Latest News from Tad Anderson

Delivering Business Intelligence with Microsoft SQL Server 2012

Wed, 16 May 2012 10:15:00 EDT

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Tue, 15 May 2012 20:29:00 EDT

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Delivering Business Intelligence with Microsoft SQL Server 2012 Book Review

Tue, 15 May 2012 13:52:00 EDT

Get ready to learn, but be ready to work for it. This book is packed full of hands on exercises the author calls "Learn by Doing". Every topic covered is accompanied by a "Learn by Doing" section. If you take the time to go through these while reading the book you will absorb triple the information. It takes a lot of time, but is definitely worth it.

The author does provide a download of all the databases and projects created throughout the book, so if you do not have time to manually type everything in, you can download and configure them. I did the exercises of the things I had not done before, but used the downloads to explore solutions of concepts I already had a pretty good understanding of.

Although this book is packed full of hands on exercises, it is also packed full of accompanying information. The first part of the book provides a great overview and foundation of Business Intelligence.

The second part of the book is where the hands on exercises begin. You dig deep into creating and populating Data Marts using SSIS. The third part of the book digs deep into creating Cubes and Multidimensional Expressions (MDX) scripting.

Part four covers the Tabular BI Semantic Model and the Data Analysis Expressions (DAX) Language. Part five first gives a really nice introduction to data mining, including covering some of the common algorithms used in data mining. It then covers the Microsoft tools available for mining.

The last part of the book covers the client tools available for delivering business intelligence including Reporting Services, Excel PivotTable and PowerPivot, SharePoint PerformancePoint, and Power View.

I have listed the six parts and their chapters below.

Part I: Business Intelligence
Chapter 1. Equipping the Organization for Effective Decision Making
Chapter 2. Making the Most of What You've Got--Using Business Intelligence
Chapter 3. Seeking the Source--The Source of Business Intelligence
Chapter 4. Two, Two, Two Models in One--The BI Semantic Model
Chapter 5. First Steps--Beginning the Development of Business Intelligence

Part II: Defining Business Intelligence Structures
Chapter 6. Building Foundations--Creating Data Marts
Chapter 7. Transformers--Integration Service Structure and Components
Chapter 8. Fill 'er Up--Using Integration Services for Populating Data Marts

Part III: Working with a Multidimensional BI Semantic Model
Chapter 9. Cubism--Measures and Dimensions
Chapter 10. Bells and Whistles--Special Features of OLAP Cubes
Chapter 11. Writing a New Script--MDX Scripting
Chapter 12. Pulling It Out and Building It Up--MDX Queries

Part IV: Working with a Tabular BI Semantic Model
Chapter 13. Setting the Table--Creating a Tabular BI Semantic Model
Chapter 14. A Fancy Table--Tabular BI Semantic Model Advanced Features

Part V: Mining
Chapter 15. Panning for Gold--Introduction to Data Mining
Chapter 16. Building the Mine--Working with the Data Mining Model
Chapter 17. Spelunking--Exploration Using Data Mining

Part VI: Delivering
Chapter 18. Special Delivery--Microsoft Business Intelligence Client Tools
Chapter 19. Let's Get Together--Integrating Business Intelligence with Your Applications

The downloadable code is very well organized and usable. The databases each have instructions on getting them setup and configured. Like I said above I did the exercises of the things I had not done before, but used the downloads to explore solutions of concepts I already had a pretty good understanding of. All the databases restored without error and all the projects deployed without issue after changing some of the security setting for my local environment.

One topic missing from the book is Master Data Services (MDS), but Microsoft does not include MDS as part of their defined BI solutions either.

Some of my favorite parts of the books included the coverage of Change Data Capture, the complete coverage of the Control Flow items and Data Flow items available in the SSIS Toolbox, the detailed coverage of the BI Semantic Model (BISM), and the coverage of the Data Mining tools.

I honestly do not think you will find a better resource for learning the SQL Server 2012 Business Intelligence Tools.

Delivering Business Intelligence with Microsoft SQL Server 2012 3/E

Book Review: How Google Tests Software

Fri, 11 May 2012 13:04:39 EDT

As I read the beginning of this book I was thinking to myself that the story being told of a giant like Google seems just a little too good to be true, but I will trust what hey are saying about the atmosphere. Giant companies have never impressed me. They take on their own life and the individual is usually lost in the shuffle. When I was near the end of the book is when I found out James Whittaker quit Google. In his blog "Why I left Google" he describes what I had envisioned Google to be. It sounds like Google has made some bad decisions to compete with Facebook, just like Microsoft has made some horrible decisions to compete with Apple.

How Google Tests Software Book Review

Fri, 11 May 2012 12:19:00 EDT

As I read the beginning of this book I was thinking to myself that the story being told of a giant like Google seems just a little too good to be true, but I will trust what they are saying about the atmosphere. Giant companies have never impressed me. They take on their own life and the individual is usually lost in the shuffle.

When I was near the end of the book is when I found out James Whittaker quit Google. In his blog "Why I left Google" he describes what I had envisioned Google to be. It sounds like Google has made some bad decisions to compete with Facebook, just like Microsoft has made some horrible decisions to compete with Apple.

That said, this book is still a great read. It talks about the events that James calls the old Google and I highly recommend reading it.

After the book gives an introduction to what testing at Google is, it has a chapter on each role in their testing world. Each chapter goes into great detail about the tools they use, the different test sizes, coding practices, team structure, process, bug attributes, workflow, and much more. There are also ton of really interesting interviews scattered throughout the book. I found these really entertaining.

The book chapters include Introduction to Google Software Testing , The Software Engineer in Test , The Test Engineer , The Test Engineering Manager , and Improving How Google Tests Software. It also includes three appendices Chrome OS Test Plan , Test Tours for Chrome , and Blog Posts on Tools and Code.

This book is now part of the orientation of new employees at Google, so if you plan on interviewing with them, it may be a good idea to read it in advance.

Testing can become a major pain point on any decent size project. If done wrong, it can be a huge bottleneck and a source of pain, instead of being a relief and productivity gain. This book has tons of advice on how to avoid going off the rails with testing.

This book isn't only for testers. The Software Engineer in Test is a developer focused on testability and test infrastructure. The chapter that covers The Software Engineer in Test is great for all developers to read.

IT Managers, CIOs, Software Architects, and Enterprise Architects should definitely read this book. It is guaranteed to give you ideas and advice that you can use to improve testing in your organization.

Over all I found this book very educational and very entertaining!!!

How Google Tests Software

Book Review: Elemental Design Patterns

Mon, 07 May 2012 05:15:00 EDT

Elemental Design Patterns Book Review

Thu, 03 May 2012 20:29:00 EDT

Elemental Design Patterns are the underlying core concepts of programming and software design that have remained described.

This book is a book I wish I had 15 years ago to help me put the basics of programming into their proper context. Learning how to make use of patterns over the years would have been much simpler had I read this book first.

I have listed the chapters of the book below along with the patterns in the catalog. Take a look at he names of the patterns and you can see how low level these patterns are.

Chapter 1: Introduction to Design Patterns
Chapter 2: Elemental Design Patterns
Chapter 3: Pattern Instance Notation
Chapter 4: Working with EDPs
Chapter 5: EDP Catalog
Create Object
Retrieve
Inheritance
Abstract Interface
Delegation
Redirection
Conglomeration
Recursion
Revert Method
Extend Method
Delegated Conglomeration
Redirected Recursion
Trusted Delegation
Trusted Redirection
Deputized Delegation
Deputized Redirection
Chapter 6: Intermediate Pattern Compositions
Fulfill Method
Retrieve New
Retrieve Shared
Objectifier
Object Recursion
Chapter 7: Gang of Four Pattern Compositions
7.1 Creational Patterns
7.2 Structural Patterns
7.3 Behavioral Patterns
Appendix A: Rho-Calculus

My goal with a solution's architecture is always to make it the simplest solution possible in order to maximize maintainability. That means i must accomplish providing the highest level of transparency possible. That means providing the right level of detail at the right level of abstraction. When they are used patterns allow for a common language to be used. This book provides a language to allow you to go to a lower level of abstraction getting to the core concepts of programming.

My favorite part of this book is how explicitly names and sheds light on all the logic we take for granted when we are programming. Don't however expect to breeze through this book. Although the author is bringing to light concepts that you use everyday, this is the first time you'll be thinking about them with intensity. You have to following along with the author's logical introduction throughout the first few chapters to get the why of the rest of the book.

I think the Pattern Instance Notation (PIN) and the different PINboxes is a really cool way to visually represent patterns, parts of patterns, and the associated patterns.

This thought that kept coming to mind as I read this book is "this is the way I wish I would have learned this in the beginning of my career". This is a refreshing read. It makes you think in an enjoyable way and you really do learn something of value along the way.

Anyone involved with any programming language should read this book.

Elemental Design Patterns

The Scrum Field Guide: Practical Advice for Your First Year

Sun, 29 Apr 2012 09:00:00 EDT

The Scrum Field Guide: Practical Advice for Your First Year Book Review

Thu, 26 Apr 2012 16:34:00 EDT

This is one cool book. If you are starting to use Scrum, read it. If you are using Scrum, read it. If you are just wondering what Scrum is all about, read it. It gives the best insight into the workings of Scrum I have seen in a book.

The chapters are laid out in a really nice to read format. Each one contains sections titled The Story, The Model (or The Practices in some chapters), Keys to Success, References, and sometimes Works Consulted (although I never figured out what the difference between these and references where?).

