8 Comments
founding

Its because of you that we don't need 10 years to understand it (cohesion) well ❤️

Expand full comment
May 31Liked by Kent Beck

It is amazing how hard it is to find the essence of a concept or value proposition.

I remember Launch Darkly basically created the SaaS feature flagging category as a commercial dev tool product, but I remember years of solid and worthwhile descriptions before they finally got to "decouple deploy from release" and (at least for me) it suddenly became so much easier to explain to other people.

Expand full comment

It's hard for me to articulate how strange and contradictory my thoughts were when I started reading this article. The author, whom I immensely respect for all he has done and is doing for the global IT industry, is training an IT company from Russia. The third year of the so-called full-scale war or the 13th year of the hybrid one.

To give a bit more context. Kyiv, June 2, 2024. It's the second hour without electricity. Yesterday, the Russians once again shelled (and reportedly almost destroyed) the second largest hydroelectric power plant in the country. You, who have the internet that works without electricity (well, not quite, it's *PON technology, the provider guarantees at least 20 hours), several charging stations, and understand where to charge them from a diesel generator if necessary. You decide that since there's no electricity, you won't work for now – you'll take a break and "chill" with IT news.

"I just finished a week of training at SKB Kontur in Ekaterinburg, Russia."

Well, OK. Maybe it's just business for someone and nothing personal, but for all of us, unfortunately, it is perceived very unequivocally. The world begins to split into black and white. And if you're not with us, then...

I couldn't read the article. Probably, like most of the author's texts, it's excellent. I still remember my first "Wow" from "Extreme Programming Explained," which I read in the 2000s. My first experience with the JUnit port (I was still working in .Net back then, it's only been the last 20 years that I've moved into the world of Java) and many other things that the esteemed Kent Beck contributed to.

Health and success to you, and please, choose a side in this confrontation.

Oleg, Kyiv 2024 (46 years old, 25 years in IT)

Expand full comment

Did you somehow skip the intro paragraph? The part where Kent states he wrote the article in 2009, *more* than 13 years ago?

Expand full comment
author

Hold on, Eric. FoxyBOA was writing about their own experience. It wasn't a critique of me or anything I have done. If I'd had friends who'd been killed because some politician felt his grip on domestic power slipping, I'd feel some kind of way too.

Expand full comment
Jun 3·edited Jun 3

I guess you and I read the comment differently. I saw some clear (to me) indicators that it was expressing disappointment about the fact that you (Kent) is doing business with a Russian company. For example, " ...is training an IT company from Russia." Another example, quoting Kent writing, "I just finished a week of training at SKB Kontur in Ekaterinburg, Russia."

I re-read and still see it that way. As such I just wanted to make sure FoxyBOA understood that this was a retro-post from long before the war started, and not to judge it (or Kent) based on an oversight in reading. I didn't think my comment came across aggressively or condescendingly.

As an aside, I 100% support Ukraine (emotionally and intellectually) in its defense of its territory, culture, and sovereignty against the tyrannical invasion.

Expand full comment
author

My first reading was like yours so I sat with it, asked for counsel, & came to my conclusion. It's a gut punch to think that my life could be like Oleg's but for an accident of birth.

Expand full comment