This book draws on material Michael created for his renowned Object Mentor seminars, techniques Michael has used in mentoring to help hundreds of developers, technical managers, and testers bring their legacy systems under control. The topics covered include: Understanding the mechanics of software change, adding features, fixing bugs, improving design, optimizing performance Getting legacy code into a test harness Writing tests that protect you against introducing new problems Techniques that can be used with any language or platform, with examples in Java, C++, C, and C# Accurately identifying where code changes need to be made Coping with legacy systems that aren't object-oriented Handling applications that don't seem to have any structureThis book also includes a catalog of twenty-four dependency-breaking techniques that help you work with program elements in isolation and make safer changes.

    When Ruby first burst onto the scene in the Western world, the Pragmatic Programmers were there with the definitive reference manual, Programming Ruby: The Pragmatic Programmer's Guide.Now in its second edition, author Dave Thomas has expanded the famous Pickaxe book with over 200 pages of new content, covering all the improved language features of Ruby 1.8 and standard library modules. The Pickaxe contains four major sections:An acclaimed tutorial on using Ruby.The definitive reference to the language.Complete documentation on all built-in classes, modules, and methodsComplete descriptions of all 98 standard libraries.If you enjoyed the First Edition, you'll appreciate the expanded content, including enhanced coverage of installation, packaging, documenting Ruby source code, threading and synchronization, and enhancing Ruby's capabilities using C-language extensions. Programming for the World Wide Web is easy in Ruby, with new chapters on XML/RPC, SOAP, distributed Ruby, templating systems, and other web services. There's even a new chapter on unit testing.This is the definitive reference manual for Ruby, including a description of all the standard library modules, a complete reference to all built-in classes and modules (including more than 250 significant changes since the First Edition). Coverage of other features has grown tremendously, including details on how to harness the sophisticated capabilities of irb, so you can dynamically examine and experiment with your running code. Ruby is a wonderfully powerful and useful language, and whenever I'm working with it this book is at my side --Martin Fowler, Chief Scientist, ThoughtWorks

    In this insightful book, leading advocate Jeff Gothelf teaches you valuable Lean UX principles, tactics, and techniques from the ground up—how to rapidly experiment with design ideas, validate them with real users, and continually adjust your design based on what you learn.Inspired by Lean and Agile development theories, Lean UX lets you focus on the actual experience being designed, rather than deliverables. This book shows you how to collaborate closely with other members of the product team, and gather feedback early and often. You’ll learn how to drive the design in short, iterative cycles to assess what works best for the business and the user. Lean UX shows you how to make this change—for the better.Frame a vision of the problem you’re solving and focus your team on the right outcomesBring the designers’ toolkit to the rest of your product teamShare your insights with your team much earlier in the processCreate Minimum Viable Products to determine which ideas are validIncorporate the voice of the customer throughout the project cycleMake your team more productive: combine Lean UX with Agile’s Scrum frameworkUnderstand the organizational shifts necessary to integrate Lean UXLean UX received the 2013 Jolt Award from Dr. Dobb's Journal as the best book of the year. The publication's panel of judges chose five notable books, published during a 12-month period ending June 30, that every serious programmer should read.

    This authoritative book scrapes away these bad features to reveal a subset of JavaScript that's more reliable, readable, and maintainable than the language as a whole--a subset you can use to create truly extensible and efficient code.Considered the JavaScript expert by many people in the development community, author Douglas Crockford identifies the abundance of good ideas that make JavaScript an outstanding object-oriented programming language-ideas such as functions, loose typing, dynamic objects, and an expressive object literal notation. Unfortunately, these good ideas are mixed in with bad and downright awful ideas, like a programming model based on global variables.When Java applets failed, JavaScript became the language of the Web by default, making its popularity almost completely independent of its qualities as a programming language. In JavaScript: The Good Parts, Crockford finally digs through the steaming pile of good intentions and blunders to give you a detailed look at all the genuinely elegant parts of JavaScript, including:SyntaxObjectsFunctionsInheritanceArraysRegular expressionsMethodsStyleBeautiful featuresThe real beauty? As you move ahead with the subset of JavaScript that this book presents, you'll also sidestep the need to unlearn all the bad parts. Of course, if you want to find out more about the bad parts and how to use them badly, simply consult any other JavaScript book.With JavaScript: The Good Parts, you'll discover a beautiful, elegant, lightweight and highly expressive language that lets you create effective code, whether you're managing object libraries or just trying to get Ajax to run fast. If you develop sites or applications for the Web, this book is an absolute must.

    It took the open source world by storm since its inception in 2005, and is used by small development shops and giants like Google, Red Hat, and IBM, and of course many open source projects.A book by Git experts to turn you into a Git expert. Introduces the world of distributed version control Shows how to build a Git development workflow.

    

    In it, developer and life coach John Sonmez addresses a wide range of important "soft" topics, from career and productivity to personal finance and investing, and even fitness and relationships, all from a developer-centric viewpoint.For most software developers, coding is the fun part. The hard bits are dealing with clients, peers, and managers, staying productive, achieving financial security, keeping yourself in shape, and finding true love. This book is here to help.Soft Skills: The software developer's life manual is a guide to a well-rounded, satisfying life as a technology professional. In it, developer and life coach John Sonmez offers advice to developers on important "soft" subjects like career and productivity, personal finance and investing, and even fitness and relationships. Arranged as a collection of 71 short chapters, this fun-to-read book invites you to dip in wherever you like. A Taking Action section at the end of each chapter shows you how to get quick results. Soft Skills will help make you a better programmer, a more valuable employee, and a happier, healthier person.What's InsideBoost your career by building a personal brandJohn's secret ten-step process for learning quicklyFitness advice to turn your geekiness to your advantageUnique strategies for investment and early retirement