The story is literally a story that comes from the author's field experience that introduces the topic the chapter covers and brings to light problems being solved by the next section, The Model.

The Model and the Practices sections are the guidance and suggestions to help with the problems identified in the story. Keys to Success provide advice on how to execute the model.

The book starts with an introductory chapter, Scrum: Simple, Not Easy, in which the author makes some very important points. I don't know how many times I have repeated the sentence, "Agile does not mean easy and I believe it requires much more experience to pull off than traditional processes".

The book is then broken down into four parts. I have listed the parts and the chapters below.

Part I- Getting Prepared
Getting People On Board
Using Team Consultants to Optimize Team Performance
Determining Team Velocity
Implementing the Scrum Roles
Determining Sprint Length
How Do We Know When We Are Done?
The Case for a Full-Time ScrumMaster

Part II- Field Basics
Why Engineering Practices Are Important in Scrum
Core Hours
Release Planning
Decomposing Stories and Tasks
Keeping Defects in Check
Sustained Engineering and Scrum
The Sprint Review
Retrospectives

Part III- First Aid
Running a Productive Daily Standup Meeting
The Fourth Question in Scrum
Keeping People Engaged with Pair Programming
Adding New Team Members
When Cultures Collide
Sprint Emergency Procedures

Part IV- Advanced Survival Techniques
Sustainable Pace
Delivering Working Software
Optimizing and Measuring Value
Up-Front Project Costing
Documentation in Scrum Projects
Outsourcing and Offshoring
Prioritizing and Estimating Large Backlogs
Writing Contracts

Appendix- Scrum Framework
The Roles
The Artifacts
The Meetings
Putting It All Together

Every chapter was great, but I really liked Documentation in Scrum Projects, Using Team Consultants to Optimize Team Performance, The Fourth Question in Scrum, and Outsourcing and Offshoring. All these chapters contain topics I usually see Scrum teams avoiding.

A lot of agile teams like using the agile process as an excuse for not doing documentation. The author makes it very clear that documentation can rarely be dismissed. It is about doing what is needed to succeed, and planning and documentation are tools for success when they aren't over done. Too much can kill your project just as easily as doing none.

The Fourth Question in Scrum rocks. This basically brings to the table all chatter that happens after the daily standup when a project is hitting rocky ground. It gives the team a chance to voice their real opinion of how things are going.

The author provides a very realistic picture of what outsourcing and offshoring actually cost and how much hidden extra effort is involved.

The team consultant model does a good job of showing how to structure a flexible team structure.

One thing I would have liked to see more of is the inclusion of the actual practices that are executed in order to produce the documentation the author mentions. An example is architecture. The architecture documentation that results from the architecture definition process (or the Architecture Business Cycle) is just an artifact of many practices that need to be preformed throughout the entire project.

The author also includes a link to supplemental material which includes some nice tools. I really like the 14 and 30 Day Sprint Backlog Templates.

Over all I thought this book was great. It pulled a ton of real project experience into one place. It was also an easy read. The author's writing style made it really easy read. The stories were all interesting and were a cool way to lead into the chapter's topics.

The Scrum Field Guide: Practical Advice for Your First Year

Book Review: Designing Silverlight Business Applications

Sat, 21 Apr 2012 10:00:00 EDT

Designing Silverlight Business Applications: Best Practices for Using Silverlight Effectively in the Enterprise Book Review

Fri, 20 Apr 2012 15:54:00 EDT

If I could change one decision Microsoft has made, it would be the one they made to drop Silverlight. Silverlight is the prefect line of business application platform for the enterprise, and this book shows us how to take full advantage of it.

Although the author does an excellent job of building a case for using Silverlight over HTML5 in many scenarios, the key ingredient missing that would allow me to build Silverlight applications for my customers is support from Microsoft.

Why read this book then? Because XAML is here to stay and I don't want to skip a release. I want to stay completely current even if there is no chance of building Silverlight applications with my current customers. Microsoft not saying it is dead, is not enough for them. They need to hear it will be supported before they use it again. Since that isn't happening anytime soon, neither will a Silverlight project.

All that said, this book was a pure pleasure to read and shows us why Silverlight is absolutely, hands down, the best technology available today for enterprise LOB applications.

This book doesn't contain any fluff. After the awesome introduction there is a Getting Started chapter. I planned on skimming this but as I started skimming I found myself repeatedly pulled into the topics. I ended up reading the entire thing.

The complete list of chapters is Silverlight, Getting Started, Extensible Application Markup Language (Xaml), Advanced Xaml, The Visual State Manager, Data-Binding, Model-View-ViewModel (MVVM), The Managed Extensibility Framework (MEF), Testing, Navigation, The Service Layer, Persistence and State Management, Out of Browser Applications, Line of Business Features, and Debugging and Performance Optimization.

One of the things I really like about this book is the down to earth attitude the author has. A perfect example is his chapter on MVVM. Most books I have read take the approach of over complicating MVVM. In this book the author simplifies and does a great job of explaining the pattern.

One thing I didn't like was that some of the sample code didn't run right off the bat, and some I just gave up on. Chapter 10 Manual Navigation was an interesting chapter, but the way the application with the sample code was put together the application didn't load and could not be easily debugged. Some of the other samples included dlls from the feature pack 2 which requires Visual Studio Premium or Ultimate, so not everyone will be able to run them. A lot of them also require IIS Express. Most of the samples worked and they would all probably work if you want to take the time to get them working. I didn't get any of the To-Do samples to work which made up 12 of the 40 samples. Spent way too much time trying to.

One chapter that began with cracking me up was Line of Business Features. The author starts off with a description of a miserable picture of what the word "enterprise" paints in the eyes of the development community. He then paints a much better picture of what an enterprise line of business development environment can look like throughout the rest of the chapter. I have seen plenty of both and the picture the author paints of how it could be is absolutely achievable. Although, most enterprises I have seen don't come close to achieving it.

Developing LOB with Silverlight provides us with the opportunity to do development right. Technology absolutely plays a big part in an enterprises development environment. Where it really counts is in maintenance and enhancements. HTML (ASP.NET), CSS, and JavaScript have always produced spaghetti code nightmares in every shop I have seen use it. I know it is necessary for reach, but when you own the environments, which most enterprises do, Silverlight is the way to go. After Silverlight WPF. Microsoft is missing a huge opportunity to own the enterprise development world. They are forcing us back to two choices again, Browser spaghetti code or perceived thick client deployment headaches. Yes, the world still fears thick client deployment. They threw the baby out with the bath water when they dropped Silverlight.

So my advice? Read this book. The author does a great job of showing us what we should be doing today with LOB application architecture and development. He also brings us up to speed on the latest inner workings of XAML based development. The asynchronous model will be there in Windows 8 XAML development, so learning how to use it and other features now will help you later. The author does a great job of walk us through a the most power features Silverlight has to offer and puts them into a line of business application context.

Designing Silverlight Business Applications: Best Practices for Using Silverlight Effectively in the Enterprise

Java Application Architecture: Modularity Patterns with Examples

Wed, 18 Apr 2012 07:30:00 EDT

Java Application Architecture: Modularity Patterns with Examples Using OSGi Book Review

Sun, 15 Apr 2012 18:04:00 EDT

Finally someone has put the most important software architecture practices into words. Within this book lies the concepts that are the heart of true agility. Without a modularized architecture, any decent size project can not achieve agility. I have seen so many agile projects flop because they ignored architecture, in particular they ignored modularization.

This book also provides the keys concepts needed to ensure modifiability, the number one quality attribute for any architecture. It drives home the importance of physical design. An often overlooked aspect of designing modularity, yet it is the most important. Good logical design does not really matter if you have a poor physical design.

The book is broken down into 3 parts and includes an appendix that gives an overview of the SOLID Principles.

Part 1 The Case for Modularity introduces modularity and how it relates to complexity, architecture, SOA, Reuse, Design Rot, and Technical Debt. Part 1 chapters include Module Defined, Two Facets of Modularity, Architecture and Modularity, Taming the Beast, Realizing Reuse, Modularity and SOA, and Reference Implementation. The last chapter Reference Implementation shows how to apply several of the patterns through a series of refactorings applied to a sample architecture.

The sample did not include OSGi. The reason the author left OSGi out of the picture is that you do not need it to design proper modularized architecture. It is a tool to enhance the runtime experience, not the design experience. I was glad the author took this approach.

Part 2 of the book is the pattern's catalog. I have listed the chapter and the patterns included below.
-Base Patterns: Manage Relationships, Module Reuse, and Cohesive Modules
-Dependency Patterns: Acyclic Relationships, Levelize Modules. Physical Layers, Container Independence , and Independent Deployment
-Usability Patterns: Published Interface, External Configuration, Default Implementation, and Module Facade
-Extensibility Patterns: Abstract Modules, Implementation Factory, and Separate Abstractions
-Utility Patterns: Collocate Exceptions, Levelize Build, and Test Module

The pattern form (sections of the patterns) are Pattern Name, Pattern Statement, a Sketch, Description, Implementation Variations, Consequences, a Sample, and a Wrapping Up section.

Part 3 of the book provides a introduction to OSGi within several contexts. Part 3 chapters include Introducing OSGi, The Loan Sample and OSGi, OSGi and Scala, OSGi and Groovy, and the Future of OSGi.

The author has put up a site that includes a pattern catalog on his site Java Application Architecture: Modularity Patterns.

The author has all the source code available on github. It is organized by sample/pattern name. The code is very well organized and usable.

