Maybe functional languages will be the language for Web 3.0 where semantic interoperability and semantic correctness will be prominent.
Kung Fu Coding – Bruce Lee Style
Bruce Lee would have been one awesome software developer. Even better, I would have really loved him being my coach or mentor. I came a across a site with his views on Jeet Kun Do and was astounded by the relevance to agile software development. There’s definitely something in it for everyone involved in a software development effort: from requirements gathering and problem definition, writing code and unit tests, software architecture and mentorship to attitude and values. Check out the following (anything in italics is a Bruce Lee quote) …
On Understanding the Problem or Domain
One the traps we often fall into when facing a problem domain is that of exploding the problem into spaces that we never anticipated. Often we lose track of the original problem. Users are equally guilty of digressing from the problem space. But check out Bruce Lee’s approach:
In building a statue, a sculptor doesn’t keep adding clay to his subject. Actually, he keeps chiselling away at the unessentials until the truth of its creation is revealed without obstructions. Thus, contrary to other styles, being wise in Jeet Kune-Do doesn’t mean adding more; it means to minimize, in other words to hack away the unessential. It is not daily increase but daily decrease; hack away the unessential.
The key is to remain focused, “to hack away the unessential”, so you can get to the truth – the heart of the problem. Now our stories/use cases and release plans focus directly at the core of the problem. The truth is revealed and the starting point for test driven development is cut to the bone, it’s bare. You know exactly where to start and what you are solving.
Writing Clean Code (without smells)
So we have our problems defined, we have a some cool release plans and we start some early designs. Again, complex solutions ead to complex implementations. In agile software development we always aim for simplicity. This is exactly what Bruce Lee’s Jeet Kun Do is all about.
My movements are simple, direct and non-classical. The extraordinary part of it lies in its simplicity.
and
One must be free. Instead of complexity of form, there should be simplicity of expression.
I always coach teams by saying that “If you draw it, you must build it … otherwise don’t draw anything”. The simpler the solution that is architected, the higher the chance of success at the code level, implementation level, maintenance level, all levels. Bruce Lee maintains that “I always believe that the easy way is the right way.”
Avoiding Code Bloat
So we have our bare-bones problem with a simplist solution possible, and we start coding. How often, have you meandered off to explore some cool feature that your user will just love? But it doesn’t address the problem. And test driven development trys to address that. But here’s some very sobering advice from Mr. Lee:
Don’t indulge in any unnecessary, sophisticated moves. You’ll get clobbered if you do, and in a street fight you’ll have your shirt zipped off you.
From this moment on, the imagery of having my shirt ripped off and getting clobbered is enough to keep me on the right track. At a more basic level, it is the philosophy of suppressing your ego (the “cool” recognition factor) that is so essential in reducing code bloat.
Embracing Change
You crafted your solution, you are about to go live and a new requirement sneaks in. SCOPE CREEP!!! CAN’T DO THAT!!! In Extreme Programming, you are meant to embrace change and react to it in a manner that serves the interests of all stakeholders. However, you can only react if you are flexible, if your design is simple and fluid. Bruce Lee reckons that “One should not respond to circumstance with artificial and ‘wooden’ prearrangement.” If you stick to a rigid point of view, or react rigidly with pre-conceived intent, then that essential new requirement will never see the light of day. Be fluid and react accordingly. If your design is simple and fluid, if your code is simple and fluid, you can embrace the changes.
Use of Tools and Technologies
I often come across teams where the choice of tools, technologies, languages, frameworks, etc becomes an obsession. I have seen far too many architectures where a one-framework/language/tool-will-do approach just kills off an otherwise excellent piece of work. For these situations, remember “Any technique, however worthy and desirable, becomes a disease when the mind is obsessed with it.” There is always a another way to solve a problem, or produce the same result. Don’t become obsessed with your choices. There is nothing wrong with writing core backend code in Java or C# and front end code in Ruby where a dynamic language is, maybe, a better option.Even more appropriate: “Again let me remind you Jeet Kune Do is just a name used, a boat to get one across, and once across it is to be discarded and not to be carried on one’s back.” The way I see it is that once you’ve used something, done some good, there’s no reason to be burdened by it. If your choices have served their purpose then accept that, appreciate it and move on…don’t force the same fit everytime.
