Allen Holub. https://linkedIn.com/in/allenholub

I've been cross posting to "X" for the few people left who aren't nazis, but "X" just changed its APIs in a way that makes it impossible to do that automatically, so I'm done. If you'd like to follow me, I'm @allenholub.bsky.social (though it's rather quiet over there) and…

Has anybody switched from an iPhone over to Android (I'm looking at the soon-to-be-released Samsung Fold—which is perfect for my main use case: reading) while keeping the rest of the Apple ecosystem in place? I'm debating if the form factor is worth the hassle.

I keep reading about things like detailed up-front Sprint plans, about "failed" Sprints, about people panicking when a Sprint doesn't go according to plan, etc. There is no agility in that thinking, whatsoever. A Sprint is NOT a mini-waterfall with a detailed upfront plan that…

Some people seem to think from my posts that I'm an AI Luddite when it comes to programming. That's not true. I am, however, an AI-hype antagonist. AI, even an LLM, is an essential incipient technology that's here to stay, and we all need to learn to use it effectively. That…

Yes, it's true that an AI can slop together a prototype faster than we can. The question is whether or not that actually saves us time overall. It might if what we do now is throw away that quick-and-dirty prototype once it's served its purpose and then start over from scratch…

I'm copying this BlueSky post👇 for amplification [t.ly/lSbSF]. "The results surprised us: Developers thought they were 20% faster with AI tools, but they were actually 19% slower when they had access to AI than when they didn't." Far from a big enough sample set,…

I thought I'd throw this out as an example of the worst UX I have ever seen. All of us have occasionally wanted to rewatch a series on Amazon Prime Video, but have been frustrated that you can't just reset the series to "unwatched." Turns out you can, at least one season at a…

I've come to realize that one of my discomforts with AI at the program-creation level (as compared to small-snippet-of-a-program level) is that it's a fundamentally waterfall process that produces a black box solution. You need to come up with a highly detailed specification up…

Starting an Agile journey with a process framework like Scrum is like giving a bunch of poets a random set of carpentry tools and telling them to build a house. The result may not be what you expect. To have a good outcome, the workers first need to be carpenters. They'll learn…

So, we have a gaggle of geese, a murder of crows. What's a good collective noun for a random group of developers?

The only way to get an approximation of a correct bit of code from an AI is to ask the right questions (i.e., create the correct prompt). It seems to me that, as a profession, we have been struggling to ask the right questions for 80 years now. It's a hard problem. The issue has…

I just got an email from Goodreads telling me I had to verify my email address! The link on that page sent me to a page that sent me an email with a link on it! Around and around and around we go. You know, software quality would improve immeasurably if we just thought for 5…

My general rule is that if there's a certificate in it, it's not Agile. The very notion of a certificate is based on a faulty premise: that Agile is a fixed process, and if you learn and do that process, you will be Agile. That's just wrong. Certificates are nothing more than a…

Budgeting around projects is usually a bad idea. You'll be paying your engineers, even if they're sitting around playing canasta, so why not budget accordingly? Create a budget for the entire engineering department (fully loaded salary * some multiplier for expenses). There.…

I use the word "estimate" in the normally accepted way: making a rough prediction based on the analysis of a specification or design. What you describe is a wild-ass guess, not an estimate.

Just read that DoorDash is now rolling out drone delivery, for the moment, in the DFW area. Guess it's finally time that I go out and buy that shotgun 😄.

Most people who call me misguided, crazy, or an idiot when I point out that we don't need estimates are effectively saying, "Estimates are an essential part of the way I work." I don't doubt it. Perhaps you should reconsider the way you work? 😄 It's not as if there is only one…

80% of estimates are wrong in the best case. It's just math. Assuming you have good-faith estimates, the map of real-to-actual time forms a normal bell curve: 40% or so will be early, 40% will be late, and the top of the curve is within acceptable limits. This curve skews…

One of the most important concepts in Goldratt's "Throughput Accounting" is that inventory (something you've built or spent time on) that has not been released into the customer's hands) is a financial liability. It's money spent with no balancing revenue. Every bit of software…

I'd like your input. Would the following pricing model work, and if so, what metrics would fairly assess improvement? I've been pondering a value-based pricing model for longer-term consulting work. I'll provide guidance, training, etc., that results in considerably better…