This book is not only for Java developers. It is a great book for anyone developing object oriented systems. It easily translates to .NET. I was constantly drawing parallels with my experience using PRISM to develop modular .NET applications.

This is a must read for every architect and developer interested in doing architecture right. The concepts in this book will take you to a new level of quality with your architectural designs.

Java Application Architecture: Modularity Patterns with Examples Using OSGi

Book Review: Programming iOS 5

Sun, 15 Apr 2012 10:00:00 EDT

Programming iOS 5: Fundamentals of iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch Development Book Review

Thu, 12 Apr 2012 17:27:00 EDT

A little background so you know what type of experience I have. I have been a Microsoft .NET architect and developer since the first beta release. Before that C, C++, ColdFusion, ASP, JavaScript and of course HTML. Being a .NET developer has many advantages, but the one major disadvantage we suffer has driven me to Java and Objective-C over the past year. That one disadvantage? Microsoft themselves. They come off as completely lost and have wreaked havoc on .NET developer community the past few years.

I have read several books on programming with Objective-C, but this is by far the most comprehensive and well put together. One book I would recommend to anyone coming from the .NET world is Migrating to iPhone and iPad for .NET Developers.

After advising the reader to brush up on their C by reading certain parts of C Programming Language, and then spending a chapter showing how C relates to Objective-C, the author has a really nice overview of Objective-C. The overview is Part I of the book and it is 5 chapters long. The chapters include Just Enough C, Object-Based Programming, Objective-C Objects and Messages, Objective-C Classes, and Objective-C Instances.

Part II IDE includes chapters on Anatomy of an Xcode Project, Nib Management, Documentation, and Life Cycle of a Project. In part II the author goes into detail about the architecture of the project and the files included in the project. He does a great job of explaining nibs, the coding environment, testing, debugging, and provides an overview of the steps taken when submitting your app to the app store. The author also points out and shows you how to take advantage of the Xcode documentation.

Part III is all about Cocoa. It includes chapters on Cocoa Classes, Cocoa Events, Accessors and Memory Management, and Data Communication. The author does a great job of explaining Automatic Reference Counting (ARC) in this section.

Part IV Views contains chapters on Views, Drawing, Layers, Animation, and Touches. This part is all about paths, clipping, gradients, colors, patterns, transforms, shadows, points, pixels, layers, sublayers, hierarchy, resizing, positioning, depth, borders, everything about animation, touch events, gestures, and hit-testing. In other words a ton of information about views is covered in this part.

Part V Interface includes chapters on View Controllers, Scroll Views, Table Views, Popovers and Split Views, Text, Web Views, Controls and Other Views, and Modal Dialogs. The understanding you gain of view controllers in this part of the book is amazing. The author did an awesome job explaining them and how they relate to rotation.

Part VI introduces some of the other Cocoa frameworks available including Audio, Video, Music Library, Photo Library and Image Capture, Address Book, Calendar, Mail, Maps, and Sensors.

Part VII is called Final Topics. In this part of the book the author introduces Persistent Storage, Basic Networking, Threads, Undo, and includes an Epilogue.

The downloadable code is very well organized and usable. It is broken down into folders by chapter and page number which makes it very convenient to find the sample you want.

This is by far one of the best programming books I have ever read. The author's approach and writing style made it a pleasure to read. He does a great job of explaining complex topics and always covers everything in depth.

If you are an iOS 5 developer, you owe it to yourself to buy this book and keep it at arms length!!!

Programming iOS 5: Fundamentals of iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch Development

Book Review: Software Engineering Best Practices

Wed, 11 Apr 2012 08:00:00 EDT

Microsoft SharePoint 2010 Web Applications: The Complete Reference

Wed, 11 Apr 2012 08:00:00 EDT

Software Engineering Best Practices: Lessons from Successful Projects in the Top Companies Book Review

Sun, 08 Apr 2012 11:13:00 EDT

I have been wanting to read this for a while now but have not had the time. Although my current review is of a book 3 years old, the book is just as relevant today as it was then and will be for a long time to come. If the author gets his way, it will be relevant until 2049. He has included a chapter title "A Preview of Software Development and Maintenance in 2049".

This is a massive book filled with tons of knowledge and wisdom accumulated from years of experience. The author does not pull punches. He tells it like it is. He covers what is working in the industry and points out what isn't. He also writes in a way that makes the book a very enjoyable read. At certain points in the book I forgot I was reading an IT book.

Below are the chapters included in the book.
Introduction and Definitions of Software Best Practices
Overview of 50 Software Best Practices
A Preview of Software Development and Maintenance in 2049
How Software Personnel Learn New Skills
Software Team Organization and Specialization
Project Management and Software Engineering
Requirements, Business Analysis, Architecture, Enterprise Architecture, and Design
Programming and Code Development
Software Quality: The Key to Successful Software Engineering

After chapter one which introduces and defines software best practices with topics like what best practices are and how you can evaluate them, different paths for software development, deployment, and maintenance, and a nice ranking of methods, sociological factors, and practices, the author lists and defines 50 software best practices.

Some of the best practices included in the 50 listed include:
Minimizing Harm from Layoffs and Downsizing
Motivation and Morale of Technical Staff
Motivation and Morale of Managers and Executives
Selection and Hiring of Software Personnel
Appraisals and Career Planning for Software Personnel
Early Sizing and Scope Control of Software Applications
Outsourcing Software Applications
Using Contractors and Management Consultants
Selecting Software Methods, Tools, and Practices
Certifying Methods, Tools, and Practices
Requirements of Software Applications
User Involvement in Software Projects
Executive Management Support of Software Applications
Software Architecture and Design
Software Project Planning
Software Project Cost Estimating
Software Project Risk Analysisr
Software Project Value Analysis
Canceling or Turning Around Troubled Projects
Software Project Organization Structures
Training Managers of Software Projects
Training Software Technical Personnel

The book is worth buying just for the list of 50 best practices.

The next chapter is just down right cool. It is a preview of software development and maintenance in 2049. Topics include Requirements Analysis, Design Circa, Software Development, User Documentation, Customer Support, Deployment and Customer Training, Maintenance and Enhancement, Software Outsourcing, Software Package Evaluation and Acquisition, and many more. They are all based on what they will look like in 2049.

The chapter How Software Personnel Learn New Skills is invaluable to everyone involved with software engineering. It shows what techniques are the most effective when trying to learn new technology and skills. Some of the techniques include Web Browsing, Webinars, Podcasts, and E-Learning, Electronic Books (e-books), In-House Education, Self-Study Using CD-ROMs or DVDs, Commercial Education, Vendor Education, and Live Conferences. That is just a few of them. He includes a prognosis and an explanation of each that range from several paragraphs to several pages. He also ranks each with the following- Costs, Efficiency, Effectiveness, Currency, and Overall Score.

All of the chapters and topics are extremely valuable and interesting. I have never seen a book like this before and I am so glad I decided to read it.

One of the things I really like about the book is all the statistical data included. There are tons of tables showing how different types of data rank. Some of them include Major Cost Drivers for Software Applications, Evaluation of Software Methods, Practices, and Results, Best Practices for IT Projects and Embedded/Systems Projects, Software Methods and Practices Considered “Professional Malpractice”, Software Knowledge Areas, Software Specialization in Large Software Organizations, Distribution of Software Specialists for 1,000 Total Software Staff, Twenty-Three Kinds of Maintenance Work, Chronology of Programming Language Development, and Sample of 150 Applications Sized Using Pattern Matching. That was just a few of them.

This is one of those books that should be read by every person with a relationship to IT. Testers, CIOs, CFOs, developers, architects, project managers, and agilists will benefit from this book. I highly recommend reading it. You will come out the back end of it with a complete new perspective on Software Engineering.

Software Engineering Best Practices: Lessons from Successful Projects in the Top Companies

Microsoft SharePoint 2010 Web Applications The Complete Reference Book Review

Fri, 06 Apr 2012 16:44:00 EDT

I must admit I was mislead by the title of this book, but it was my own fault. I was in the middle of developing an ASP.NET application that was using a lot of the SharePoint web services and the SharePoint Server Object Model. Although it used all SharePoint data, my application was completely separate from the main SharePoint site and completely built with ASP.NET outside of SharePoint and the SharePoint Designer. In my mind I wanted this book to be all about that and I allowed the title to make me believe it would be.

Although the book was not what I expected it is still a great book to read and keep handy on your shelf. This book does cover using the SharePoint Server Object Model, but it also covers much more. It includes building SharePoint solutions with all the tools available, not just ASP.NET like I was hoping it would.

The book is broken down into 5 parts. I have listed each part along with the corresponding chapters below.

Part I: Introduction to SharePoint 2010 Development
Chapter 1. The Microsoft SharePoint 2010 Platform
Chapter 2. Developing with SharePoint 2010

Part II: Presentation Layer
Chapter 3. Presentation Layer Overview
Chapter 4. Client Object Model
Chapter 5. InfoPath Forms Services
Chapter 6. Enterprise Content Management
Chapter 7. User Interface Customization

Part III: Application Services
Chapter 8. Application Services Overview
Chapter 9. Service Application Framework
Chapter 10. Word Automation Services
Chapter 11. Workflow
Chapter 12. Excel Services

Part IV: Data Access Layer
Chapter 13. Data Access Overview
Chapter 14. LINQ to SharePoint and SPMetal
Chapter 15. Business Connectivity Services
Chapter 16. Enterprise Search
Chapter 17. User Profiles and Social Data
Chapter 18. Business Intelligence

Part V: Configuration
Chapter 19. Packaging and Deployment Model
Chapter 20. PowerShell

My favorite part of this book was the coverage of LINQ to SharePoint and SPMetal. That is rarely covered in most of the SharePoint books out there. The rest of the topics in the book are very well covered also. Every chapter is packed with samples.

