Tim Marman's Loosely Coupled

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• (Developer) Productivity Tool of the Week: GhostDoc

  Dave recently turned me on to GhostDoc , a (free) add-in for Visual Studio that automatically generates documentation. ( One of MSDN's 10 must-have add-ins in the last issue ). The VS2003 add-in has been available for awhile and a VS2005 version has also been released. GhostDoc is a free add-in for Visual Studio that automatically generates XML documentation comments. Either by using existing documentation inherited from base classes or implemented interfaces, or by deducing comments from name and type of e.g. methods, properties or parameters. It's really a great time-saver for generating baseline documentation. It's pretty powerful if you follow a consistent set of conventions (you can customize the rules to fit your particular style). Definitely worth a download. Posted Dec 29 2005, 12:17 PM by Tim with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: Technology, Software Development, Productivity

• Productivity Tool of the Week: TaskArrange

  TaskArrange is a simple utility that lets you rearrange the buttons of the Windows taskbar. Sometimes we open our programs in a specific sequence, to keep their taskbar buttons in a desired order. But what happens if a program crashes or we close it, and then we open it again? That's right - its task button ends up last in the taskbar. Windows itself does not allow us to move the task buttons around, so we are stuck with two options: either accept the new order, or close everything and reopen them in the preferred order. TaskArrange brings an end to this annoyance, by letting us do exactly what we want: reorder the task buttons . (Ok, it's not a productivity tool per se, but it can help you be more productive) Posted Nov 01 2005, 01:34 PM by Tim with | with no comments Filed under: Technology, Software Development, Productivity

• Herding Racehorses, Racing Sheep

  I had the opportunity to hear Dave Thomas (of Pragmatic Programmers fame, not the Wendy's guy ) give his (and his partner Andy Hunt's) Herding Racehorses, Racing Sheep speech last week. It was a high-level talk on software development, psychology, expertise and generally how to move (yourself and/or others) along the expertise curve. The core message is that developers of different expertise need to be managed differently. The novice has different needs and goals than the expert, and there are things we can do to maximize each of their contributions. While Dave loves process, he says process alone cannot overcome poor personnel. He also challenged the assumption that expertise is increased by adding knowledge. ( When the brain gets to full, we are experts, right? ) Dave used the Dreyfus Model, a meta-model for skill acquisition used in looking at artificial intelligence. The Dreyfus has 5 stages of expertise: The Novice is task-oriented, relies on context-free rules and has no sense of... Posted Oct 31 2005, 11:51 AM by Tim with | with no comments Filed under: Technology, Software Development, Productivity

• Vista on the Tablet

  As I mentioned in my previous post, I have Vista up and running on the tablet. Curiously, the upgrade process failed again - it worked flawlessly when I did a fresh install. I had the same problem with Beta 1 on my desktop (from XP Home). Yet others have reported no problems doing an upgrade. Weird. The tablet experience is really much improved. Colin has a great overview of the new pen functionality . I'm glad I decided to upgrade the Tablet first... AS for the flyout TIP, it can get a little annoying if you work near the edge of the screen often (e.g., in Outlook!). I've actually disabled it. I find the new pen cursor quite usable, and I just love the spiffy new animation for right click. The pen flicks are a great feature once you master them. The only thing is, to get them working you really have to flick it... it sort of attracts attention. I feel like I'm playing Golden Tee or something. Handwriting recognition is also improved with the personalized recognition engine. I've always... Posted Sep 23 2005, 08:11 AM by Tim with | with 2 comment(s) Filed under: Technology, Software Development, Productivity, PDC05