Team - Multiple Branches Management Strategy | Flexibility | Productivity

Oops…! It's an era of Agile-Scrum-Sprint.

This is still okay but What about Monthly Releases and delivering various features using Jenkins as continuous integration (CI) tool?

Nowadays single team is working on different modules and various stories around them.

Working as a Technical Leader/Development Manager one may face difficulties in delivering various features in the same release.

This may be due to below considerable points:

• All features and issues are getting fixed on a single branch.
• Late identification of Technical Feasibility.
• Third Party dependency (UI/UX/Core Team).
• DEV/QA Team runtime bandwidth.
• Last moment urgent Production Bugs.

As a general practice and to avoid branch management, traditional teams have only one branch per release.

Changes done in that branch are targeting:

• New Feature/Story
• Bug Fixes
• Performance Fixes.

If any of the story/performance fixes can cause a delay that will lead to impacting timelines for other stories.

• This has to consider the overall effort to put in the last moment to roll back those changes.
• Again this leads to compromising the quality of the deliverable.
• Dev team gets less time to analyze the impact-areas.
• QA Team will get less time to verify the changes done.
• Marginally less/no time for regression.
• *Most importantly Handling pressure from upper management and criticism.

Below diagram gives pictorial representation of Teams' changes in Single Branch:

Let's try to analyze the scenario – Time for WH Questions!

·         What Team is doing?

o   Creating a Single branch from the Production/Stable branch for a release.

o   Making changes for Bug fixes, Performance issue fixes, and Story Development in a Single Branch.

·         Why Team is doing changes in the Single Branch?

o   Avoid extra branch management.

o   Availability of QA Environments.

o   Avoid Migration/Regression efforts on every branch.

·         How is it impacting?

o   Anything gets delayed entire feature suit is getting delayed for a release.

o   Timelines are getting missed.

o   Last moment extra efforts without deeper analysis.

o   Compromising Quality of deliverables due to lesser Testing Time.

It's time to change the way changes are getting pushed in Single Branch and come up with multiple branching strategies.

Let's summarize what needs to be achieved & HOW?

•  Need to have Feature-Shelf so that based on decision any time any Merge-Ready Feature can be released in production with good quality.
• Want to have no pressure from management for technical items.

·       No impact of any Story development/release plan decision on other Story.

o   How? à Separate Branch for each Story and Performance Fixes.

·         Every Story branch should have the latest issues fixed in this release.

o   How? à Separate Branch for Bug Fixes name it : team_fixes.

§  Create Story Branch from team_fixes branch and keep merging on regular basis.

·         Where to push a fix for Story Defects?

o   Every fix for Story Defect must be pushed in the respective team_story_x branch only.

·         Single Environment for QA to validate all these changes.

o   How? à Create team_story branch where all story (team_fixes, team_story_1…. team_story_N) and performance(team_perf) branches are merged on daily basis if those are stable. J

o   Migration and Regression will be done on single environment. (Same Target as using Single Branch Previously)

·         Jenkins/CI:

o   Run Compile & Test Execution job on individual branch.

o   If Selenium tests written have single Job for team_story branch.

Please refer below diagram for suggested Branching Strategy.

Please feel free to comment to this article for any suggestion and queries.

Team - On Track Concept Using JIRA and Confluence

If you are using JIRA and used its Search Feature to look for particular issue or list of issues, it's very cumbersome to do that every time.

One may find lots of Drop-downs for various fields for creating JIRA Filter Criteria using BASIC Query.

To do advance querying, one may require Knowledge about JQL – JIRA Query Language and fields used in JIRA.

Considering overall efforts to look-up and get stats every time one can store such queries as a JIRA Filter.

For a Scrum Master or Development Manager keeping track of various Features, Story-defects and Product issues is not an easy task for every day.

One have to think, Dev Manager generally takes care of multiple modules and different teams.

To do this task more productively, we can use Confluence along with JIRA to have customize Dashboard.

This article will help to know more about what your daily-dynamic Dashboard should have and how to prepare the one using Confluence-JIRA-Filters.

As I have pure technical background and love to follow coding principles, I am trying to avoid repeating the items each time and each place.

Before we dive into knowing what are the things to be done for Tracking the Team Stats, we should be knowing which items we should look for.

