Meetings

Get out of technical debt now!

Andy Lester

Tuesday June 13th 2006 at 7:00pm
Wheaton, Illinois Institute of Technology - Rice Campus, Room 103

Abstract

Technical debt is stuff that gets left behind during a project: postponed documentation, unwritten tests, unfixed "TODO" notes throughout your code, and other workarounds you promise to do to "later". Like financial debt, unpaid technical debt accrues interest until you go bankrupt. Software projects start out fun, but often accumulate technical debt that drains project resources and makes developers miserable.

In this session, you'll learn:
* How to work debt payments into projects, and show the value of this unseen work
* How to tell good debt from bad
* Where to start correcting a debt-ridden project
* Automated tools for measuring and tracking your debt level
* Habits to develop to keep debt to a minimum
* How to keep the quest for perfection from causing paralysis

Speaker Bio

Andy Lester (http://petdance.com) is QA & Release Manager for Socialtext (http://socialtext.com), and is starting his third decade of software development.

He's a leader in the Perl QA community,maintaining a dozen testing-related modules on CPAN, and handles public relations for The Perl Foundation.

Getting to the meeting

The next PerlSIG meeting of UniForum Chicago will be at:

        IIT Rice Campus
        Room 103
        201 East Loop Road
        Wheaton, IL 60187-8489

Directions to IIT - Rice Campus in Wheaton
The 19-acre campus is located just northeast of the intersection of Naperville and Butterfield roads in south Wheaton's Danada development. The campus is three miles west of the Butterfield Road interchange of the N orth-South Tollway (I-355) and two miles north of the Naperville Road interchange of the East-West Tollway ( I-88).

From the North or South: From I-355 (North-South Tollway), exit westbound at Rt.56/Butterfield Road and proceed west 3 1/2 miles on Butterfield Road to East Loop Road. Turn right onto East Loop Road (Phillip's 66 Gas Station on the corner); the campus will be on your right about a block north of Butterfield Road, behind Cozymel's. Park in the Student parking lot behind the building. Room 103 is the first room inside the north enterance.

From the I-294 (Tri-State Tollway), take the I-88 (East-West Tollway) westbound and follow directions "From the East or West" below.

From the East or West: From I-88 (East-West Tollway), take the Naperville Road exit. At the traffic light, turn left onto Naperville Road and continue north for 1\275 miles to Rt. 56/Butterfield Road. Turn right onto Rt. 56/Butterfield Road and proceed 1/4 mile to the first traffic light (East Loop Road). Turn left on to East Loop Road, ( Phillip's 66 Gas station on the corner); the campus will be on your right about a block north of Butterfield Road, behind Cozymel's. Park in the Student parking lot behind the building.

Room 103 is the first room inside the north enterance.

Contact Deborah Vose at vosedj@yahoo.com for additional information about the meeting.