XTC-Boston - October 2, 2008 at Kinsale's

The next meeting will be:

* Thursday, October 2, from 6:30pm
* The Kinsale Irish Pub and Restaurant, 2 Center Plaza, Boston, MA 02108

In this meeting, we'll discuss "Transitioning to Agile".

How quickly can a transition be made? Whar changes are best to start with? How do you measure success?

We'll also discuss XTC itself - see "How can we improve eXtreme Thursday".

How can we improve eXtreme Thursday?

It's approximately a year since we started XTC. In that year, we've had some very good meetings, but also some that were tiny and one that was just me enjoying a drink by myself...

Some thoughts on changes that might help:

Settle on a location

Kinsale's seems appropriate based on our experiences.

Select a main topic for each meeting

I'll propose a topic for the October meeting.

Schedule more frequent meetings

Might have an interesting counter-intuitive effect.

Note who's attending

We're getting a bit of this from meetup. Can it be improved? London does this by a wiki.

I'd love to hear other ideas. What would make this group more useful to you?

XTC-Boston - September 4, 2008 at Kinsale's

The September meeting will be:

* Thursday, September 4 from 6:30pm
* The Kinsale Irish Pub and Restaurant, 2 Center Plaza, Boston, MA 02108

Agile Bazaar FIT4Data presentation July 31

In several of our XTC meetings, we have discussed the use of Fit: Framework for Integrated Test, and another local agile group is holding an interesting related session at 6 PM July 31 on the MIT campus, in building E51, room 315.

In this session, Adrian Mowat will describe how he test-drives database migration code using a database tool layered on top of the Java implementation of FIT.

For a bit more description, see http://agilebazaar.org/.

XTC-Boston - August 14, 2008 at Kinsale's

The schedule is changing to the second Thursday for this month because the regular date would put it during the Agile2008 conference in Toronto, which some of our members will be attending.

The August meeting will be:

* Thursday, August 14 from 6:30pm
* The Kinsale Irish Pub and Restaurant, 2 Center Plaza, Boston, MA 02108

July 3 Meeting canceled

Something else has come up on my schedule, and I have no indication anyone else was planning to attend.

We'll try to meet in August!

XTC-Boston - July 3, 2008 at Kinsale's

The June meeting was light - just two of us, and I was late for it. But I had a good rambling talk with Jason, about story sizing and splitting, kanban boards, his experiences working at ThoughtWorks, my adventures in job-hunting, and assorted languages.

This month, we'll return again to Kinsale's, which is convenient for most of the regulars and has worked well in the past. If we finally settle on a recurring venue, this is likely to be it.

The schedule puts us very close to a major holiday, so people may be out of town. If it looks likely I'm going to be all alone, I might cancel. Please try to let me know if you plan to attend. If I decide to cancel, I'll put up a notice.

The July meeting will be:

* Thursday, July 3 from 6:30pm
* The Kinsale Irish Pub and Restaurant, 2 Center Plaza, Boston, MA 02108

XTC-Boston - June 12, 2008 at Tavern in the Square

The May meeting was small but pretty good anyway, at least in my opinion.

I arrived early and waited at the bar. I was delighted to discover that instead of peanuts at the bar, Felt had wasabi peas. Yum! Rumor is that Felt frequently has events on Thursdays with cover charge though, so it doesn't work as a permanent hangout.

Three of us (Don, Dave and Duane) met and discussed many things, including Python/Jython, Scala, FIT, computing in ancient times, and my job options (I'm still looking ...).

The schedule is changing to the second Thursday for next month because of a conflict I have for the regular date.

We're going to a place in Central Square, Cambridge that I recently saw work very well for a different group.

The June meeting will be:

* Thursday, June 12 from 6:30pm
* The Tavern in the Square, 730 Mass Ave, Cambridge, MA 02139

XTC-Boston - May 1, 2008 at Felt

The April meeting was a smashing success, with a near-record 10 people attending.

This month, we're going to try a new place suggested at a previous meeting.

The May meeting will be:

* Thursday, May 1 from 6:30pm
* Felt, 533 Washington Street, Boston, MA 02111

This is a nightclub and restaurant on three floors with billiard tables. We hope we'll be able to find a quiet spot in it on a Thursday night, and maybe we'll even play some pool while talking about agile software development.

XTC-Boston - April 3, 2008 at Kinsale

This month, we'll return to Kinsale's, and expect to have some guests from the Cyrus NYC team. Sorry for the late decision on venue.

The April meeting will be:

* Thursday, April 3 from 6:30pm
* The Kinsale Irish Pub and Restaurant, 2 Center Plaza, Boston, MA 02108

New England Agile Bazaar March 27, 2008

Topic: Developer Workspaces Enable Agile Teams

Workspace Management is often an afterthought for teams, agile or not.
For teams to work effectively developers need mechanisms to help
ensure that their changes will integrate well with others' work. Good
workspace practices also improve team productivity by avoiding "works
for me" conversations and by decreasing ramp up times when people
start new projects.

This talk will discuss some of the patterns and practices for
workspace management that you can apply to help developers be more
effective.

Speaker: Steve Berczuk, Cyrus Innovation.

Steve Berczuk has been developing software applications for over 20
years, and is an evangelist for practices that enable agile teams.
Steve is a Certified Scrum Master (Practicing), the author of Software
Configuration Management Patterns: Effective Teamwork, Practical
Integration and a columnist for CM Crossroads.

• TIME: 6:30 - 9:00pm
• Networking: 6:00 - 6:30pm
• LOCATION: MIT E51-315
• COST: free
• RSVP: None required.
• DIRECTIONS: See directions on AgileBazaar site

XTC-BOSTON - March 6th, 2008

In February, five of us met at An Tain and had some quite good conversations, but changed venue half way through because the bar was quite load. We're going to try the bar we switched to again.

We'll keep trying out different locations in hopes of finding one more conducive to discussion.

The next meeting will be:

* Thursday, March 6th from 6:30pm
* The Place, 2 Broad St., Boston, MA 02110

Mary Poppendeick in Worcester Jan 31

Appraisals and Compensation: The Elephant in the Room

Appraisals, bonuses, and compensation in general have a dramatic impact on individual and team performance, and yet these subjects tend to be avoided as if they were taboo. This talk will take a look the underlying conflict between individual rewards and teamwork. It will examine the history and literature of reward systems, particularly those in environments which require collaboration.

The location is a bit afield from Boston, but it is also possible to participate remotely.

This event is sponsored by another local Agile group - The New England Agile Bazaar. See the website for directions, schedule, and instructions for remote connection.

XTC-BOSTON - February 7th, 2008

Last week at Coogan's five eXtreme Thursday members - Heather Kanzer, Jason Wadsworth, J.L. Holup, Moss Collum and Don Roby (yours truly) - met and had some quite good conversations in spite of having to converse over a rather loudly miked trivia question game.

We'll keep trying out different locations in hopes of finding one more conducive to discussion. The decision to meet on Thursdays may continue to make this difficult, so we might at some point going back to Tuesdays. But not just yet...

The next meeting will be:

• Thursday, February 7th from 6:30pm
• An Tain, 31 India St, Boston, MA 02110
  

I don't know this place, but it was recommended as a nearby possibility. It may of course have similar problems on a Thursday night. It definitely has entertainment that would interfere on the weekends.