On day-to-day basis, every team generally works on Sprint tasks, so it may be Stories, Story Defects, Bugs, Testing or Miscellaneous Items.

All these things can be tracked in JIRA against different issue types by creating tasks and sub-tasks for EPIC, Story, Story Defect, Bug, Sub-Tasks, etc.

There is a good article about Agile-Sprint Planning, refer this link:requirements-epic-feature-user-story-task-size-and-estimation-in-agile-and-scrum.

Considering all the things are followed and are available in JIRA, now we have below items with us to track:

·         Product Backlog/Roadmap.

·         Bugs/Issues in released Product.

·         Current Sprint:

o   Stories, Defects, Sub-Tasks, Testing, Bugs etc.

·         Miscellaneous:

o   Quality Stats.

o   Performance stats.

I want to limit this article about Which things to be tracked in a Sprint using JIRA.

This who knows about JIRA Issue creation and its workflow usage, can move to next part of this article.

Please refer below diagram about creation of different issues and using JIRA attributes.

Every JIRA tasks has workflow associated with it. It is good to have information about respective workflow statuses.

Please refer below for EPIC/Story and can be customized based on your organizational strategy.

Keyboard Shorcuts (Microsoft Windows)

1. CTRL+C (Copy)
2. CTRL+X (Cut)
3. CTRL+V (Paste)
4. CTRL+Z (Undo)
5. DELETE (Delete)
6. SHIFT+DELETE (Delete the selected item permanently without placing the item in the Recycle Bin)
7. CTRL while dragging an item (Copy the selected item)
8. CTRL+SHIFT while dragging an item (Create a shortcut to the selected item)
9. F2 key (Rename the selected item)
10. CTRL+RIGHT ARROW (Move the insertion point to the beginning of the next word)
11. CTRL+LEFT ARROW (Move the insertion point to the beginning of the previous word)
12. CTRL+DOWN ARROW (Move the insertion point to the beginning of the next paragraph)
13. CTRL+UP ARROW (Move the insertion point to the beginning of the previous paragraph)
14. CTRL+SHIFT with any of the arrow keys (Highlight a block of text) SHIFT with any of the arrow keys (Select more than one item in a window or on the desktop, or select text in a document)
15. CTRL+A (Select all)
16. F3 key (Search for a file or a folder)
17. ALT+ENTER (View the properties for the selected item)
18. ALT+F4 (Close the active item, or quit the active program)
19. ALT+ENTER (Display the properties of the selected object)
20. ALT+SPACEBAR (Open the shortcut menu for the active window)
21. CTRL+F4 (Close the active document in programs that enable you to have multiple documents opensimultaneou sly)
22. ALT+TAB (Switch between the open items)
23. ALT+ESC (Cycle through items in the order that they had been opened)
24. F6 key (Cycle through the screen elements in a window or on the desktop)
25. F4 key (Display the Address bar list in My Computer or Windows Explorer)
26. SHIFT+F10 (Display the shortcut menu for the selected item) 27. ALT+SPACEBAR (Display the System menu for the active window)
28. CTRL+ESC (Display the Start menu)
29. ALT+Underlined letter in a menu name (Display the corresponding menu) Underlined letter in a command name on an open menu (Perform the corresponding command)
30. F10 key (Activate the menu bar in the active program)
31. RIGHT ARROW (Open the next menu to the right, or open a submenu)
32. LEFT ARROW (Open the next menu to the left, or close a submenu)
33. F5 key (Update the active window)
34. BACKSPACE (View the folder onelevel up in My Computer or Windows Explorer)
35. ESC (Cancel the current task)
36. SHIFT when you insert a CD- ROMinto the CD-ROM drive (Prevent the CD-ROM from automatically playing)

Dialog Box - Keyboard Shortcuts

1. CTRL+TAB (Move forward through the tabs)
2. CTRL+SHIFT+TAB (Move backward through the tabs)
3. TAB (Move forward through the options)
4. SHIFT+TAB (Move backward through the options)
5. ALT+Underlined letter (Perform the corresponding command or select the corresponding option)
6. ENTER (Perform the command for the active option or button)
7. SPACEBAR (Select or clear the check box if the active option is a check box)
8. Arrow keys (Select a button if the active option is a group of option buttons)
9. F1 key (Display Help)
10. F4 key (Display the items in the active list)
11. BACKSPACE (Open a folder one level up if a folder is selected in the Save As or Open dialog box)