Coaching Teams
So you squeezed in the new requirement and you have some happy users. You decide to build your team and be the head-geek … the ARCHITECT guy!! Now your responsibilities change, you have to guide, mentor and help the unenlightented so they too can be fluid. You impose your way on a few newbies, you tell them what patterns they should use and what algorithms where wrong choices. And you have a mutiny. Why? Because, according to Bruce Lee:
Each one of us is different and each one of us should be taught the correct form. By correct form I mean the most useful techniques the person is inclined toward. Find his ability and then develop these techniques.
I have so often made the mistake of leading people into my way of thinking, my way of coding, my way of writing and the end result is always that the work produced is never up to MY standard. But if I take Bruce’s idea of teaching the useful techniques, and letting a newbie develop their own style, their own identity which will reflect their individuality in their creations, then I have helped a person grow. There is no other way.At the same time, you have to watch for classical symptoms in your team. Check this out:
Too much horsing around with unrealistic stances and classic forms and rituals is just too artificial and mechanical, and doesn’t really prepare the student for actual combat. A guy could get clobbered while getting into this classical mess. Classical methods like these, which I consider a form of paralysis, only solidify and constrain what was once fluid. Their practitioners are merely blindly rehearsing routines and stunts that will lead nowhere.
This is serious stuff. I often refer to this as “cut ‘n paste” coding from Google search results. Blindly hacking away old code is not code reuse, it just creates a maintenance nightmare. Software developers need to understand that the patterns and techniques that they use are only relevant in particular circumstances and contexts. Even if the pattern is relevant to solving the problem, it may be a poor choice because of other architectural considerations.Another word of advice from The Legend on coaching people:
A teacher must never impose this student to fit his favourite pattern; a good teacher functions as a pointer, exposing his student’s vulnerability (and) causing him to explore both internally and finally integrating himself with his being.
Now this is some serious advice which I need to heed. We often lapse into a one-way-for-all approach to coaching. Is this not a symptom of our educational methods: the exclusion of individuality for the sake of mass education? The cookie cutter approach of modern schooling – Another Brick in the Wall, Pink Floyd style.
It’s all about attitude
I’m not even going to elaborate on this. Just read the following and let it rest with you, then start Kung Fu Coding … Bruce Lee style.
Do not be tense, just be ready, not thinking but not dreaming, not being set but being flexible. It is being “wholly” and quietly alive, aware and alert, ready for whatever may come.When one has reached maturity in the art, one will have a formless form. It is like ice dissolving in water. When one has no form, one can be all forms; when one has no style, he can fit in with any style.Finally, a Jeet Kune Do man who says Jeet Kune Do is exclusively Jeet Kune Do is simply not with it. He is still hung up on his self-closing resistance, in this case anchored down to reactionary pattern, and naturally is still bound by another modified pattern and can move within its limits. He has not digested the simple fact that truth exists outside all molds; pattern and awareness is never exclusive.
Technical Debt Does Not Exist
Metaphors may be a good way of getting to grips with a new domain. It allows you to imagine the behavior of something that you don’t quite understand (yet) in terms of something with which you are quite familiar. That’s were it should stop. I hate metaphors that extend beyond their purpose. Once I have a good enough understanding, I drop the metaphor. My reason is simple. Metaphors force me to do a lot of energy sapping context switching.
Technical debt is one of those metaphors that have been extended so far, that it is believed by many to be something tangible. Let’s get real here: Technical debt does not exist. It is just a metaphor for us to realise that our code base may cost us more money than it should, and that is a future view. Sometimes our metaphors become euphemisms, and then it is dangerous. When it comes to technical debt, the less I think of code problems as debt the more I am able to face the problems head on.
