Re: NetBeans: No longer working backwards?

I think you will find, as with all former projects from Sun, Oracle
has ceased honest and direct communications with the community as
there is no money in doing so.


Alex.



On Thu, Apr 21, 2011 at 8:26 PM, Tom Wheeler <[email protected]> wrote:
> I really enjoyed the section about "Working Backwards" in Jaroslav
> Tulach's API Design book.  For those that are still waiting on their
> copy of this excellent book to arrive, it suggests a novel approach of
> staying focused to achieve an important goal.  To work backwards, you
> write a press release now which explains all the valuable features of
> the software you're getting ready to write.  That press release is
> dated with your expected release date, the implication being that
> you'll know you've been successful if the press release is still
> accurate when you ship your code.
>
> Although Jaroslav didn't originate this technique, he did apply it to
> NetBeans starting with NetBeans 6.1. I don't think it's a coincidence
> that the IDE has seen a lot of improvement since then.  Here are some
> examples from the last several production releases:
>
>   http://wiki.netbeans.org/Fitness69PressRelease
>
>   http://wiki.netbeans.org/Fitness68PressRelease
>
>   http://wiki.netbeans.org/Fitness67PressRelease
>
>   http://wiki.netbeans.org/Fitness65PressRelease
>
>   http://wiki.netbeans.org/Fitness61PressRelease
>
> However, I was not able to find one for NetBeans 7.0, nor have I see
> one for NetBeans 7.1.  I thought "working backwards" was a good way to
> plan features and to communicate this information to interested people
> -- it was in the "Teamwork" chapter after all -- so I am curious why
> this approach seems to be abandoned.
>
> --
> Tom Wheeler
> http://www.tomwheeler.com/
>