Microsoft Natural Keyboard Shortcuts
1. Windows Logo (Display or hide the Start menu)
2. Windows Logo+BREAK (Display the System Properties dialog box)
3. Windows Logo+D (Display the desktop)
4. Windows Logo+M (Minimize all of the windows)
5. Windows Logo+SHIFT+M (Restorethe minimized windows)
6. Windows Logo+E (Open My Computer)
7. Windows Logo+F (Search for a file or a folder)
8. CTRL+Windows Logo+F (Search for computers)
9. Windows Logo+F1 (Display Windows Help)
10. Windows Logo+ L (Lock the keyboard)
11. Windows Logo+R (Open the Run dialog box)
12. Windows Logo+U (Open Utility Manager)
13. Accessibility Keyboard Shortcuts
14. Right SHIFT for eight seconds (Switch FilterKeys either on or off)
15. Left ALT+left SHIFT+PRINT SCREEN (Switch High Contrast either on or off)
16. Left ALT+left SHIFT+NUM LOCK (Switch the MouseKeys either on or off)
17. SHIFT five times (Switch the StickyKeys either on or off)
18. NUM LOCK for five seconds (Switch the ToggleKeys either on or off)
19. Windows Logo +U (Open Utility Manager)
20. Windows Explorer Keyboard Shortcuts
21. END (Display the bottom of the active window)
22. HOME (Display the top of the active window)
23. NUM LOCK+Asterisk sign (*) (Display all of the subfolders that are under the selected folder)
24. NUM LOCK+Plus sign (+) (Display the contents of the selected folder)

MMC COnsole Windows Shortcut keys
1. SHIFT+F10 (Display the Action shortcut menu for the selected item)
2. F1 key (Open the Help topic, if any, for the selected item)
3. F5 key (Update the content of all console windows)
4. CTRL+F10 (Maximize the active console window)
5. CTRL+F5 (Restore the active console window)
6. ALT+ENTER (Display the Properties dialog box, if any, for theselected item)
7. F2 key (Rename the selected item)
8. CTRL+F4 (Close the active console window. When a console has only one console window, this shortcut closes the console)

Remote Desktop Connection Navigation
1. CTRL+ALT+END (Open the Microsoft Windows NT Security dialog box)
2. ALT+PAGE UP (Switch between programs from left to right)
3. ALT+PAGE DOWN (Switch between programs from right to left) 4. ALT+INSERT (Cycle through the programs in most recently used order)
5. ALT+HOME (Display the Start menu)
6. CTRL+ALT+BREAK (Switch the client computer between a window and a full screen)
7. ALT+DELETE (Display the Windows menu)
8. CTRL+ALT+Minus sign (-) (Place a snapshot of the active window in the client on the Terminal server clipboard and provide the same functionality as pressing PRINT SCREEN on a local computer.)
9. CTRL+ALT+Plus sign (+) (Place asnapshot of the entire client window area on the Terminal server clipboardand provide the same functionality aspressing ALT+PRINT SCREEN on a local computer.)

Microsoft Internet Explorer Keyboard Shortcuts
1. CTRL+B (Open the Organize Favorites dialog box)
2. CTRL+E (Open the Search bar)
3. CTRL+F (Start the Find utility)
4. CTRL+H (Open the History bar)
5. CTRL+I (Open the Favorites bar)
6. CTRL+L (Open the Open dialog box)
7. CTRL+N (Start another instance of the browser with the same Web address)
8. CTRL+O (Open the Open dialog box,the same as CTRL+L)
9. CTRL+P (Open the Print dialog box)
10. CTRL+R (Update the current Web )

Notepad++ : Another good tool discovered for developers

This is very handy tool having rich file types support and syntax highlighting.

I found it quite handy if you are dealing with any Character Encoding related issues or 

Need to verify or view various characters like TAB, Carriage Return(CR), Line Feed(LF) or New Line Characters.

It also supports very reach support for Character Encoding.