Ironically, I did a talk recently on dealing with technical debt. My fundamental position is simple. Either your code base has things that exist as a result of broken principles or it does not. The more principles you break, the more potential problems you have in your code. It is not a problem right now, but it may be a problem in the future. This future can be a minute away when I run my next test or a year away. If the future is infinitely far away, then it is not a problem at all.
My first prize is to not break principles, so I don’t create potential problems. My second prize is to deal with real problems and just leave the potential problems for the future.
(Warning: I’m drifting into my enlightenment self-reflection, so feel free to stop reading now.)
If I am part of the exploration that is looking for a solution (living in the moment and not outside it as an observer), then I should be aware of principles that I am breaking and I should change course immediately. If I am part of the exploration that is dealing with the potential problem that is now a real problem, than I need to understand the principle that was broken and fix the problem by restoring the principle. Restoring the principle could mean going on a search for the right solution to the original problem, not just trying to fix the problem that is a result of breaking a principle. This problem that broke the principle may just be the wrong solution that we thought was the right solution because we ignored our principles in the first place.
Hmmm, that’s an interesting thought. Karen Greaves asked me if a re-write can be justified and I mumbled something about technology, etc. What tripe! Now I think I’ve just reflected on when a rewrite is justified. When refactoring will not fix the broken principle, then the right solution was never discovered in the first instance. That is also what I mean when I say that clean code is necessary by not sufficient. At factor10, we call this a radical makeover. Radical makeovers are a viable way of getting rid of real problems, and restoring principles.
Heck! This blog post is less about technical debt metaphors than I thought. Oh well, the ride on this journey never stops.
By the way, a huge thank you to Steve for helping me realise that all problems come from breaking principles, in code and in life.
Reflections on the JCSE Agile and Architecture Talk
It was really good to be part of a very topical subject at the JCSE Architecture Forum last night. While these discussion are so valuable, the things that surface can only be glossed over, largely because of time constraints. I end up feeling a very satisfied and energised but a part of me feels a bit hollow.
So here are some of the things that surfaced at the Forum, and my narrow, unworldly opinion on each (i.e. I’m just trying to fill that hollow feeling).
When we talk about architecture, we need to define what we mean by architecture?
In my talk it was a very simple view of architecture which, thinking back, I should have disclosed very early. I am now applying from Kent Beck who talks about mutually beneficial relationships. So I think of architecture as the mutually beneficial relationship between two or more things. So what is a thing? It could be lines code in a method, methods in a class, classes in namespace, namespaces in code base, binaries in an application server, application servers in a cluster, … see where I am going? Architecture is about creating beneficial relationships, and the 5 things I discussed are based on this view. If you don’t know anything about the things, then you cannot create beneficial relationships. From an agile perspective, the beneficial relationship that you create should only be beneficial based on your knowledge right now. Tomorrow your knowledge changes, so the relationship may not be as beneficial as yesterday. Time to change.
Building infrastructural architecture independently of functional requirements…
I am not convinced of the benefit of this approach. In my limited experience, every business need defines the constraints or needs of the infrastructural architecture. I find it hard to find the point of departure, yet there is a school of thought that suggests that function is orthogonal to the architecture. Perhaps I just don’t understand this. However from an agile perspective, I want to release early and there are many constraints on infrastructure from the business (for example, administrative processes like procurement of hardware). I like to understand what these are early on, reach agreement on what we can release at the earliest and design accordingly. Perhaps the first release is on lightweight infrastructure and that means we “limit” scalability. So, I don’t design for beyond what I know is real.
Model Driven Architecture …
My view is more philosophical and abstract. What is a model? For me, a model is something intangible. It is a way we understand something. But we represent our models in many ways. Through words in written or spoken conversation, in unstructured pictures, in structured notation like UML, even code is a representation of a model.
What do we mean by driven? I view it as a something that takes an input that produces an output. In this case, we take an input, the model, and produce an output, an architecture. So, I take an understanding of problem and use that to derive an architecture. So, that’s nothing new here. However, I don’t like to confuse driving out an architecture from a representation of the model. That’s different. Now we are going beyond thought processes into mechanical processes. Then the challenge is about how to apply the feedback to the representation of the model – and that is what will make you agile. Too much for my small brain.
