Adventures of an aspiring agile developer in a not-quite agile world
One step past Assert.Throws<>
If you’re not using xUnit (and you should be), at least consider adopting the practices they have...
Date: 07/29/2008
Can you take the single responsibility principle too far?
This morning, I had a conversation with a colleague of mine who has recently started using EDD about...
Date: 03/28/2008
Gatineau Beta upgrade goes live!
The main reason for my lack of blogs posts recently has been the final push to get Gatineau...
Date: 03/04/2008
XAML : XAMLPad :: LINQ : ?
One of my teammates just sent a link to LINQPad, a small application written by the authors of C#...
Date: 11/19/2007
Now you can fool your xUnit tests
Back in the 'early days' of xUnit, I posted an example of how to use the BeforeAfterTestAttribute to...
Date: 11/12/2007
Task Parallel Library goes public
If you're interested in taking advantage of multiple processors and code in .NET with a minimal...
Date: 10/18/2007
The cool stuff is starting to surface (introducing Graffiti)
It's been tough not being able to write about anything that we work on here in Dublin, but slowly...
Date: 10/18/2007
Come join us!
Our team here in Dublin has launched a recruiting site at https://www.joinmicrosofteurope.com/. It's...
Date: 10/16/2007
ReSharper and xUnit.net
Those of you who have switched over to xUnit.Net may have a received a nasty surprise with the 'type...
Date: 10/03/2007
Weaving with xUnit.net
There has been mixed reaction to the removal of [SetUp] and [TearDown] in xUnit.net. Personally, I...
Date: 09/27/2007
Faking out [PrincipalPermission]
Depending on how your unit tests are setup, you may not be running as the proper user and won't have...
Date: 09/26/2007
xUnit.net goes live!
NUnit is dead! Long live xUnit.net! There are several cool features, including aspect-like...
Date: 09/21/2007
Dropping multiple tables in SQL Server 2005
I'm currently working on a project that has a Cache database that stores query results, and so...
Date: 09/19/2007
The one where Toby finds a dependency injection container
Toby is less than happy. Due to some unforeseen circumstances, he recently lost all the code he'd...
Date: 09/10/2007
Toby and the loss of domain knowledge
One morning, as Toby is drinking his cup of hot water, a thought strikes him - did the acceptance...
Date: 09/02/2007
Toby and the mega-class deletion
So it's become obvious that having a large, all-encompassing EDMSystem class was probably not the...
Date: 09/01/2007
Toby and the step backwards
Being passionate about anything can have its drawbacks; in my zeal to give inside-out development a...
Date: 09/01/2007
Toby and the complete stab in the dark
During my rather long wait for the plane in Dublin this morning, I had the opportunity to revisit...
Date: 08/30/2007
Trying out Behave#
One of the neat things I saw at the Agile conference was a short demo of RSpec and RBehave....
Date: 08/30/2007
Agile 2007 - Design sense
Yesterday afternoon I attended a workshop held by Michael Feathers and Emmanuel Gaillot called...
Date: 08/17/2007
Words I learned at Agile 2007
Agilitization Robustification Administrivia
Date: 08/17/2007
Agile 2007 - Metaprogramming in Ruby
This morning's I went to a session called 'Ruby's Secret Sauce: Metaprogramming'. It was interactive...
Date: 08/15/2007
Agile 2007 - Day two
This morning was Paul King's presentation on 'Agile Developer Practices for Dynamic Languages.'...
Date: 08/14/2007
Agile 2007 - Shout Kata
Yesterday afternoon I attended Emmanuel Gaillot's 'Shout Kata' session - programming a full...
Date: 08/14/2007
The way of Testivus
I apologise for the lack of updates on Tony's adventures—we have been busy doing integration work...
Date: 08/09/2007
The mess that mocks can make
Aside: I guess this post is really about mock frameworks rather than mocks, but I didn't want to...
Date: 07/13/2007
Bubble Factory Silverlight game
Vincent Vergonjeanne, an extremely smart developer who used to code games for mobile devices in a...
Date: 07/12/2007
Toby's perfect day
I glossed over an important point at the end of my last post when estimating the user stories. Toby...
Date: 06/21/2007
A small mix-up
A colleague of mine was reading through Toby's adventures and asked why, in the name of all that is...
Date: 06/21/2007
Toby goes on vacation
Well, actually I'm going on vacation :) The adventures of Toby will continue in about two weeks when...
Date: 06/06/2007
+1 to the Developer Express guys
I've been a happy user of Refactor! Pro for a little while now, and recently installed the newest...
Date: 06/06/2007
Toby and the user stories
With the end of his first week rapidly approaching, Toby resolves to come up with some sort of...
Date: 06/06/2007
Windows Live Writer Beta 2 available
A nice update to a very solid little application was released a few days ago. You can grab the...
Date: 06/05/2007
Toby's first few days
During his brief 'vacation' from work, Toby got a chance to do some reading and is psyched to try...
Date: 06/05/2007
Toby and the company's EDM
Once upon a time, there was a man named Joe who worked as a document controller for a large...
Date: 06/05/2007
Treading on thin ice
I wasn't sure if I should comment on this, but the power of Agile and good programming compel me. I...
Date: 06/02/2007
They're at it again
Two of the smartest guys I know, Brad and Scott, are making some pretty cool changes to...
Date: 06/02/2007
It's easier to be critical than correct
If you want to make a name for yourself these days in the blog-o-sphere, there's a simple formula:...
Date: 05/28/2007
Extension methods are gonna be fun!
So I've had a (very) small amount of time to play around with Orcas and Silverlight, but some of the...
Date: 05/23/2007
I guess I'm in the OO guild
Actually, I was in <Lithe> for a while, but I haven't played WoW in a good long time. I just...
Date: 05/09/2007
It's how you use the medium
Every few years someone rails against PowerPoint, but of course what they're really complaining...
Date: 04/10/2007
EE/TwC presentation
Last Tuesday I gave a presentation for the Engineering Excellence / Trustworty Computing day here in...
Date: 04/10/2007
Unit testing moving to VS Pro!
Due to popular demand, the unit testing features normally found only in Visual Studio Team System...
Date: 03/28/2007
The journey to CeBIT
You would think that flying from Dublin to Hanover would be a simple thing. After all, you can get...
Date: 03/27/2007
Builders and factories and objects, oh my!
(I wrote this about three weeks ago and never got a chance to post it. Luckily there's a small lull...
Date: 03/13/2007
Spreading the word far and wide
On Feb. 7th, we had a onsite technical university event here at the EPDC 5 building in Dublin. I was...
Date: 03/12/2007
The occasional difficulty with being a proper developer
As children, we're often taught the "proper" way to do a task. Usually the advice is promptly...
Date: 02/06/2007
Keyboard Layout Creator 1.4
The man of a thousand Unicode characters, Michael Kaplan, recently blogged about the new version of...
Date: 02/01/2007
Well it's almost the word for 'cake'
Looks like one of our planners, Ian, has posted a bit of information on Gatineau, the project my...
Date: 01/12/2007