That leads me to the part of the book I was not found of and that was the code download. There are samples for chapters 2, 3, 4, and 9. Like I said above there are tons of samples, but they aren't included in the download.

The book covers a ton of topics and but only covers them in depth enough to give you a clear understanding of the topic without going overboard with details. That keeps you moving and the book a bit lighter than most of the SharePoint books with this much coverage.

All in all I highly recommend adding this to your SharePoint 2010 library.

Microsoft SharePoint 2010 Web Applications The Complete Reference

Book Review: C# 4.0 The Complete Reference

Tue, 03 Apr 2012 13:51:30 EDT

C# 4.0 The Complete Reference Book Review

Tue, 03 Apr 2012 13:10:00 EDT

This book is all about C# the language and some of the .NET Framework class library. It is broken into two parts. Part I introduces C# with a view into the language's history. It then spends 19 chapters covering C# in detail. It begins those chapters with an introduction to object oriented programming, encapsulation, polymorphism, and inheritance.

Part II digs deep into the .NET Framework's System namespace, collections, multithreading (including the Task Parallel Library and PLINQ), and networking. I have listed the book's chapters below.

Part I: The C# Language
Chapter 1. The Creation of C#
Chapter 2. An Overview of C#
Chapter 3. Data Types, Literals, and Variables
Chapter 4. Operators
Chapter 5. Program Control Statements
Chapter 6. Introducing Classes and Objects
Chapter 7. Arrays and Strings
Chapter 8. A Closer Look at Methods and Classes
Chapter 9. Operator Overloading
Chapter 10. Indexers and Properties
Chapter 11. Inheritance
Chapter 12. Interfaces, Structures, and Enumerations
Chapter 13. Exception Handling
Chapter 14. Using I/O
Chapter 15. Delegates, Events and Lambda Expressions
Chapter 16. Namespaces, the Preprocessor, and Assemblies
Chapter 17. Runtime Type ID, Reflection, and Attributes
Chapter 18. Generics
Chapter 19. LINQ
Chapter 20: Unsafe code, Pointers, Nullable Types, Dynamic Types, and Miscellaneous Topics

Part II: Exploring the C# Library
Chapter 21. Exploring the System Namespace
Chapter 22. Strings and Formatting
Chapter 23. Multithreaded Programming, Part One
Chapter 24. Multithreading Part Two: Exploring the Task Parallel Library and PLINQ
Chapter 25. Collections, Enumerators, and Iterators
Chapter 26. Networking Through the Internet Using System.Net
Appendix A. Documentation Comment Quick Reference

The thing I like best about this book is the way the author is able to use reasonable size examples get his message across and that there is a sample for everything. There is tons of code in the book.

One thing I did not like was the lack of the use of the using statement to properly dispose of objects. The author mentions that it should be used, but doesn't make use of it. The reasoning is he wants to show you how and where things should close without using it. That is fine, and should be shown once, but I would have preferred the majority of the examples showing it being used.

The downloadable code is in the form of text files. Each chapter has a file. The samples are in the order they are found in the book. In the sample files they number each listing, which is nice, but it does no good since they aren't numbered in the book. Nevertheless they are easy to find and all of them are console application that can be cut and pasted into a console application for running.

The authors writing style makes this an easy read. He does a great job of explaining complex topics. The book is good for beginners and as a reference for advanced developers.

All in all I highly recommend this book to every C# developer!!!

C# 4.0 The Complete Reference

Why Is Scrum So Widely Adopted and So Very Dangerously Deceptive

Tue, 03 Apr 2012 08:45:00 EDT

Why is Scrum so widely adopted and so very dangerously deceptive

Mon, 02 Apr 2012 09:03:00 EDT

I was sitting in a meeting sometime ago with a company that was embracing Scrum like a ten year old being offered a warm plate of chocolate chip cookies. They were grabbing at it as fast as they're little hands could reach out and grab the goodies.

Watching this made me wonder what is was about Scrum that made them embrace it so emphatically. They had claimed to be an Agile shop for years, but were still failing to deliver quality software on time with in budget. Over the past years they refused every single proposed process improvement recommendation made by dozens of consultants. They literally went from zero process (using the name Agile to execute no process at all) to zealot Scrumbots overnight. After spending some time pondering this and interviewing a few people I found the answers I was looking for.

Scrum was allowing them to preform the magic trick of perceived success better than they had ever been able to before just using the generic fake Agile process. A scary realization. This of course was not the fault of the Scrum process. It was the team's refusal to truly change anything except a few timelines, titles of individuals, and a few names like iteration to sprint.

First lets look at the developers. Scrum did not require the developers to change anything they were doing except code less in a given iteration (now called sprint) because the only required change imposed on them was shorter deadlines. They were still not required to adopt agile programming practices, because the scrum process they implemented didn't advocate for change at a developer level, only a middle management level.

No code reviews, no difference in testing, no difference in the use of patterns or TDD, no difference in anything except, now missed deadlines were written off to "we are not only agile we are Scrum, push it to the next sprint". Bugs… they don't exist, they are errors or simply new requirements that need new user story written for them. Of course their favorite part of the process they implemented is that there is no design or architecture involved. Just cowboy coding as fast as their little fingers can spew the crap out to the screen.

Project managers were renamed Scrum Masters. They were not given the responsibilities of the role of Scrum Master as defined by scrum. They simply changed role names and continued to project manage.

Upper management doesn't care. They are planning the same and paying the same prices for projects. They are getting reports that improvements are taking place, but don't bother to look at the bottom line which isn't actually changing.

None of the several projects run under Scrum have come in within budget, on time, or any less buggy. It just shows me that the same thing I have watch over the years is still happening with software development process. Most places are only pretending to adopt them. The same sad truth remains, that they actually usually think that they are changing. They are whole organizations in denial about their development environments.

Like I said above this is not the fault of Scrum. I have seen it make improvements, but only when change actually happens. It must happen at the upper management level, the project (middle) management level, and huge changes have to happen at the developer level. Architecture on any decent size project is just as important as it ever was, so to think you can do without it is naïve and shows immaturity. I have been seeing the Waterfall syndrome happening way too much with Scrum. People look at the picture and read a few lines of information about the process and think they got it. Waterfall was iterative, people simply did not read the entire paper behind the diagram. Scrum needs much more implemented than the time management aspects shown in the diagram.

Agile processes require agile development practices, which include architecture and design. Without them, you are only pretending to execute Scrum. I would recommend taking a look at the Scaled Agile Framework. Scrum is one small blip in the big picture of enterprise development.

How do you avoid this company's same fate? Bring in an outside consultant who knows software process engineering and put them in charge. Your team's best thinking have gotten them to where they are today, if that is not where you want your company to be, their best thinking won't get you anywhere different tomorrow. I have now seen Scrum transform one organization's development team and process, but that team brought in a consultant and allowed that consultant to lead the initiative. Although there was some resistance to the changes being made, because a majority of the team went along with them, the rest eventually followed.

I do not believe Scrum offers anything more than any other process including OpenUP, the Unified Process, RUP, XP, etc. Where the difference between success and failure lies is in the implementation of them, actually executing them with someone who has successfully executed them on multiple projects, and your willingness to take and execute their advice. That will mean change. Change in skill sets of your people, or change in your people, but to believe you can go from using no process to implementing any of these processes without help and changing is just naive and guaranteed to fail. That is unless you fake it like the company from this blog did and so many others I have seen do.

Book Review: Microsoft SQL Server 2012 - A Beginner's Guide

Sun, 01 Apr 2012 14:00:00 EDT

Microsoft SQL Server 2012 A Beginners Guide Book Review

Fri, 30 Mar 2012 12:42:00 EDT

This book is a really great beginners guide for core SQL Server 2012, and it also does a great job of introducing new features introduced in SQL Server 2012. What I mean by core is that topics like Master Data Services and Data Quality Services are not introduced. That is not a bad thing. By limiting the scope of the book, the author was able to better the topics that are included.

I wanted this book because I like having a book about the basics close by. I am not in SQL Server everyday and when I find myself needing to go back to it, I not only want books on the advanced features nearby, I want the basics also.

The book covers all the basics you need to know to get up and running quickly. After a really nice introduction where the author covers the new 2012 features and where they are covered in the book, they have a nice overview of relational databases and detailed coverage of the installation process.

The book is broken into five parts. I have listed the parts and the chapters in each below. The titles of the chapters show the topics covered.

Part I: Basic Concepts and Installation
Chapter 1. Relational Database Systems: An Introduction
Chapter 2. Planning the Installation and Installing SQL Server
Chapter 3. SQL Server Management Studio

Part II: Transact-SQL Language
Chapter 4. SQL Components
Chapter 5. Data Definition Language
Chapter 6. Queries
Chapter 7. Modification of a Table's Contents
Chapter 8. Stored Procedures and User-Defined Functions
Chapter 9. System Catalog
Chapter 10. Indices
Chapter 11. Views
Chapter 12. Security System of the Database Engine
Chapter 13. Concurrency Control
Chapter 14. Triggers

Part III: SQL Server: System Administration
Chapter 15. System Environment of the Database Engine
Chapter 16. Backup, Recovery, and System Availability
Chapter 17. Automating System Administration Tasks
Chapter 18. Data Replication
Chapter 19. Query Optimizer
Chapter 20. Performance Tuning

Part IV: SQL Server and Business Intelligence
Chapter 21. Business Intelligence: An Introduction
Chapter 22. SQL Server Analysis Services
Chapter 23. Business Intelligence and Transact-SQL
Chapter 24. SQL Server Reporting Services
Chapter 25. Optimizing Techniques for Relational Online Analytical Processing

Part V: Beyond Relational Data
Chapter 26. SQL Server and XML
Chapter 27. Spatial Data
Chapter 28. SQL Server Full-Text Search

The author has a great writing style and really explains things clearly making good use of diagrams, code samples, and tables. I mention that because I have seen books that don't.

