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The Seven Righteous Fights by Heidi Waterhouse There are seven fights that I have over and over again, whenever I start at a company. I'm here to convince you that it's valuable for everyone to have these things in mind from the inception of a project. Having these fights early prevents you from doing the software equivalent of poking chocolate chips into an already-baked cookie
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In her talk "The Seven Righteous Fights" at RubyConf 2015, Heidi Waterhouse discusses critical discussions that every software development project should embrace from the very start, emphasizing the importance of addressing potential challenges early on. By doing so, teams can avoid complicated adjustments later that can lead to project delays and quality issues. **Key Points Discussed:** - **Common Points of Failure:** Waterhouse identifies that sticking to familiar patterns can lead to failures in development. Individuals who only contribute during certain project phases may lack insights into later-stage challenges. - **Technical Debt and Compound Interest:** She likens technical debt to compound interest, stressing that mistakes made early can multiply in severity, leading to costly fixes down the road. - **Localization and Early Stage Development:** Using a case study from a product launch, she emphasizes the necessity of incorporating localization from the project's inception to avoid major hitches later, urging developers to build the necessary support from the start rather than hard-coding language labels. - **Security Best Practices:** Waterhouse urges the consideration of security in all stages of development, distinguishing between authentication and authorization, and advocating for building in encryption from the beginning. - **Extensibility:** The importance of designing software to work seamlessly with external systems and APIs is covered, using the analogy of building with Legos to highlight modularity. - **Documentation:** She emphasizes the role of comprehensive documentation in preventing knowledge silos, supporting effective onboarding, and ensuring that users can access important information without roadblocks. - **Affordance and Accessibility:** Waterhouse discusses the importance of designing software that is easy to use for all, with a focus on the accessibility of features, including colorblind-friendly design and support for assistive technologies. **Takeaways:** Waterhouse concludes by reiterating the importance of engaging users throughout the development process. She stresses the necessity of building empathy and understanding their needs to create quality software, positing that aligning development practices with user experiences leads to better outcomes. She calls for a culture where accessibility, security, and usability are prioritized throughout the design and development stages.
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