Daniel Cooper's personal blog. I write about software development sometimes.
As I sit here and wonder if I really should let Kiro (which is very good btw) run whatever python script it fancies, it’s hard not to notice just how big a change we’ve all been dealing with in the past year is. 50 years of hard won engineering lessions may well be going up in smoke. Which is exciting and concerning in equal measure. But we’re in a moment with AI dev tooling where engineering…
I’m not good at this. I don’t mean writing (how dare you). I mean prioritizing. Saying no. Picking one thing and seeing it through without getting distracted by a shiny new tab or an “urgent” Slack message that turns out to be a request for a slightly different font weight. So I’m choosing to prioritize writing this down not because I’ve nailed it, but because maybe if I say it out loud, I might…
I like AI. Let’s get that out of the way.
I kinda think you should just sack off the retro action item.
I get why they exist. I get the theory: Say what you’re working on. Flag if you’re blocked. Don’t get sidetracked. Keep it tight. We’ll adjust the sprint as if it matters. As you move around teams and companies you’ll come across a load of different styles. It might be five camera off Zoom squares (you need to get out). Someone will try and throw a ball at you . I’ve heard of a team that finish…
Every team I’ve ever seen maintains a backlog. Every team I’ve ever been on pretends they’ll get to it someday, and they never do. The backlog aint a roadmap. It’s a graveyard of forgotten promises, good intentions, half-baked ideas and easy ways not to say no to someone. Like that box of wires I’m almost certain you’ve got in your house with a SCART to RGB cable - you think you’ll need it, but…
“FFS, not another blog post about technical debt”.
PR reviews aren’t about taste. They’re about trust.
Letting anyone ship, without the usual setup pain
I’d think carefully about letting AI code reviews become the norm.