The author has made all the scripts, sample database, and exercise solutions available. The author also makes use of the AdventureWorks and AdventureWorksDW database. I thought is was strange they didn't use the AdventureWorks2012 and the AdventureWorksDW2012 version available on CodePlex, but that was probably because they weren't available at the time the book was written.

Like I said at the beginning if the review, this is a beginners book, just like the title states. You won't find coverage of topics like cursors, buy you will find all the basics are covered.

All in all I highly recommend this book as the starting point for anyone looking to learn SQL Server 2012

Microsoft SQL Server 2012 A Beginners Guide 5/E (Beginner's Guides)

Book Review: Microsoft SQL Server 2012 Reporting Services

Sun, 25 Mar 2012 10:00:00 EDT

All in all if you are building SQL Server 2102 Reporting Services Reports, or if you are interested in learning how to, you owe it to yourself to get this book. Over the years I have been on quite a few projects and there have been very few if any that did not require some type of reporting. For a while that meant Crystal Reports, but when SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS) hit the scene, Crystal Reports began to fade on Microsoft projects. That was especially true if I had my way. I was the first person to champion SSRS in state projects in Pennsylvania. That was quite a battle but well worth it!

Microsoft SQL Server 2012 Reporting Services Book Review

Thu, 22 Mar 2012 21:59:00 EDT

Over the years I have been on quite a few projects and there have been very few if any that did not require some type of reporting. For a while that meant Crystal Reports, but when SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS) hit the scene, Crystal Reports began to fade on Microsoft projects. That was especially true if I had my way. I was the first person to champion SSRS in state projects in Pennsylvania. That was quite a battle but well worth it!

SSRS is one of the best solutions to come out of Microsoft. I don't say that lightly. I have plenty of complaints about different Microsoft products, but none about SSRS. The extensibility model built into the architecture makes the product completely customizable through extension.

This book introduces the SSRS architecture, the report manager, the basics of databases and database queries, but every topic introduced supports the report builder role. This book is all about the report builder. The chapters are listed below.

Part I: Getting Started
Chapter 1. Let's Start at the Very Beginning
Chapter 2. Putting the Pieces in Place: Installing Reporting Services

Part II: Report Authoring
Chapter 3. DB 101: Database Basics
Chapter 4. A Visit to Emerald City: The Report Wizard
Chapter 5. Removing the Training Wheels: Building Basic Reports
Chapter 6. Graphic Expression: Using Charts, Images, and Gauges
Chapter 7. Geography Lesson: Using Maps and Spatial Data Types
Chapter 8. Kicking It Up a Notch: Intermediate Reporting
Chapter 9. Beyond Wow: Advanced Reporting

Part III: Reporting Serving
Chapter 10. How Did We Ever Manage Without You--The Report Manager
Chapter 11. Delivering the Goods: Report Delivery
Chapter 12. Teamwork: Integrating Reporting Services
Chapter 13. Well Begun: Best Practices

One thing that struck me as a little weird was there was no "What's new in SSRS 2012" section. That is no big deal as I usually skip those sections anyway, but some readers may be looking for it. One big change that was worth mentioning was no more Report Models. I didn't see that mentioned anywhere in the book.

Reports can be built using Visual Studio 2010, Visual Studio 2010 with the SQL Server Data Tools add-in, and Report Builder. The author does a great job showing how to use the different tools with each example when usage is different. This really helps you get familiar with the tools and in the end will help you choose which tool you would like to use.

There is no coverage of custom extensions. My review started by touting that that is my favorite part of the product, so I was disappointed to see nothing about it. Although I do believe the content of this book will take you to the maximum possible potential of creating and delivering reports with the out of the box functionality, I have had to write custom extensions on many projects in order to meet the client's requirements. It is a topic that I would like to see covered and have seen covered in other reporting services books. However, I am not going to ding the book for this because I know that 99.9% of the reporting services authors will never have to write a custom extension or even have to know they exist.

My favorite part of the book was the hands on approach the author takes to teach us the ins and outs of SSRS. The best way to read this book is with Visual Studio or Report Builder open. The author goes through tons of step by step tasks.

Another thing I really liked was the coverage of data visualization. One of the biggest business user requests I hear is for data visualization in the form of charts, images, and gauges. This book will teach you how to use all three. It also includes great coverage of maps and spatial data types.

One last thing I really like about this book is that the author does a great job of teaching the reader how to retrieve data. In the beginning of the book he does an excellent job explaining joins. Then throughout the book he advances the reader to some fairly complex queries using joins. After running through all the examples you'll know how to get to the data you want.

Like I said above this is a Report Builder's book. If you want to learn everything there is about building reports, this is the book to teach you. The best part though is that you do not have to have any experience. This book takes the beginner from databases 101 to beginning reports, through intermediate reports, to building advanced reports.

The downloadable code is well organized and very usable. The author includes a database and an OLAP database. Both come with instructions for installing and configuring. All the code works well and adds a lot of value to the book.

All in all if you are building SQL Server 2102 Reporting Services Reports, or if you are interested in learning how to, you owe it to yourself to get this book.

Microsoft SQL Server 2012 Reporting Services 4/E

Book Review: Microsoft BizTalk Server 2010 Unleashed

Tue, 20 Mar 2012 08:00:00 EDT

All in all I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants the complete picture of all the features BizTalk 2010 has to offer. BizTalk is no small topic. To cover it all in detail in one book is one huge task. This book comes the closest to doing that I have seen so far. This is not a beginners BizTalk book. You won't find a chapter on installation and configuration, although there is a chapter on the administration console and one on deployment concepts. It digs right into the meat. It is perfect for anyone who knows a little about BizTalk and wants to get a complete picture of the BizTalk features available in BizTalk 2010.

Microsoft BizTalk Server 2010 Unleashed Book Review

Sat, 17 Mar 2012 23:15:00 EDT

BizTalk is no small topic. To cover it all in detail in one book is one huge task. This book comes the closest to doing that I have seen so far.

This is not a beginners BizTalk book. You won't find a chapter on installation and configuration, although there is a chapter on the administration console and one on deployment concepts. It digs right into the meat. It is perfect for anyone who knows a little about BizTalk and wants to get a complete picture of the BizTalk features available in BizTalk 2010.

After a nice introduction and overview the authors have chapters on Schemas, Maps, Orchestrations, Pipelines, Adapters, BizTalk 2010 and WCF: Extensibility, BizTalk and Windows Azure, Business Activity Monitoring with BizTalk BAM, The Business Rules Framework, Rule-Based Programming, ESB with BizTalk Server, Administration Console Concepts, Deployment Concepts, BizTalk RFID, and BizTalk RFID Mobile.

Over the years I have worked with BizTalk at different levels. I have also worked just with BAM on some projects. My current company will probably skip going to BizTalk 2010 since they just recently upgraded to 2009. Personally I don't want to skip getting familiar with a version of BizTalk. My goal with this book was to get a refresher on BizTalk and an introduction to the new 2010 features. This book definitely accomplished that goal for me.

Each chapter does a thorough job of hitting all the related points. For example the Adapter chapter discusses Native Adapters, Line-of-Business Adapters, BizTalk Adapter Pack, Host Adapters, and Third-Party and Custom Adapters. Coverage includes FTP Adapter, HTTP Adapter, MQ Series Adapter, MSMQ Adapter, POP3 Adapter, SMTP Adapter, SharePoint Services Adapter, WCF Adapters, and SQL Server Adapter.

The biggest let down with the book is that there is no accompanying download. With the amount if code samples throughout the book the authors should have put in the effort to provide one. In my search for one I saw one of the authors promised it, but there has been none produced to date.

The biggest highlight is the coverage of the Business Rules Engine. The book has 172 pages of premium Business Rules Engine coverage. This is not common. Most BizTalk books have a very little detail on the Business Rules Engine.

Although there are multiple authors on the book it doesn't read like it. All of them did a great job of writing in a style that makes the topics at hand easy to understand.

All in all I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants the complete picture of all the features BizTalk 2010 has to offer.

Microsoft BizTalk Server 2010 Unleashed

Book Review: Networking Essentials (3rd Edition)

Fri, 16 Mar 2012 08:45:00 EDT

Sparx Systems Has Released Enterprise Architect 9.3

Thu, 15 Mar 2012 10:32:48 EDT

Enterprise Architect 9.3 is a collaborative modeling, design and management platform based on UML 2.4.1 and related standards. Sparx Enterprise Architecture is my tool of choice for software architecture, design, project management, and project planning. This new version offers some really great new features. I have summarized them below with content I copied from the Sparx Enterprise Architect 9.3 Release Highlights page. Although I really like all the new features the ArchiMate update is really cool. I have been using ArchiMate for enterprise level diagrams for a while now. It is the primary modeling language on my current project.