Listed below the features from its official website:

• Syntax Highlighting and Syntax Folding
• User Defined Syntax Highlighting and Folding: screenshot 1, screenshot 2, screenshot 3 and screenshot 4
• PCRE (Perl Compatible Regular Expression) Search/Replace
• GUI entirely customizable: minimalist, tab with close button, multi-line tab, vertical tab and vertical document list
• Document Map
• Auto-completion: Word completion, Function completion and  Function parameters hint
• Multi-Document (Tab interface)
• Multi-View
• WYSIWYG (Printing)
• Zoom in and zoom out
• Multi-Language environment supported
• Bookmark
• Macro recording and playback
• Launch with different arguments

You can DOWNLOAD this from below link:

http://notepad-plus-plus.org/download/v6.3.1.html

OUTLOOK Shortcuts

Some useful OUTLOOK shortcuts:

• Alt + . (period) Open the Address Book with the To field selected
• Alt + A Open the Action drop-down menu
• Alt + B Open the Address Book with the BCC field selected
• Alt + C Select message recipients for CC field
• Alt + D Switch to Daily calendar view
• Alt + E Open the Edit drop-down menu
• Alt + F Open the File drop-down menu
• Alt + G Open the Go drop-down menu
• Alt + H Open the Help drop-down menu
• Alt + I Open the Find tool bar / Open the Insert drop-down menu
• Alt + J Move to the Subject field
• Alt + K Check names in the To, CC, or BCC field against the Address Book (cursor must be in the corresponding message header field)
• Alt + L Reply All
• Alt + M Switch to Monthly calendar view
• Alt + N Open the Accounts drop-down menu
• Alt + O Open the Format drop-down menu / Switch to Today calendar view
• Alt + P Open the Message Options dialog box
• Alt + R Reply / Switch to Work Week Calendar view
• Alt + S Send
• Alt + T Open the Tools drop-down menu
• Alt + V Open the View drop-down menu
• Alt + W Forward an item / Switch to Weekly calendar view
• Alt + Y Switch to Daily calendar view
• Ctrl + 1 Go to Mail
• Ctrl + 2 Go to Calendar
• Ctrl + 3 Go to Contacts
• Ctrl + 4 Go to Tasks
• Ctrl + 5 Go to Notes
• Ctrl + 6 Go to Folder List
• Ctrl + 7 Go to Shortcuts
• Ctrl + 8 Go to Journal
• Ctrl + A Select all
• Ctrl + B Bold when editing a rich text message
• Ctrl + C Copy
• Ctrl + D Delete an item (message, task, contact, etc.)
• Ctrl + E Activate the Find drop-down menu / Center Align when editing a rich text message
• Ctrl + F Forward
• Ctrl + J Open a new Journal Entry from the selected item (message, task, contact, etc.)
• Ctrl + K Check names in the To, CC, or BCC field against the Address Book (cursor must be in the corresponding message header field)
• Ctrl + M Send/Receive all
• Ctrl + O Open
• Ctrl + P Print
• Ctrl + Q Mark the selected message Read
• Ctrl + R Reply
• Ctrl + S Save a draft message
• Ctrl + T Tab
• Ctrl + U Mark the selected message Unread
• Ctrl + V Paste
• Ctrl + X Cut
• Ctrl + Y Go to Folder
• Ctrl + Z Undo
• Ctrl + Backspace Delete the previous word
• Ctrl + End Move to the end
• Ctrl + Home Move to the beginning
• Ctrl + Shift + A Open a new Appointment
• Ctrl + Shift + B Open the Address Book
• Ctrl + Shift + C Create a new Contact
• Ctrl + Shift + E Open a new folder
• Ctrl + Shift + F Open the Advanced Find window
• Ctrl + Shift + G Flag message for follow up
• Ctrl + Shift + J Open a new Journal Entry
• Ctrl + Shift + K Open a new Task
• Ctrl + Shift + L Open a new Distribution List
• Ctrl + Shift + M Open a new Message
• Ctrl + Shift + N Open a new Note
• Ctrl + Shift + O Switch to the Outbox
• Ctrl + Shift + P Open the New Search Folder window
• Ctrl + Shift + Q Open a new Meeting Request
• Ctrl + Shift + R Reply All
• Ctrl + Shift + S Open a new Discussion
• Ctrl + Shift + U Open a new Task Request
• Ctrl + Shift + Y Copy a Folder
• Shift + Tab Select the previous message header button or field
• F1 Open Outlook Help
• F3 Activate the Find toolbar
• F4 Open the Find window
• F7 Spellcheck
• F9 Send and receive all
• F10 Select File from the Outlook toolbar button
• F11 Activate the "Find a contact" dialog box
• F12 Save As
• Alt + F4 Close the active window

Dropping all DB tables, views, indexes, sequences in one query.

