develpreneur podcast
Posted on Three Ways To Improve

Win Projects And Jobs Better With These Three Tips

Our career path will inevitably require us to try to win projects or land a job.  There are simply no ways to avoid that.  That means that almost every time you apply for a project or position, there will be others to compete against.  Here are three ways to put your best foot forward and separate your proposal from the others.  While these do not guarantee wins, they will help you stand out and get you in the door (literally or figuratively). Win Projects By Addressing Details The easiest way for someone to throw out a proposal is when it does not address the requirements.  Boilerplate applications and responses that skip over the details will almost always be ignored before... Read more

develpreneur podcast
Posted on Three Ways To Improve

Three Tips To Avoid Writer’s Block And Find Content Topics

Writer’s block is a nasty situation when you are trying to crank out regular content.  This may be for a blog, a podcast, or a brown bag lunch session.  In all of these cases, we want to get straight to the work of creating the content.  When we lack a topic or direction, that is not an option.  This situation can lead to a lot of lost time while we try to find a subject.  However, there are some areas where we can explore and often get past that block quickly. Recent Events The first area to explore is recent events.  Although technology moves fast, the other areas of our life tend to be dynamic.  That means any area of... Read more

develpreneur podcast
Posted on Three Ways To Improve

Three Tips for Faster Debugging

It is time for honesty.  There is a dirty little secret we need to discuss.  It might be surprising even.  However, we need to talk about the bugs in our code.  We all would like to think about writing error-free code.  Unfortunately, we also all know that we code bugs more than we want to admit.  Therefore, we spend a substantial amount of our time debugging errors ranging from typos to logical flaws.  That leads to the topic of this episode.  Here are three ways to approach your mistakes that will lead to faster debugging. Verify The Source is Correct The most common source of errors is not logic or even typos.  It is an out-of-date piece of source code. ... Read more

Posted on Become a Better Developer

Key Considerations For Evaluating Software – A Template For Success

We all will have a time where we need to evaluate and select a software solution.  This moment can seem daunting when we need to be confident in making the best decision.  We do not want to choose poorly for our personal use and can experience a career impact when we do so professionally.  Thus, we need a process that we can lean on to help us be thorough and focused on the things that matter.  In this presentation on evaluating software, we look at steps to take that will help you make (and defend) the best decision. A Plan For Evaluating Software The most important part about any evaluation os to create a method for scoring the options.  Once... Read more

develpreneur podcast
Posted on Three Ways To Improve

Build a Better To-Do List With These Three Tips

Steady progress is an essential step in becoming a better developer.  One tool for achieving this is to create a good set of tasks to complete.  A daily list is an excellent starting point for building this habit.  However, not all approaches are the same.  Keep these three items in mind so you can create a better to-do list each day. Simple/Actionable The central idea of a to-do list is to provide a simple plan for getting things done.  Thus, these tasks must be well-defined and easy for you to understand.  We want to be able to hold ourselves accountable for our list.  That is where the simple requirement comes in.  We are listing items that will either be “done”... Read more

develpreneur podcast
Posted on Three Ways To Improve

Three Key Skills For Database Developers

Relational databases are an essential piece of many modern solutions.  Thus, most developers have some exposure to SQL within the first few years of their careers.  Nevertheless, there are a few skills that separate database developers from others.  These three areas make a significant difference between those that want to stick out from their peers. Understand Joins (Inner, Outer, etc.) Relational databases are all about the relationships among data.  That means you are limited in how you can utilize these tools until you can leverage the relationships as part of a query.  Database relationships, at their most simple, will be among tables.  That leads to joins.  If you are struggling to understand how to join data from two (or more)... Read more