Sparx Systems has released Enterprise Architect 9.3 which includes ArchiMate 2.0

Wed, 14 Mar 2012 21:01:00 EDT

Sparx Enterprise Architecture is my tool of choice for software architecture, design, project management, and project planning. This new version offers some really great new features. I have summarized them below with content I copied from the Sparx Enterprise Architect 9.3 Release Highlights page.

Summary of New Features:
Visualize complex relationships across multiple diagrams
Easily move information between two open diagrams
Create and share custom menus to improve workflow
Hide page borders on all diagrams with a single click
Analyze and debug systems with enhanced Testpoint capabilities
Develop open, scalable architectures using ArchiMate 2
Capture, visualize and document the run-state and relationships of objects during program execution
Instantly drag Breakpoints and Markers to a different line in the source code editor

Although I really like all the new features the Archimate update is really cool. I have been using Archimate for enterprise level diagrams for a while now. It is the primary modeling language on my current project.

ArchiMate® 2.0 includes:

ArchiMate Core improvements.
- Separate diagrams for Business, Application and Technology layers
- Clearer differentiation between elements in different layers, e.g. Business Service, Application Service and Infrastructure Service.
- New element types: Location, Infrastructure Function.
Motivation Extension.
- Models stakeholders, drivers for change, business goals, principles and requirements.
- New Motivation diagram.
- New element types: Stakeholder, Driver, Assessment, Goal, Requirement, Constraint and Principle.
- New relationship: Influence.
Implementation and Migration Extension.
- Supports project portfolio management, gap analysis and transition and migration planning.
- New Implementation and Migration diagram.
- New element types: Work Package, Deliverable, Plateau and Gap.

More about Archimate 2.0 here.

You can check out a list of all the features included in this 9.3 release and others here.

Networking Essentials (3rd Edition) Book Review

Wed, 14 Mar 2012 20:00:00 EDT

Being a software architect requires keeping up to speed with the hardware and networking options that are available. I decided to go with this textbook to brush up on networking.

This book is intended to get you up to speed to take the CompTIA's Network+ exam. Throughout the book the author lists the CompTIA Domain/Objective Number being covered in the chapter and which section you'll find it.

After a nice introduction to networking chapter the book digs into the details with chapters Physical Layer Cabling: Twisted Pair, Physical Layer Cabling: Fiber Optics, Wireless Networking, Interconnecting the LANs, Introduction to Router Configuration, Introduction to Switch Configuration, Routing Protocols, Internet Technologies: Out to the Internet, Troubleshooting, and Network Security.

One thing that is really cool about the book is that it comes with some nice companion content. There is a demo of the Cisco CCENT Mind Share Game, Wireshark example captures, Net-Challenge software, and samples of other certification guides.

To all the instructors that are considering using this book in their class, I think this is the perfect text to introduce networking. The chapters start by providing a chapter outline, define the objectives, list the key terms, and then provide a nice introduction to the topic.

At the end of each chapter there is a large set of questions and problems. There is also a section review and test your knowledge after each section. If your students take the time to complete these, they will really be driving home the chapter's material.

There are a ton of real production pictures, product specifications, diagrams, schematics, and screenshots that help to paint the full picture of the subject being covered. Throughout the book the authors also list key terms in the margins. There is also a nice glossary of key terms near the end of the book.

This book is one of the best overall networking books I have seen. It introduces everything and also goes deep enough to provide a clear understanding of the topic at hand.

I highly recommend it to anyone interested in learning about network and to instructors look for an excellent text book for their class. This book can teach the student on its own and they need no prior network experience.

Networking Essentials (3rd Edition)

Book Review: SharePoint Designer 2010 Unleashed

Sat, 10 Mar 2012 15:00:00 EST

SharePoint Designer 2010 Unleashed Book Review

Fri, 09 Mar 2012 12:25:00 EST

When I first saw this book was coming out I completely ignored it. The SharePoint Designer ? Who uses that I thought? Then I noticed it starting to get some good reviews and I decided to read them. One of them mentioned 1600 pages. That threw me for a loop and also convinced me I had to check it out. I had to see what was in 1600 pages worth of content about SharePoint Designer and I am really glad I did.

This book is about so much more than just the SharePoint Designer. It gives a great overview of SharePoint 2010's architecture, covers how to make modifications in the browser, goes deep into security details, covers new and depreciated site templates, working with the ribbon, CSS, XSLT, Business Connectivity Services, data controls, workflows, InfoPath, and more!!!

The timing of me getting my hands on this book was perfect. I seem to be needing it everyday lately. I am just finishing a 2007 to 2010 SharePoint upgrade process and there are a ton of new features available in 2010. In the past I have done a lot of web part programming and Silverlight web part programming. In my current position I got drafted to figure out how to do the 2010 upgrade. Now with the help of the book I am able to learn more about creating solutions without programming them.

The book has four parts. The first part is a really nice in-depth overview of SharePoint's architecture, an introduction to SharePoint 2010 features, and how to make in-browser customizations. The second part introduces using the SharePoint Designer 2010 to design and modify web user interfaces, site templates, content types, lists, and libraries. Part three is all about styling and designing SharePoint sites using CSS, page layouts, content pages, web part zones, and themes. The last part is all about working with different data sources and data views.

I have listed each part and the chapters they include below.

Part I: Welcome to SharePoint Server 2010
1. SharePoint 2010 Overview
2. SharePoint 2010 Architectural Overview
3. Introduction to the SharePoint 2010 Fluid Interface
4. Design Administrative Tasks: Site Settings, Permissions and Creating Sites
5. In-Browser Customization: Navigation, Content Pages and Content
6. In-Browser Customization: Branding with Web Parts, Themes and Master Pages

Part II: Enhancing Sites with SharePoint Designer 2010
7. Web Interface Design with SharePoint Designer 2010
8. Creating Sites with Site Templates
9. Working with Content Types and Columns in SharePoint Designer
10. Creating and Configuring Lists and Libraries

Part III: Styling and Designing SharePoint 2010 Sites
11. Understanding SharePoint Designer Editing Features
12. Working with Content Pages in SharePoint Designer
13. Building New Content Pages and Configuring Web Parts and Web Part Zones
14. Extending Content Pages with Media and Dialogs
15. Creating New Publishing Page Layouts
16. Working with and Creating New SharePoint Cascading Style Sheets (CSS)
17. Creating New SharePoint 2010 Master Pages
18. SharePoint Themes and Themable CSS: The Icing on the Cake

Part IV: Data Manipulation and Business Processes
19. Configuring Data Sources (Non-BCS)
20. External Content Types and External Lists (BCS)
21. Manipulating Data with ASP.NET Data Controls
22. Overview of XSLT List View and Data View Web Parts in SharePoint 2010
23. Working with XSLT List View Web Parts (XLVs)
24. Working with the Data View and Data Form Web Parts
25. Configuring and Customizing List Forms
26. Customizing List Forms with InfoPath 2010 Forms
27. Using Workflows and Creating Custom Workflows
28. Creating Custom List Actions: Adding Buttons to the Ribbon and List Item Menus

The author has a download on the publisher's site of all the resources used throughout the book.

The author's writing style makes things easy to understand and the book's material an easy read. One of the things I liked about the book is that the author points out cool extra stuff along the way. One of the things I thought was cool was how to make it snow on the SharePoint site.

This book will definitely remain by my side. The massive amount of information makes it a great reference. You will not find information on SharePoint Designer 2010 this in-depth anywhere else.

I highly recommend this book to anyone involved with SharePoint development and design.

SharePoint Designer 2010 Unleashed

Book Review: Decision Management Systems

Fri, 09 Mar 2012 04:30:00 EST

If you are in IT, I highly recommend reading this book. There are not too many systems being created today that I would consider more than interfaces to a data structure. Meaning most systems today rely on people to provide the intelligence behind them. The systems themselves are viewed as a necessary evil by the people who use them. I find this to be especially true in organizations with a long history. Their attitude is they were built by people, and people will continue to be their most valuable asset. The author of this book challenges us to take our systems to the new level of existence. One where they are responsive partners in the company along with the people who use them. Responding in real-time to customers and users of the system. Decision Management Systems are intended to be active participants in optimizing your business.

Book Review: Pro .NET Best Practices

Sun, 26 Feb 2012 04:00:00 EST

I highly recommend this book to any role involved with developing .NET software. I personally do not find software development an art form. It is not an unpredictable activity driven by crazy business users that come to work every day inventing a new way to operate their businesses just to savagely changing your requirements. Project teams that use changing requirements as an excuse for their dates constantly slipping and bugs being pushed to production are simply not good development teams and they are poorly managed. Even when you're in an environment where requirements are volatile, proper architecture and process engineering can level the playing field.

Book Review: The CERT Guide to Insider Threats

Fri, 24 Feb 2012 09:15:00 EST

The CERT Guide to Insider Threats: How to Prevent, Detect, and Respond to Information Technology Crimes (Theft, Sabotage, Fraud) (SEI Series in Software Engineering) . Working as a Software Architect one of the main concerns we always have is Security. At an application level that can usually be easily implemented if you are up to speed with the latest industry standards and best practices for the technology you are working in. Working as an Enterprise Architect, security becomes a much broader subject. Insider threats become part of the picture and there is no cookie cutter solution for them. I have seen plenty of potential issues thwarted, and over the years working as a consultant I have witnessed plenty of successful insider attacks.

The CERT Guide to Insider Threats: How to Prevent, Detect, and Respond to Information Technology Crimes Book Review

Wed, 22 Feb 2012 20:10:00 EST

Working as a Software Architect one of the main concerns we always have is Security. At an application level that can usually be easily implemented if you are up to speed with the latest industry standards and best practices for the technology you are working in.