Most of the time one faces the issues like one need to delete all the tables, views, indexes or sequences in the database.
So following the query which generates DROP statements for all the components present in the Oracle database:

SELECT 'DROP TABLE ' || table_name || ';' AS statement FROM user_tables
Union
SELECT 'DROP VIEW ' || view_name || ';' AS statement from user_views
Union
SELECT 'DROP INDEX ' || index_name || ';' AS statement from user_indexes
Union
SELECT 'DROP SEQUENCE ' || sequence_name || ';' AS statement from user_sequences
Union
SELECT 'DROP SYNONYM ' || SYNONYM_name || ';' AS statement from user_SYNONYMs;

Cheers :)

Productivity Tool - PowerPro

The PowerPro software provides the user with a launch bar that is both compact and powerful. It also includes a menu and tray icon functionality. The program integrates three functionalities. It can run commands such as tool bars, tray icons, scheduler, menus, timer, mouse and hot keys. The PowerPro software can also be used by the user to close, maximize, minimize, position, roll-up to caption and tray minimize other program's windows. The program also provides utility functions. It can send keystrokes to programs, provide virtual desktops, run commands when Windows first opens, serve as a clipboard extender, can shutdown, enable keyboard macros, show all folder files in a menu, enable sounds, wallpaper and screensaver activation as well as randomization.

In practical scenarios, software professionals can use this to :

·         Add List of putties to connect to various servers and get rid of typing username password each time.
Command is as follows:
putty.exe -ssh <UserName>@<ServerIP> -pw <Password>
·         Create shortcuts to various software.
·         Create shortcuts to documentation page(so no need to open browser and then search for bookmark if done).

You can more explore about this software using following link:

·         Home Page: http://powerpro.webeddie.com/index.html
·         Feature & Configuration Demo: http://powerpro.webeddie.com/tour/index.htm

So after exploring this, you can save time and concentrate on other work :)

Cheers!!!

Keynote NF : Handy and productive tool to manage notes.

I would like to let you know about a good lightweight tool : Keynote NF

As we use notepad to save various important notes or mark some to-dos.

Due to this desktop gets messy and its trouble to find things which we have written for our simplicity :)

Using keynote one can save the important notes or any under process notes in single file.

It is having various features, I have found few of it while its usage:

• Simple to use and Lightweight – When not in use keeps running in background.
• Freeware – No licenses.
• Supports Rich Text and various feature like MS Word.
• Alarm / Reminders.
• Tree based to arrangements of notes and multiple tabs.
• Good search capabilities.
• No need to install – Unzip and start using it.

You can explore it more and I am sure you may find it handy as compared to using notepad.

Here are details about Keynote NF:

http://code.google.com/p/keynote-nf/

Keynote NF Downloads (No need to install – Unzip and Use it):

Release_1.7.8.1 (true version).rar – Size 1.76 MB

Cheers!

Use Productivity Tool : StrokeIt !!!

While working on various windows tired of minimizing, opening, doing various operations.
Now time to move on to StrokeIt - Mouse Gestures for Windows. : http://www.tcbmi.com/strokeit/

Want to download StrokeIt, use the following link:
http://www.tcbmi.com/strokeit/downloads.shtml

It is also FUN to use this tool using your mouse :)

To get more information about how to use and other details, check out following link:
http://www.tcbmi.com/strokeit/wiki/index.php?title=Help:Getting_started

Which Firefox Plug-ins are useful for developers to increase productivity?

While working with Web-Applications we need to test a lot of stuff in the browser.
As world wide most of browsers are used, I find the Mozilla firefox one of the coolest browser to use.
It is more helpful in testing your web applications, as you can install add-ons & plug ins to this browser.

