Spanky's Place :: AD502 Creating Maintainable IBM Lotus Notes and Domino Applications

Category LS 2007

Speaker: Rocky Oliver (IBM)

From the sessions db:

Have you jumped into an application to troubleshoot or improve it, only to wonder what in the world the former developer was thinking -- and then realized YOU created the mess? In this session you'll learn lightweight and proven techniques for creating applications that are easy to maintain. You'll learn ways to structure your code for readability, effective commenting and much more. You'll take away the knowledge and techniques to create applications that anyone can follow at any time -- even you!

I went to this session (unaware that Rocky was presenting until I got there) because I wanted to see if there was anything I could use. I've been a HUGE proponent of writing code with other developers in mind for quite some time; and to be honest I didn't think I would learn much -but I hoped there was.

I'm really glad I went.

I've been to several of Rocky's presentations at various conferences over the years, and I've always maintained that he is an excellent speaker. In this session he lived up to his reputation: it was excellent and I would strongly recommend it to others.

Most of the stuff he spoke about I have been doing for years. Some of his design standards I agree with, and some I disagree with. The important point here is to have and use a standard; and that point he drove home extremely well.

Now don't just think to yourself "so what's the big deal, coding and naming standards I understand"; this session provided much more than that. Rocky covered many different techniques, and most importantly he explained why the "thing" was important.

If you are curious about whether or not I actually learned something; the answer is yes. I most definitely did learn several new things.