Working as an Enterprise Architect, security becomes a much broader subject. Insider threats become part of the picture and there is no cookie cutter solution for them. I have seen plenty of potential issues thwarted, and over the years working as a consultant I have witnessed plenty of successful insider attacks.

One of my first experiences with insider threat was when I was still in the engineering field. We used an email product called Pega eMail. A few of us discovered that no password was required to log into another person's email if it was done in a certain way. We would do goofy stuff like rename each other's folders to stupid names. We got bored with it in about a day and forgot about it. As time went on our company was purchased by an England company.

The new parent company sent in a new president. One of the new president's jobs was to reorganize. People were let go and offices were moved. Some of the people in one of the departments decided they wanted the inside scoop. Apparently they had learned about the email trick. They began reading all the new presidents emails. From what I heard one of them mentioned something in a meeting that was confidential between the new president and the company's London office.

The IT security team started to investigate and discovered the email product flaw. They then monitored the IP logging into the presidents email and discovered the entire department was guilty. One Friday afternoon they were all escorted out of the building.

I have experienced several insider threat scenarios but the worst one was at a small company that decided it was a good idea to hire a hacker to be the lead network administrator. At the time he was very good at hacking, but not so good with ethical hacking. Actually he wasn't so good with ethics at all. I am pretty sure he had a drug problem also. Either that or he was just downright nuts. He came and went as he pleased. In the weeks leading up to the incident he was missing for days at a time. When he did show up, it was better to avoid him. He was a mess.

They eventually called him in and told him he had to straighten up, or else. He politely apologized, said no problem, and proceeded to change all the network and server passwords and remove everyone else's access. He then disappeared for good. It took the company a few days to figure out what had happened. There only choice was to completely rebuild a mirror company infrastructure. It took weeks and cost them a ton of cash.

That is just two of many things I have witnessed over the years as a consultant. You like to think you work with people you can trust, but everyone has the potential for having an off day and making a bad choice. The problem is being able to identify those individuals that are heading towards their bad day and their bad decision. This book is a tremendous resource in helping with that.

Below are the chapters and appendices included in the book.

Chapter 1: Overview
Chapter 2: Insider IT Sabotage
Chapter 3: Insider Theft of Intellectual Property
Chapter 4: Insider Fraud
Chapter 5: Insider Threat Issues in the Software Development Life Cycle
Chapter 6: Best Practices for the Prevention and Detection of Insider Threats
Chapter 7: Technical Insider Threat Controls
Chapter 8: Case Examples
Chapter 9: Conclusion and Miscellaneous Issues

Appendix A: Insider Threat Center Products and Services
Appendix B: Deeper Dive into the Data
Appendix C: CyberSecurity Watch Survey
Appendix D: Insider Threat Database Structure
Appendix E: Insider Threat Training Simulation: MERIT InterActive
Appendix F: System Dynamics Background

This book has categorized insider threats into IT Sabotage, theft of intellectual property (IP), and fraud. After the introduction in chapter 1 the book has a chapter on each category. It mainly covers attacks by current and former employees, contractors, and trusted business partners. They each cover patterns related to the crimes and offer mitigation strategies.

Insider IT Sabotage covers patterns like Personal Predispositions, Disgruntlement and Unmet Expectations, Behavioral Precursors, Stressful Events, Technical Precursors and Access Paths, and The Trust Trap. Some of the mitigation strategies include Handling Disgruntlement through Positive Intervention, Eliminating Unknown Access Paths, A Risk-Based Approach to Prioritizing Alerts, Measures upon Demotion or Termination, and Test Backup and Recovery Process.

Insider Theft of Intellectual Property patterns include Insider Contribution and Entitlement, Insider Dissatisfaction, Insider Theft and Deception, Insider Planning of Theft, and Increasing Access. This chapter also cover the who, what, and why of the crimes. Some of the mitigation strategies covered include Network Data Exfiltration, Host Data Exfiltration, Physical Exfiltration, Exfiltration of Specific Types of IP, and Concealment.

Insider Fraud patterns include Origins of Fraud, Outsider Facilitation, Recruiting Other Insiders into the Scheme, and Insider Stressors. This chapter also includes a cool who, why, what, and how section. This chapter countermeasure such as watching out for Inadequate Auditing of Critical and Irregular Processes, Employee/Coworker Susceptibility to Recruitment, Financial Problems, and Excessive Access Privilege.

The authors use MERIT (Management and Education of the Risk of Insider Threat) diagrams to design the most effective mitigation strategies. They really help put the threat into context. The really cool thing about the MERIT diagrams in the book is that they are mirrors of actual working system dynamics models. I wish these models were available for download.

The chapter on Insider Threat Issues in the Software Development Life Cycle really points out the importance of following a good SDLC and how a an inadequate job of following one can later lead to exploitations. It covers topics like Separation of Duties, Automated Data Integrity Checks, Exception Handling, Code Reviews, Attribution, System Deployment, and Backups.

Best Practices for the Prevention and Detection of Insider Threats is worth the price of the book. It covers 15 practices. A few of them include Consider Threats from Insiders and Business Partners in Enterprise-Wide Risk Assessments, Institute Periodic Security Awareness Training for All Employees, Anticipate and Manage Negative Workplace Issues, and Monitor and Respond to Suspicious or Disruptive Behavior, Beginning with the Hiring Process. Each principle includes section explaining what you can do, and offers a case study to give you an example of what can happen if you don't.

One of the things I like most about this book is all the examples that are included. They are very interesting. They help to put you in the shoes of a person that may commit a crime. They really will help you identify and head off attacks.

The CERT Insider Threat Center has a ton of additional information available. You can learn a lot form the site, but I highly recommend reading the book. It has put everything together in one place in a logical reading order.

Over all I think every single person that has anything to do with IT should read this book. Even if you don't deal with sensitive data, you are at risk for sabotage.

The CERT Guide to Insider Threats: How to Prevent, Detect, and Respond to Information Technology Crimes (Theft, Sabotage, Fraud) (SEI Series in Software Engineering)

Book Review: Succeeding with Agile

Wed, 22 Feb 2012 10:15:00 EST

Succeeding with Agile: Software Development Using Scrum Book Review

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 19:49:00 EST

I have been implementing and improving development processes for a while now. Either directly when I am brought in as a Software Process Engineer, or indirectly when I am brought in as a Software Architect. I have not been involved with process improvement on all my engagements. The ones I was not involved with already had a decent development process in place, or they already had an initiative underway.

I have never personally lead a process improvement initiative to Scrum. I always implement a configurable process repository that allows for everything from OpenUP, to UP, to RUP. I have never had the request for Scrum nor have I tried to sell it as an option. The main reason for that is until recently I have found it to be incomplete when it came to enterprise scale. The Scaled Agile Framework has taken the initiative and filled in the gaps. The book Agile Software Requirements: Lean Requirements Practices for Teams, Programs, and the Enterprise does a great job of covering the Scaled Agile Framework.

I have seen Scrum attempted multiple times. Depending on the perspective they all failed and they all succeeded. Watching from the sidelines, our consult team's view was they failed miserably, but according to the internal managers that made the choice to go with Scrum they were a huge success. Depending on who was asking the development team, us or the managers, they had completely different answers.

The most important party, the end user, saw no change to the quality of software delivered or slightly worse quality. They were never the wiser that the team was attempting Scrum, so their opinion didn't matter. What? Yep, in every single attempt I have witnessed the end user's role didn't change. Neither did the upper management, sales, or marketing. It was a development level attempt to implement a bottom up change that requires change at every level of any decent size organization.

I don't have to really go into any more detail explaining why the initiatives failed. By the way, if you are sitting there thinking, 'I must have missed something, why did they fail?', you absolutely must read this book!!!

This book down to earth does not just regurgitate Scrum practices, it provides tons of advice and examples from past experience. The book is for all levels of individuals and teams involved with or thinking about getting involved with Scrum.

The book is broken down into five parts. Getting Started, Individuals, Teams, The Organization, and Next Steps.

The chapter's titles are self explanatory. I have listed them by part below.

Part I: Getting Started- Why Becoming Agile Is Hard (But Worth It), ADAPTing to Scrum, Patterns for Adopting Scrum, Iterating Toward Agility, Your First Projects

Part II: Individuals- Overcoming Resistance, New Roles, Changed Roles, Technical Practices

Part III: Teams- Team Structure, Teamwork, Leading a Self-Organizing Team, The Product Backlog, Sprints, Planning, Quality

Part IV: The Organization- Scaling Scrum, Distributed Teams, Coexisting with Other Approaches, Human Resources, Facilities, and the PMO

Part V: Next Steps- Seeing How Far You’ve Come, You’re Not Done Yet

Every chapter gives in depth coverage of the topics included. What I like best about the book is all the examples the author includes from past experience. There is only two ways of gaining experience, gain by doing and learning yourself, or learning from others that are willing to share theirs with you. The author offers every ounce of his experience he has with both successes and failures. He does not pull punches. He gives accurate full accounts of the reasons for both.

There wasn't a chapter I did not enjoy or did not find valuable, but I really liked part two, Individuals. The first chapter in part two is Overcoming Resistance. I have experienced everything the author highlights in this chapter when I am involved with process improvement. You will need the advice offered in this chapter to succeed. People do not like change even when it is for the better. There will be those that make it their mission to sabotage your efforts.

