Martin Fowler
Press release/News aggregator
I started martinfowler.com as a place to keep my own writings, initially just articles I'd written for other purposes. In the early 2000s, blogs got popular and that encouraged me to start the bliki in 2003 to engage with some more informal writing.
As the site got more popular, I felt I could use it to help other people get more visibility for their writing, so I've steadily increased publications from others here. I vet each article before accepting it - and often do a considerable amount of developmental editing too - so there isn't a high rate of publication. I do believe, however, that the quality of the articles matters much more than the quantity.
The topics of the articles I publish cover a broad range of software development, from writers who share my broad philosophy favoring agile approaches that appreciate the importance of technical skill in making that style work effectively. Many are, or have been, colleagues of mine at Thoughtworks, although that isn't mandatory. I generally only consider articles from people I know, although occasionally from those I don't but are vouched for by those I do. Source
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| Scope | National |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Country | United States of America |
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Recent Articles
Search ArticlesAre Harnesses Worth the Cost?
I went into this experiment expecting a behavioral harness to help a coding agent meet the requirements more reliably, save tokens and prevent wasted work. Giving an agent clear architectural contracts and deterministic test feedback while it coded seemed like an obvious way to help it get the implementation right on the first pass.
Fragments: October 4
In response to my last fragments (probably the bit about us worrying if LLMs have consciousness when we when we should be wondering why they don’t have a conscience) “Metalanguage” replied: we shipped the id and forgot the superego. classic software lifecycle. I don’t know what was on their mind, but their post immediately made me think of the classic 1956 movie Forbidden Planet.
Principles for effective slides
By now, we’ve established the need for a strong narrative before you build slides. Not every presentation needs slides. Once you’ve built your narrative, you may decide that a speech is good enough. In fact, a few months back, I did just that. I was a leader-in-residence at our graduate program, Thoughtworks University. The trainers expected me to deliver a keynote, and I decided against slides. I called the talk “1% better — three things I wish I'd known as a grad.” 15 minutes, no visuals, just talk.
bliki: Sensible Default
A Sensible Default is a practice that, absent some overriding context, should be used when carrying out a certain kind of task. In software development such sensible defaults might include things like “use version control”, “separate UI logic from domain logic”, “automate deployment pipelines”. The term “sensible default” is a deliberate contrast to “best practice”.
Fragments: September 29
Simon Willison: The more time I spend working with coding agents, the more convinced I am that they make software engineering even harder We can do amazing things with them, but unlocking their full potential requires extraordinary discipline and knowledge This has been a constant impression I get from following Willison’s writing.
Fragments: September 24
Rob Bowley is “flipping tables in his head” with anger at the current media coverage of the danger of AI killing us all The risk I’m worried about isn’t a future machine deciding to wipe us out. It’s today’s AI, being wired into everything, carelessly and fast. Cyber attacks have already cost millions of dollars in lost economic output, often without AI being involved at all. Bowley feels the push to slow down AI is distracting us from the problems that are lurking with current technology.
Healthy Feedback
How to exchange feedback The early-and-often feedback loop principle also applies to peer-to-peer feedback. If we could do something better, why not know early? And if we’re already doing something well, how about getting some feedback to strengthen our confidence, so we can repeat that behaviour with gusto? While reflective feedback—i.e., feedback that you share, looking back at a stretch of time—is instructive, we find that the most useful feedback is the one you receive in the flow of work.
I don't like LLMs
I have a lot of mixed feelings about AI and LLM technology. I’m fascinated by its effect on our profession, excited by the potential gains in productivity - and thus the products we could rapidly build. On the other hand, I’m fearful of the damage AI might cause: agent swarms taking over our virtual and physical infrastructure, designing bio weapons. But, back on my first hand, LLMs might also design miracle cures, and come up with clever ways to raise our prosperity.
Fragments: September 16
Reports of agentic hacking continue, in this case it happened back in May and it seems OpenAI did not disclose that they were responsible. Simon Willison sees two options: After the Hugging Face and Wiki attacks OpenAI were still unable to review their previous logs and determine that they had previously attacked RubyGems. They knew about the attack on RubyGems and made the decision not to reach out to the RubyGems team about it.
Nail your narrative
Building the storyline Are you ready to go to slides yet? Nope. Once you’ve identified your big idea and the top three takeaways, I suggest fleshing out your narrative to serve them. Narrative building is a subjective craft, so choose a story structure that fits your content. Here are six story structures I’ve used with success.