    "Uncle Bob" Martin shows how to bring greater professionalism and discipline to application architecture and design.As with his other books, Martin's Clean Architecture doesn't merely present multiple choices and options, and say "use your best judgment": it tells you what choices to make, and why those choices are critical to your success. Martin offers direct, no-nonsense answers to key architecture and design questions like:What are the best high level structures for different kinds of applications, including web, database, thick-client, console, and embedded apps?What are the core principles of software architecture?What is the role of the architect, and what is he/she really trying to achieve?What are the core principles of software design?How do designs and architectures go wrong, and what can you do about it?What are the disciplines and practices of professional architects and designers?Clean Architecture is essential reading for every software architect, systems analyst, system designer, and software manager — and for any programmer who aspires to these roles or is impacted by their work.

    Topics covered include:Basic version control commands and conceptsIntroduction to Distributed Version Control Systems (DVCS)Advanced branching workflowsStrengths and weaknesses of DVCS vs. centralized toolsBest practicesHow distributed version control works under the hoodFeaturing these open source version control tools:Apache SubversionMercurialGitVeracity

    It's Tuesday morning and on his drive into the office, Bill gets a call from the CEO. The company's new IT initiative, code named Phoenix Project, is critical to the future of Parts Unlimited, but the project is massively over budget and very late. The CEO wants Bill to report directly to him and fix the mess in ninety days or else Bill's entire department will be outsourced. With the help of a prospective board member and his mysterious philosophy of The Three Ways, Bill starts to see that IT work has more in common with manufacturing plant work than he ever imagined. With the clock ticking, Bill must organize work flow streamline interdepartmental communications, and effectively serve the other business functions at Parts Unlimited. In a fast-paced and entertaining style, three luminaries of the DevOps movement deliver a story that anyone who works in IT will recognize. Readers will not only learn how to improve their own IT organizations, they'll never view IT the same way again.

    In this one-of-a-kind text, author V. Anton Spraul breaks down the ways that programmers solve problems and teaches you what other introductory books often ignore: how to Think Like a Programmer. Each chapter tackles a single programming concept, like classes, pointers, and recursion, and open-ended exercises throughout challenge you to apply your knowledge. You'll also learn how to:Split problems into discrete components to make them easier to solve Make the most of code reuse with functions, classes, and libraries Pick the perfect data structure for a particular job Master more advanced programming tools like recursion and dynamic memory Organize your thoughts and develop strategies to tackle particular types of problems Although the book's examples are written in C++, the creative problem-solving concepts they illustrate go beyond any particular language; in fact, they often reach outside the realm of computer science. As the most skillful programmers know, writing great code is a creative art—and the first step in creating your masterpiece is learning to Think Like a Programmer.

    Leading agile consultant and practitioner Mike Cohn presents detailed recommendations, powerful tips, and real-world case studies drawn from his unparalleled experience helping hundreds of software organizations make Scrum and agile work. "Succeeding with Agile" is for pragmatic software professionals who want real answers to the most difficult challenges they face in implementing Scrum. Cohn covers every facet of the transition: getting started, helping individuals transition to new roles, structuring teams, scaling up, working with a distributed team, and finally, implementing effective metrics and continuous improvement.Throughout, Cohn presents “Things to Try Now” sections based on his most successful advice. Complementary “Objection” sections reproduce typical conversations with those resisting change and offer practical guidance for addressing their concerns. Coverage includes: - Practical ways to get started immediately–and “get good” fast - Overcoming individual resistance to the changes Scrum requires - Staffing Scrum projects and building effective teams - Establishing “improvement communities” of people who are passionate about driving change - Choosing which agile technical practices to use or experiment with - Leading self-organizing teams - Making the most of Scrum sprints, planning, and quality techniques - Scaling Scrum to distributed, multiteam projects - Using Scrum on projects with complex sequential processes or challenging compliance and governance requirements - Understanding Scrum’s impact on HR, facilities, and project managementWhether you've completed a few sprints or multiple agile projects and whatever your role–manager, developer, coach, ScrumMaster, product owner, analyst, team lead, or project lead–this book will help you succeed with your very next project. Then, it will help you go much further: It will help you transform your entire development organization.

    … The book the National Security Agency wanted never to be published." –Wired Magazine "…monumental… fascinating… comprehensive… the definitive work on cryptography for computer programmers…" –Dr. Dobb's Journal"…easily ranks as one of the most authoritative in its field." —PC Magazine"…the bible of code hackers." –The Millennium Whole Earth CatalogThis new edition of the cryptography classic provides you with a comprehensive survey of modern cryptography. The book details how programmers and electronic communications professionals can use cryptography—the technique of enciphering and deciphering messages-to maintain the privacy of computer data. It describes dozens of cryptography algorithms, gives practical advice on how to implement them into cryptographic software, and shows how they can be used to solve security problems. Covering the latest developments in practical cryptographic techniques, this new edition shows programmers who design computer applications, networks, and storage systems how they can build security into their software and systems. What's new in the Second Edition? * New information on the Clipper Chip, including ways to defeat the key escrow mechanism * New encryption algorithms, including algorithms from the former Soviet Union and South Africa, and the RC4 stream cipher * The latest protocols for digital signatures, authentication, secure elections, digital cash, and more * More detailed information on key management and cryptographic implementations

    Over the past few years, incremental developments in core engineering practices for software development have created the foundations for rethinking how architecture changes over time, along with ways to protect important architectural characteristics as it evolves. This practical guide ties those parts together with a new way to think about architecture and time.

    At under 200 pages it's quick reading too. Makes a great airplane book.