Another really important chapter in part two is Changing Rolls. Not only is it important to understand what is changing about the rolls, but also understand the ones being eliminated, like the project manager. Although the project manager is being eliminated the responsibilities are not. In Scrum most of the responsibility is transferred to the team. This can be a major issue if the team can't handle them. You need to be careful to not just blindly axe the project manager.

Every time I have seen Scrum attempted the project managers are simply give the role of ScrumMaster. The problem I have seen though, is that they don't change anything they are doing. You don't have to do away with project managers, but at a minimum a name change is recommend. The author includes a great explanation as to why in this chapter. The chapter discusses changes to Analysts, Project Managers, Architects, Functional Managers, Programmers, Database Administrators, Testers and User Experience Designers.

Another thing I like about this book is that the author does not lose sight of the enterprise. He covers several topics throughout the book that enable scale and organization wide implementation. You may get lucky and Scrum may take off like wild fire after you have a small successful project, but odds are it will not. The author covers Enterprise Transition Community, scaling Scrum, distributed teams, epics, themes, and Scrum of Scrums.

There is nothing I can think of that I would have liked to see included that wasn't. This is one of the most enjoyable reads I have read in a while. The author's writing style is great. All the stories from past experience really help you to put the subject being covered into context. The stories also keep it interesting.

All in all I highly recommend this book to anyone getting involved with, or already involved with Scrum. It is an absolute must read!!!

Succeeding with Agile: Software Development Using Scrum

Warning about Pro Silverlight 5 in C# Publishing Issue - NO COLOR

Sat, 11 Feb 2012 10:35:00 EST

I just wanted to give everyone a heads up that Pro Silverlight 5 in C# is not printed in color. The cover has the full color inside advertisement, but the book I received today is only in black and white.

I am hoping this was a printer error because one of the things that made this book a really nice read was the color. I have contacted the author and the publisher and will update this post as I receive feedback.

I am sure the content is still great, and I will follow up with a full review after I have had the chance to read it, but I wanted to get a warning out.

TFS Process Template Content Comparison

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 15:47:24 EST

Scrum 1.0 vs Agile Software Development v5.0 vs CMMI Process Improvement v5.0 I recently had to decide which base template I wanted to use for a TFS project. I had not looked at the templates for a while and wanted to compare them to each other. I ended up just taking screenshots for each category's tab.

TFS Process Template Content Comparison - Scrum 1.0 vs Agile Software Development v5.0 vs CMMI Process Improvement v5.0

Fri, 10 Feb 2012 15:13:00 EST

I recently had to decide which base template I wanted to use for a TFS project. I had not looked at the templates for a while and wanted to compare them to each other. I ended up just taking screenshots for each category's tab. You can check them out in this PDF.

Book Review: The Definitive Guide to HTML5

Tue, 07 Feb 2012 08:30:00 EST

The Definitive Guide to HTML5 Book Review

Sat, 04 Feb 2012 23:16:00 EST

Although I started with Cold Fusion for application development, I did plenty brochureware sites with HTML. I believe the version was HTML 2.0 for IE 2.0. I lived in the browser world for years doing Cold Fusion, ASP, and HTML sites. When winforms and Smart Client with Web Services emerged I changed my religion. I have been avoiding the browser whenever possible since.

For the past couple of years my extent of using simple HTML has been limited to writing blogs and book reviews. Simple HTML means no ASP.NET or ASP.NET MVC. With all the HTML5 hype I figured I would take some time and read a few books on it. This one is my third and I have one more on the way.

So far I have found HTML5 is no different than any other version with respect to the way its capabilities are implemented and where it belongs when architecting a solution. It is far reaching, but if you want a rich HTML5 UI you will be writing a lot of JavaScript and CSS. It really can't be helped, that has always been the real skin and muscle on the HTML skeleton.

HTML5, JavaScript, and CSS are broad subjects. This book can help the beginner learn HTML5, JavaScript, and CSS and it can serve as a nice reference for the experienced developer. This tome definitely delivers a lot of information.

There are getting started chapters for beginner on HTML5, JavaScript, and CSS. They are followed by a chapter that puts all the elements the book covers into context. Meaning there are tables showing which elements are used for metadata, text, grouping, sectioning, tables, forms, and embedding.

The book continues with chapters covering Creating HTML Documents, Marking Up Text, Grouping Content, Creating Sections, Working with Tables, Working with Forms, Customizing the Input Element, Other Forms Elements & Input Validation, and Embedding Content.

The chapters list above are followed by an in-depth treatment of CSS and JavaScript. There are 16 chapters covering the topics in great detail.

The author then moves into more advanced features. It covers using ajax, multimedia, the canvas, drag and drop, geolocation, web storage, and creating offline applications.

The one thing the book does not do is stray from core browser capabilities. However, the author points out when using advanced libraries like jQuery would be advantageous. I am glad the author handled it this way. Instead of glossing over topics that need a complete book to cover completely, he kept the scope limit allow for more in-depth coverage of core browser capabilities.

The authors writing style is great, but the book also makes a great reference. Tons of tables and a nice index helps you to find things quickly.

The code is organized in folders by chapter. It is all usable and works like it is supposed to. I know this sounds like something that is just expected, but there have been some book's code I have downloaded that was disorganized to the point of being unusable. In a book like this, accompanying code is an important aspect.

If you are doing, or considering doing HTML5 development, you own it to yourself to have this book by your side. I highly recommend it to anyone involved with web development.

The Definitive Guide to HTML5

Pro .NET Best Practices Book Review

Sat, 28 Jan 2012 11:38:00 EST

I personally do not find software development an art form. It is not an unpredictable activity driven by crazy business users that come to work every day inventing a new way to operate their businesses just to savagely changing your requirements. Project teams that use changing requirements as an excuse for their dates constantly slipping and bugs being pushed to production are simply not good development teams and they are poorly managed. Even when you're in an environment where requirements are volatile, proper architecture and process engineering can level the playing field.

Book Review: XAML Developer Reference

Fri, 27 Jan 2012 09:00:00 EST

Perfect for those people looking to get into WPF, Silverlight, or XAML for Windows (Windows 8) development. I have read a lot of the WPF and Silverlight books out there and there are some good ones. The difference I find with this book is that it is XAML centric so the scope is more isolated. A few months ago a fellow developer of mine had to build some XAML forms to integrate with a third party shell. This book would have been the right level of information he needed to knock the project out. The first chapter offers an overview view of XAML. The introduction is followed by 8 more chapters and two appendices. The chapters include Object Elements and Attributes, XAML Properties and Events, Markup Extensions and Other Features, Resources, Styles, and Triggers, Layout and Positioning System, Form and Functional Controls, Data Binding, and Media, Graphics, and Animation.

XAML Developer Reference Book Review

Tue, 24 Jan 2012 21:30:00 EST

I have read a lot of the WPF and Silverlight books out there and there are some good ones. The difference I find with this book is that it is XAML centric so the scope is more isolated. A few months ago a fellow developer of mine had to build some XAML forms to integrate with a third party shell. This book would have been the right level of information he needed to knock the project out.

The first chapter offers an overview view of XAML. The introduction is followed by 8 more chapters and two appendices. The chapters include Object Elements and Attributes, XAML Properties and Events, Markup Extensions and Other Features, Resources, Styles, and Triggers, Layout and Positioning System, Form and Functional Controls, Data Binding, and Media, Graphics, and Animation.

Each chapter goes in-depth into the topic at hand. Each topic is defined and then demonstrated through a practical example. There are not 10 examples showing the same thing, and they are explained in a way that makes them easy to understand.

The authors also do a good job of making use of tables, screenshots, and diagrams without going overboard. I have seen a few books that went way overboard.

The two appendices are Major Namespaces and Classes and XAML Editors and Tools. The Major Namespaces appendix give a nice list of all the major namespaces in Silverlight and WPF. It includes the class and the description and makes for a nice summary of the available tools found in each library.

The author does a good job of pointing you to additional information by including links where appropriate.

Although the author touches on the Silverlight Toolkit, I would have liked to see more coverage and coverage of the WPF Toolkit features.

The downloadable code is all there, but is a little confusing some places. Most of the samples are in projects and those ore well organized, but they also include text file snippets. The author names the snippet files by number, but the book does not label them at all. An example is chapter 9 has 33 snippets of code which is nice, but you have to use a file searcher to find the one you want. Not that big of a deal, and I would rather have them, than not.

I found the authors writing style made the book an easy cover to cover read. The book also includes a nice index which helps to make it a nice reference.

I think this book is perfect for those people looking to get into WPF, Silverlight, or XAML for Windows (Windows 8) development. It gets you up to speed fast on the ins and outs of XAML.

XAML Developer Reference

Book Review: Continuous Integration in .NET

Tue, 24 Jan 2012 07:00:00 EST

I still remember the first time I was on a project that used NAnt and CruiseControl.NET. It was years ago and both were new tools with plenty of bugs. The project manager took one of the team's architects and dedicated him to getting CI up and running. I didn't work with him for another 9 months. It was a complete nightmare. Every morning was dedicated to finding out why the builds failed, fixing the issue, and then manually rerunning the builds until successful. Then it was off to show management the new build reports. It didn't take long for them to not want to be hassled with the process. A year after it all began the code base was removed from the CI process and went back to manual builds. Not a very good story to start the review of a book on CI that I highly recommend you read. Times have changed, the tools have improved, and with books like this available you have no reason to not give CI a go. You may have plenty of excuses, but no reasons. Luckily this book contains a nice summary of excuses commonly used and does a nice job of debunking them.