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Smart Marketing for Engineers

Smart Marketing for Engineers

I saw Rebecca Geier talk at NI Week a few years ago. She was promoting her new book Smart Marketing to Engineers. I picked up a copy but didn’t get around to reading it until last year. I found it very insightful. The book starts off with some typical
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Philosophy of Coding: Ego

Philosophy of Coding: Ego

This is a continuation of my thoughts about philosophy and coding. It is an exploration of how the way we think about coding impacts the coding process and the code that we produce. This particular article is reflection upon a book i read a year or two ago called “Ego
4 min read
Book Review - Refactoring

Book Review - Refactoring

This is a book I read a few years ago. It is a very useful book. It’s considered a classic in software engineering literature because it introduced the idea of code smells and because it gave names to a bunch of common refactorings. Code smells are things that indicate
1 min read
Philosophy of Coding: Planning

Philosophy of Coding: Planning

In this continuation of my philosophy in coding series, I want to talk about planning and the way we think about planning. Start with the end in mind Many of you probably recognize this phrase from the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. In it, Steven Covey does an exercise
3 min read
February 2020 Webinar

February 2020 Webinar

Mock Objects February 26, 11:00am MT I want to verify that my code uses some other object correctly. Sometimes the code you are testing interacts with some other component.  Maybe it’s a database, a network connection, or a piece of hardware. This type of code can be really
1 min read
Fear and Motivation

Fear and Motivation

In a previous post, I mentioned how our mindset influences how we write code. Here an example of a mantra in this case from pop (or sci-fi) culture and how it can influence the way we think about designing software. Fear is the Mind Killer “I must not fear. Fear
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El Alquimista

El Alquimista

The Alchemist by Paul Cuehlo is a great book that I highly recommend. It is a great reminder to chase your dreams and ignore the naysayers. It also reminds us that having a dream is not the same as chasing it. If you have a dream get up and follow
1 min read
How to learn Computer Science

How to learn Computer Science

There is a group of us LabVIEW enthusiasts that get together in Boulder every couple of weeks for coffee. It’s pretty informal. It’s a chance for us to talk shop and catch up. Often someone will have some problem and together we will all brainstorm a solution. Recently
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Ego Is The Enemy And The Obstacle Is The Way

Ego Is The Enemy And The Obstacle Is The Way

As I wrote in a previous post about philosophy and coding I was not always a big fan of philosophy. I viewed it as an academic pursuit, a bunch of eggheads sitting around thinking about thinking. I never saw the practical value. That is until a read a pair of
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Goals for 2020

Goals for 2020

Mark Lund introduced me to a concept he called P.I.E. It was something he taught to all his team members. It was an acronym he used to remind them of what it takes to be successful. It has stuck with me because it is simple, easy to remember
4 min read
Automate the Boring Stuff With Python

Automate the Boring Stuff With Python

* NI recently added Python Integration to both LabVIEW and TestStand. * Danielle Jobe’s presentation at GDevCon last year and her hands-on at NI week this year were both on integrating LabVIEW and Python. * I had a job this year where there was potential for more work to be done but
2 min read
Unit Testing - Tips For Getting Started

Unit Testing - Tips For Getting Started

It’s a new year, so it is a good time to start planning and setting some goals for this year. If you are not currently using unit testing, starting to use it would be a great goal for the new year. People often struggle when starting to learn unit
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2019 Goal Setting Review

2019 Goal Setting Review

At the beginning of this year, I laid out some goals. Some of them I posted on here. Since it is the end of one year and the start of another, I wanted to just go back and review them and see where I ended up. That will help me
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Skills Pyramid

Skills Pyramid

This post is just really to get feedback about an idea I have had floating around in my head. As a coach/consultant I often come into groups that are already doing software development. In order to best serve them, I have to meet them where they are. Sometimes figuring
4 min read
Gitflow the easy way

Gitflow the easy way

You may have heard of Gitflow. It was first proposed here nearly 10 years ago. If you are like me, when I first saw it, I was a little overwhelmed. I certainly got the idea of making use of git’s powerful branching model, and not simply developing in master.
1 min read
Book Review Code Reviews 101

Book Review Code Reviews 101

I recently read this book on code reviews by Giuliana Carullo. I quite enjoyed it. I wrote a review on GoodReads and on the LabVIEW Champion’s book recommendations. I thought I would just post about it here to help get the word out some more about this great book.
1 min read
Managing Dependencies with DQMH Messages

Managing Dependencies with DQMH Messages

In one of his talks, Uncle Bob describes Software Engineering as the art of managing dependencies. This is something that a lot of new programmers have difficulty with. I often run into code written by beginners (and some not-so-beginnners) that has lots of circular dependencies. I also see a lot
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Data And Goliath

Data And Goliath

Nothing is private on the internet. Most of us understand this idea intellectually. We realize that we are being surveilled at some level, but most of us do not grasp the depth and breadth of that surveillance and what exactly it is used for and the implications. Bruce Schneier does
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Philosophy and Coding

Philosophy and Coding

“Is your value system producing the results you want?” My last post touched a little bit on philosophy. It talked about changing the way we think about unit testing. If you have watched my presentations on Refactoring or TDD, you’ll notice they also talk about changing the way we
4 min read
Age of Wonder

Age of Wonder

At GDevCon, Allen and I were talking about books we’d recently read and I was reminded about a book that I read last year called “Age of Wonder”. A friend had given it to me 5 years ago when I moved from Pittsburgh to Denver and it took a
2 min read
Caraya Review

Caraya Review

Caraya is a popular Unit Testing solution from JKI. Compared to JKI VI Tester, Caraya seems to be newer and better supported. In fact while conducting this review I found a small bug. I reported it and it was fixed within 24 hours. The Caraya paradigm is different from the
4 min read
December 2019 Webinar

December 2019 Webinar

Refactoring December 11 11:00am MT I need to add a feature but it is too hard. Refactoring can help! Refactoring is the art of taking existing code and waking it easier to understand and modify without actually changing it’s behavior. Why? Friction. Code is read more often than
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Insta Coverage

Insta Coverage

I first heard about InstaCoverage at NI Week 2018. I was part of a panel discussing Unit Testing. Peter Bokor gave a brief presentation right before the panel started on a new unit testing tool IncQuiry Labs had created called InstaCoverage. He really emphasized the code coverage calculation. This is
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