Making technical demos more engaging

You've completed the sprint - the goal was hit and you're ready to demo your new changes! But it's only you and the product owner who have turned up to the session - the other stakeholders "couldn't make it". You continue with your slides showing code samples and architecture diagrams to show how your cool … Continue reading Making technical demos more engaging →

When RAG statuses go bad

We can tell when the use of a RAG status is going to be ineffective - when the statuses haven't been defined. If we don't give definitions to what red, amber, and green mean then things can start to unravel later on. In this post I suggest three ways a RAG status can be misused … Continue reading When RAG statuses go bad →

Stop trying to solve hard problems!

Earlier this week I had a discussion about the running time of an algorithm used to test a method. This got me thinking about one of my favourite areas of computer science - computational complexity. We can use complexity theory to split problems into classes. Understanding some of these classes can help us to recognise when … Continue reading Stop trying to solve hard problems! →

A perfect matching of complex roots

As part of a placement earlier this year, I was given two sets of functions to play with. The first set was implemented in both MATLAB and FORTRAN and formed a root-finding algorithm. The second was implemented in only MATLAB but promised shorter running times and greater accuracy. The task was to compare the two … Continue reading A perfect matching of complex roots →