Agile!: The Good, the Hype and the Ugly

What Hacker News says

1. rramadassJun 2023
   It is great that you are looking into OOSC2. Yes Meyer is somewhat difficult to read since he is so thorough, precise and detail-oriented that it can become tedious at times. Take your time going through the book to get the big picture of his OO design/implementation arguments rather than the details of the Eiffel language (not necessary during the first pass). It is a huge book so skip topics as needed to focus on the essential concepts.

   You should also look into Meyer's "Design By Contract" technique for writing "correct" OO and other-paradigm programs. This is of great value in real-world programming.

   PS: You might also find another Meyer's book Agile! The Good, the Hype and the Ugly quite instructive - https://learning.acm.org/techtalks/agile

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2. rramadassSep 2022
   >It feels like disciplined programming is not popular anymore in favor hacking, continuous releases, agile, scrum, etc.

   Rightly said!

   I learnt "correct" OOD/OOP from his book Object-Oriented Software Construction (https://bertrandmeyer.com/oosc2/). It was one of the few books which actually looked at "Programming in the Large" specifically through the Object-Oriented lens and also instituted "Design By Contract (DbC)" within the Eiffel language to support it. DbC is a "user-friendly" version of the correct programming techniques espoused by Floyd/Hoare/Dijkstra. One can also say that it subsumes other techniques like TDD since a post-condition is like a unit test in itself. It is a shame people no longer study Meyer's works with the seriousness they should (he maybe a pedant but it is the right sort of pedantry) but instead run after buzzwords/fad of the month.

   Here is Bertrand Meyer's take (the right one, imo) on Agile from his book Agile! The Good, the Hype and the Ugly - https://learning.acm.org/techtalks/agile.

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3. rramadassMar 2022
   Not this again :-)

   The "Agile Manifesto" is nothing other than commonsense platitudes elevated to (unbecoming) Insight. There is nothing concrete and actionable in it. The "Rhetorical Devices" engaged by its proponents are (from [0]);

   1) Unverifiable claims

   2) Proof by anecdote

   3) Slander by association

   4) Intimidation

   5) All-or-nothing

   6) Cover-your-behind

   [0] - https://learning.acm.org/techtalks/agile and Also see Bertrand Meyer's book Agile!: The Good, the Hype and the Ugly.

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4. rramadassMar 2021
   Agile/Scrum in limited doses to aspects of Software Development is basically common sense. Applying it mechanically to the entire Product/Project Development life cycle is dumb.

   The "Agile Manifesto" is just well known platitudes.

   Agile!: The Good, the Hype and the Ugly by Bertrand Meyer is a must read.

   Summary: https://medium.com/@knL/i-just-read-agile-the-good-the-hype-...

   Webcast: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ffkIQrq-m34

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5. nvarsjJun 2015
   The best thing about this article is the linked book in the comments: "Agile: The Good, The Hype, and the Ugly". I suggest checking that out for a more nuanced view.

   I think also the OP doesn't give agile/XP enough credit for the good things it has mainstreamed. For example:

   - Sustainable pace (don't work > 40 hours week). Agile companies, in my experience, tend to have good work/life balance.

   - Continuous integration. Release and integrate often.

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6. rramadassJan 2024
   What you say has been well known and that is why techniques like Barry Boehm's "Spiral Model" - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spiral_model were invented long ago.

   But "Incremental Design"/"Refactoring" as practiced by XP/Agile/Scrum crowd is not that at all. It is giving up on "Upfront Design" altogether because Requirements/Design is subject to change anyway. The fact that you will have unknowns should not be an excuse to not come up with a blueprint i.e. Design for the overall system. The focus should be on the long-term with decisions/allowances/techniques made for extension/maintainability/refactoring within the blueprint. That is the point of "Upfront Design". The XP/Agile/Scrum crowd have effectively thrown the "baby out with the bathwater" with the result that their methodology has degenerated to "think short-term and make shit up as you go long-term".

   See also Bertrand Meyer, "Agile! The Good, The Hype and The Ugly" - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ffkIQrq-m34

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