Make Me a Programmer

Today’s question is an interesting one that people outside of the programming world ask me a fair amount.  Loosely speaking, this question is one of how programmers interact with the rest of the team. But here’s the thing. That question typically comes to me in the form of many more specific questions:  Should programmers test software?  Or how does project management work with the Dev Team? So let’s today take these questions in aggregate.  Who are the rest of the folks that programmers interact with?  And how does the division of responsibility work? What Are These Other Roles? Before we can really address that, though, we need to take a…

Should programmers blog? I get this question a lot, probably because I’m both a blogger and a programmer.  And because of those two things, you can probably guess my answer.  But my reasoning goes beyond my own experience, and I’m going to go into detail about the points that might explain why. But First, Let’s Answer the Question. Should Programmers Blog? Yes.  As a programmer, starting and maintaining a blog will be a significant boost to your career and to your personal development.  It may get you out of your comfort zone and require some extra effort, but it is unquestionably worth doing. Let’s unpack this a little and get into specifics. …