Hi all -   One new thing we're doing with this sprint is adding an "ideal line" to our scrum burndown chart.  This helps us see where we're at with respect to our plans, and is nicer than using an imaginary line.  Because in Scrum we use 30 calendar days, our chart spans weekends, and the ideal line is therefore a big jagged...

Greetings all –   Well, our Product Owner got the product backlog ready in time for the first sprint planning meeting, where we pick the product backlog items we’ll use for the sprint.  This planning meeting happened yesterday & went pretty smoothly, and everyone seems to feel pretty good about the product backlog items...

Greetings all -   Well, next week we’re going to start sprint 5.  We had a couple of weeks between the end of sprint 4 & the start of sprint 5, mainly since we had some distractions like an office move and a whole-team offsite fixing bugs for the main MSBuild product.   One of the troubling phenomena we’ve run into is...

Well, my dear readers, I’m pleased to report that we got things pulled together for sprint 4 and are on track to complete it successfully today, barring unforeseen complications.   One of the problems we’ve had is that our overarching mission timeline is basically impossible, and most of us on the effort have known it, either...

Dear Readers -   Please be advised that my blog is moving to http://weblogs.asp.net/cflaat (but I don't have any content there yet).  See you there soon. Chris  

Greetings, all!  My apologies again for doing such a bad job of keeping you up to date.  I have been absorbed with my duties as interim development manager for our team, and have not had much time to delve into the various technical things going on in the areas I’m still nominally dev lead for.  (Fortunately, I have great sub-leads...

Hi all -   So, as I mentioned in an earlier blog entry, Alex Kipman & Rajeev Goel are going to do a PDC presentation on MSBuild (the new build engine we’re including with Whidbey).  If you’re going to the PDC, be sure to check it out.  It’s Monday, Oct. 27th from 4:45-6pm in one of the big rooms.  I’ve seen one of the early...

Greetings all –   My apologies for being a bit out of touch for the last few weeks.  There have been several “fires” burning that I’ve had to deal with, plus a short vacation for my 10-year college reunion a couple weeks ago.  And now, my manager has been promoted to a different position inside MSFT and I’ve been asked to be interim...

So, I saw the movie Whale Rider this weekend, and I have to say it's one of the best movies I've seen in a long time.  Reading a synopsis of the film you wouldn't think much of it, but it really grabs you.  The girl who plays the lead role does an amazing job, and the rest of the cast is superb as well.  If you get a chance to see...

Hi all -   More stuff has come online.  See here for a little blurb about MSBuild, which is what we're calling our cool new build engine that will ship along with Whidbey. -Chris

Greetings, all!   Microsoft has announced the broad outline of the material to be presented at the PDC 2003.  See here for the list of tracks & presentations.   Under the “Languages and Tools” section you’ll see a cryptic reference to “a new unified build system”.  This is one of the really cool things we’re working on for...

Greetings all!  Today something happened which got me thinking about one of the nastiest problems in software development: feature creep.  This is when the feature set of a product morphs and grows to the point where it’s a significantly different product than when it began.   I’m reminded of an experience a few months ago when I...

A word about myself