Friday, August 18, 2006

SD Wild West Panel

Well, it's been a while but after a long holiday, during the dryest summer of the century here in Finland, I'm back behind my keyboard.

Currently at MetaCase we're working hard toward the release of the new MetaEdit+, which will be awesome. I had some time to go through old emails, stumbled on the panel script of SD West 2006 and my wooden shoe broke (old Dutch saying). In the annoucement to the panel I am sure the SD events group had announced "some heat" that could be expected. However, the script I read does not give any indication of "heat". Instead, it seems like the panelists were given ear plugs and asked to react to issues that were barely related to each other.

The best advice to attendees clearly came from Compuware's John Kern who wanted to point out that it matters who you hire for a software development project. I bet it does John, but don't you think that "Just hire the smart ones and you don't have to worry about getting them there" is simplifying it just a little too much? Comments like that should get you barred from any future panel if you ask me.

Jack Greenfield mentions that he does not believe in big red buttons that generate code he has to live with from high-level models. Well Jack, first, in MetaEdit+ that button is not big and not red, it's actually quite small and blue/whitish and people have been using it for over 13 years to generate full code that they can live with, and yes, from high-level models.

Scott Ambler reacts (according to the script) out of the blue that not everyone gets modeling. Correct Scott. Could it be that this is because UML, the most used modeling language - hyped since its inception by the OMG in every magazine, website and conference - is actually very complex? Would modeling not be simpler if developers can design with the concepts and rules that they are most familiar with - those from their problem domain - while the language makes sure that they follow the architecture and design rules that are valid in their problem domain?

Hopefully the next panel on MDD provides some real fireworks, cause there is enough reason to. A good moderator might help, one who doesn't let panelists get away with half answers or John-Kernisms.

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