Plumbing …
Yup, we do too much hand crafted plumbing! It’s something that we have been working on for a long, long time. I think convention over configuration, dependency inversion, meta-programming are all attempts at addressing this problem. Some early success that I have experienced is on taking a polyglot approach. I am not talking about mixing general purpose languages on one runtime only. I am also including domain specific languages. I’ve had some early success where using DSL to describe functional intentions and then generating a large portion of the plumbing. Where I’ve suffered is when I mix concepts from different domains. There is the domain of plumbing and the domain of the business. Whenever I’ve mixed the two, it pains later rather than sooner. Right now, the only way I’ve had some success is with aspect orientation and meta-programming.
@StatelessSessionBean …
Chris Naidoo is right. That thing called J2EE and subsequent versions is just horribly broken. It’s broken encapsulation and a whole lot more. The fact that we now must use an annotation and not implement an interface is immaterial. Both result in the same pain – mixed concepts (see plumbing above). Annotations should be specific to the business such as @RecalculateCostsOnRerouteOfCargo can be used as an interception point for injecting a rule on a class or method.
I would go even further and say that the POJO JavaBean specification is also broken. Why on earth must I have a no-argument constructor and accessors and mutators.
Last thoughts …
I may have missed some of the other discussions but these are the ones that I woke up with this morning. In general, my observation is that we need to be very concrete very early if we want to be agile, even in architecture.
Coding for Enlightenment
Jimmy Nilsson asked me in an email a few days ago “How’s life?”. I’m sure it was just a regular, friendly question, but I gave him a “life” answer. It was not spontaneous but something that has been brooding in me for a while. It is about things that I have been trying to do for a long time.
Here’s a few splintered thoughts from my email exchange.
- Enlightened, for me, is about happiness that comes from being content; unenlightened is just trying to be happy.
- There are many solutions for every problem, whether I am aware of them or not; and the problem has already chosen the best solution, but I have not found it yet.
- Code from my heart because I should trust myself first.
- Be part of the exploration, not just an observer.
- This moment is more important than trying to figure out how it impacts the future, because I can deal with the future in that future moment.
- Passion is constant whether I succeed or fail.
- Let the project plan me, by bending to suit the situation not and not bending the situation to suit me.
- The code I write knows everything, because every line of code has an impact on someone else or some other piece of code.
Now I’ve decided to actively explore why I write code, or why I wish to continue doing what I am doing. I am not sure what I will uncover in this exploration, but I know that it will be very personal. I don’t even know if it will be worth sharing, that’s why I am sharing so early. It just felt right.
I think it will be really tough, but I take solace from my 9 year old son who told his 6 year old sister “Getting hurt is part of playing”.
PS: I don’t think Jimmy will ever ask me a “How’s life?” question again 🙂
Testing is just a laborious pain in the rear
I thoroughly enjoyed Karen Greave’s talk on Agile Testing. She had just about 100% coverage (pun intended, groan). Yet, testing is really a pain in the rear. Testing is execution, and Karen was dead-on right, that automation is the path to follow. Computers are very good at testing. A computer does what it is programmed to do, and it can test the way it was programmed to test. It’s simple: if testing is your constraint, move that constraint away from testing by automating.
Now, you have to deal with the constraint that shifted to the next point: test authoring. While testing (i.e. execution) is just a passive, laborious effort, test authoring is a very creative, active exercise. It is actually an exercise in confirming a shared, common understanding. Kristin Nygard said “To program is to understand” and test authoring is a programming exercise. That’s why outside-in, behavior driven development style scenarios are actually tests, coded in a human language. The act of authoring a scenario proves your understanding and the expected working of the software.
This is why I separate test execution (passive) from test authoring (active). And Karen said that early feedback is good (right again), which is why I author my tests very early. I’m extreme about this. I test first.
f3yourmind 