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Return to Blogging

For the last couple of years, I’ve been running a startup to develop an app (Upkeepr) and learning many lessons along the way, which I’ve been thinking about sharing here. Also, I’ve immersed myself in Agile theory again by:

  • Taking the Scrum.org Professional Scrum Master PSM I and PSM II courses taught by Improving
  • Studying for the PSM assessments (and passing)
  • Reading
  • Applying to be a Professional Scrum Trainer (PST) and reflecting on my love of teaching

The two big books that have me thinking deeply at the moment are:

As has always been the case in my blogging, my intended audience is both the public at large who may be interested in my musings on Agility, product development, or technology, and my future self, when I’ve forgotten the clarity of thought I had at some moment or want to continue a train of thought with the next step. Plus, writing often forces me to frame my thoughts and structure ideas into something consumable by others. So maybe this will make me a better Agilist, leader, and entrepreneur along the way.

So, here goes!

Windows Azure Developer Knowledge

This seems like a great list and didn’t want to lose track of it, so thought I would post it here.

7217-windows-azure-logo-v_6556ef52Top 10 things to deepen your already existing knowledge on Windows Azure:

1. Windows Azure Training Kit: A comprehensive set of resources covering PaaS and IaaS workloads, including presentations, hands-on-labs, demos, and scripts so that you and your team may learn and re-deliver information to your customers about Windows Azure.

2. Windows Azure Track: A comprehensive set of online trainings broken down by role (sales, pre-sales, architect, developer)

3. Moving Applications to the Cloud: Provides an introduction to Windows Azure and discusses the cost model and application life cycle management for cloud-based applications, and describes how to migrate an existing ASP.NET application to the cloud.

4. Developing Applications for the Cloud: Discusses the design considerations and implementation details of applications that are designed from the beginning to run in the cloud.

5. Building Hybrid Applications on Windows Azure: Covers many topics related to architecting applications which rely on cloud AND on-premise technology (for example, an application that contains some components or features that cannot be located in the cloud, such as third-party services or sensitive data that must be maintained onsite under specialist control).

6. Building Elastic and Resilient Cloud Applications: Self-explanatory description.

7. A Guide to Claims-Based Identity and Access Control: Self-explanatory description.

8. Cloud Ninja: A comprehensive code sample on codeplex developed to demonstrate the design and implementation of key features in Windows Azure with emphasis on metering and automated scaling.

9. Fabrikam Shipping: Provides an in depth coverage of Identity Federation for multi-tenant applications. This is recommended to be reviewed in addition to Cloud Ninja.

10. Windows Azure Forums: An online community of very responsive Azure  users who help each other out with common questions, code samples, and other general technical support.

WinRAR–Do the developers use their own product?

I’m starting a recurring topic here called “Do the developers use their own product?” because I keep seeing “features” of products that make me think that those who develop a product don’t use it.  They can’t or they would fix this crap.  Here’s a feature that’s been frustrating me for years.

The WinRAR progress bar is wrong.  It’s status doesn’t make any sense if you have a multi-segment RAR file.  It often only shows status of the first segment.  Here’s an example of a file being reconstructed from 10 segments.

image

See how the progress bar says it should be finished?  Well, it should show about 30% because it’s on the 5th out of 16 segments.  Why has it been like this for years and many versions?  Don’t the developers and product owners of this product use it themselves?