I would like mentions some of the add-ons/Plug-ins for this browser which are useful for increasing your productivity & to do smart work... :)

Information of the plug ins/ add-ons have taken from their websites only, as whose product can explain well ;)

FireShot
FireShot is a Firefox extension that creates screenshots of web pages.
Unlike other extensions, this plugin provides a set of editing and annotation tools, which let users quickly modify captures and insert text and graphical annotations. Such functionality will be especially useful for web designers, testers and content reviewers.
It's possible to choose whether entire web page or only visible part of this page should be captured.
Screenshots can be uploaded to server, saved to disk (PNG, GIF, JPEG, BMP), copied to clipboard, e-mailed and sent to external editor for further processing.

FireBug
Firebug integrates with Firefox to put a wealth of web development tools at your fingertips while you browse. You can edit, debug, and monitor CSS, HTML, and JavaScript live in any web page

Speed up your web pages with YSlow
YSlow analyzes web pages and tells you why they're slow based on the rules for high performance web sites. YSlow is a Firefox add-on integrated with the popular Firebug web development tool.
YSlow gives you:
* Performance report card
* HTTP/HTML summary
* List of components in the page
* Tools including JSLint

Server Spy
Server Spy is a small Firefox extension that displays the brand of web servers (e.g. Apache, IIS, etc.) in the right-hand side of the browser window's status bar. When a tab is selected, Server Spy shows the name of the server that has served up the corresponding page.

LiveHttpHeaders
The goal of this project is to adds information about the HTTP headers in two ways:
* First by adding a 'Headers' tab in 'View Page Info' of a web page.
* Second by adding a tool in the 'Tools->Web Development' menu to be able to display http headers in real time (while pages are being downloaded from the Internet.
* Third by letting you edit request headers and replay an URL (beta). Look for the Replay button in the live window!

This project may be of some help for the following:
* Help debugging web application.
* See which kind of web server the remote site is using.
* See the cookies sent by remote site.

Fast Dial
Fast Dial replaces "about:blank" page with a panel of thumbnails of your favorite sites. Click on an empty cell, assign a site URL, click OK - a thumbnail will be generated for a site. You can also add sites opened in browser or existing bookmarks by right-clicking them and choosing "Add to Fast Dial" from context menu.
By checking "Group" checkbox in thumbnail properties you can create groups of nested thumbnails.

FireShot
FireShot is a Firefox extension that creates and edits screenshots of web pages.

Unlike other extensions, this plugin provides a set of editing and annotation tools, which let users quickly modify captures and insert text and graphical annotations.
Such functionality will be especially useful for web designers, testers and content reviewers.

Screenshots can be saved to disk (PNG, JPEG, BMP), copied to clipboard, e-mailed and sent to external editor for further processing.

iMacros
iMacros lets you record and replay repetitious work. iMacros programmatically interacts with any and all websites. It fills out forms and automates the download and upload of text, images, files and web pages. iMacros includes support for PDF handling, taking screenshots, simulating different user agents and connecting to proxy servers. It is the only web automation software that works with every website.

What iMacros can do?
(1) Web Automation / Web Scripting
(2) Data Extraction/Web Scraping/Web Mining/Enterprise Data Mash-Ups
(3) Web Testing
(4) Form Filler on Steroids and Password Manager
(5) iMacros as Software component

Session Manager
Session Manager saves and restores the state of all windows.
Building upon SessionStore, this extension allows you to save the current state of Firefox (history, text data, cookies) and return to that state at any later moment. Besides the manually saved states, Session Manager automatically stores the current state in case of a crash.

Web Developer
Web Developer screenshot The Web Developer extension adds a menu and a toolbar to the browser with various web developer tools. It is designed for Firefox, Flock and Seamonkey, and will run on any platform that these browsers support including Windows, Mac OS X and Linux.

DownThemAll
DownThemAll (or just dTa) is a powerful yet easy-to-use Mozilla Firefox extension that adds new advanced download capabilities to your browser.
DownThemAll lets you download all the links or images contained in a webpage and much more: you can refine your downloads by fully customizable criteria to get only what you really want.
DownThemAll is all you can desire from a download manager: it features an advanced accelerator that increases speed up to 400%, it allows you to pause and resume downloads at any time and, last but not least, it's fully integrated into your favorite browser!

Hyperwords
With Hyperwords all the text on the web becomes richly interactive: Select any word on any page and choose a command.
It's free! For more information, please have a look at the user guide or have a look at the demo. Read the reviews on Mozilla if you like.