Published Tick-the-Code Material
Happy Are The Software Engineers.. (article)
My first ever published article is called "Happy Are The Software Engineers.." and it appeared in Better Software magazine in December 2006. The article describes briefly how complete concentration can create the feeling of happiness especially if the task at hand is meaningful. I wanted to highlight that working for software quality is meaningful and with Tick-the-Code you can achieve complete concentration.
Simply put, happiness is Tick-the-Code.
Tick-the-Code Inspection: Theory and Practice (paper)
My first ever scientific paper is called "Tick-the-Code Inspection: Theory and Practice" and it appeared in the peer-reviewed publication of ASQ (American Society for Quality) called Software Quality Professional.
As the name says, the paper reveals all details of Tick-the-Code up to the 24 coding rules. At the moment this paper is the most comprehensive written source for information about Tick-the-Code.
Tick-the-Code Inspection: Empirical Evidence (on Effectiveness) (paper)
My second paper is called Tick-the-Code Inspection: Empirical Evidence (on Effectiveness). It was prepared for, and first presented at, Pacific Northwest Software Quality Conference 2007. The paper presents measurements taken in Tick-the-Code training courses so far (about 50 sessions with over 300 software professionals). The results are revealing. The main point of the paper is that software engineers could keep their software much simpler and avoid making many of the errors software projects are so notorious for.
In the Appendix of the paper, you'll find all the active rules of Tick-the-Code at the time of writing (summer 2007).
Tick-the-Code - traditionally novel technique in the fight against bugs (article)
Pirkanmaan Tietojenkäsittely-yhdistys (Pitky ry) published my article in their member magazine Pitkyn Piiri 1/2008. It is called "Tick-the-Code - uusvanha tekniikka taistelussa bugeja vastaan" and it is only available in Finnish.
Future Work
Tick-the-Code Inspection: The Book (book, working title)
Since 2006, I'm writing a book on Tick-the-Code to be the most comprehensive written source. I've written first drafts of all chapters, except one. I have received some review comments and acted on them. I have contacted a few publishers and received more comments (no approval yet). O'Reilly editor Andy Oram even mentions us in the Beautiful Code blog. Next, we'll need to get people excited about the concept and the book and then approach the publishers again.
Excerpt from the book
The excerpt changes weekly. Each excerpt is still a draft version and might change before ending in the book.
Checkers who make no markings while checking are asking for trouble. Their behavior necessitates personal communication with the author. The checker has to explain whatever findings he remembers to the author, there is no alternative. Personal communication is one of the best ways to avoid and clear misunderstandings, especially if done with frankly and openly, but it is good to have alternatives. As we'll see in the next section, Suboptimal Feedback, written feedback using a standardized form can be much more effective in communicating the defects to the author than verbal communication.
Why would you disregard the importance of defects so as to not make any markings? You could be aiming too low (3 findings instead of 30) and trying to remember the findings without markings. Unmarked findings don't contribute to a remarkable code inspection. Some of the unmarked findings will inevitably be lost as you cannot remember all your findings.
The reason for not marking can be unclear guidance. If you aren't clearly instructed that you are supposed to mark everything - and by the dozen -, you might think that just a few findings will be sufficient. You certainly haven't internalized the Plentiful Principle.
A part of Chapter 2. "Symptoms" are things that can go wrong with code inspections. In other words, an organization that is conducting code inspections might not be getting all it could from them because of reasons like the one above.
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