http://www.martinicity.net/articles_controller.rb/tag?tag=programmingmusician en-us 40 Mike Blake # Practice. <p> <ol> <li>Music When <a href="http://www.beefstewdios.com">Tony Macaluso</a> invites me to play bass at a gig, I need to prepare. Before I even start rehearsing songs, I break out my <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rickenbacker">Rickenbacker</a> and warm up with some scales.</li> </ol> <p></p> <ol> <li>Programming When I&#8217;m invited to help out with a software project I&#8217;m expected to hit the ground running. Each project might require a different area of expertise. How do I warm up? I usually have reserched the problem domain beging even before interviewing for the gig. But now there&#8217;s a more precise method analogous to playing scales. <p><a href="http://pragdave.pragprog.com/">Dave Thomas</a> has begun a blog called <a href="http://www.codekata.com/">CodeKata</a> . He already has about 15 different exercises created to help us programmers <a href="http://redsquirrel.com/dave/work/a2j/patterns/PracticePracticePractice.html">practice our craft</a>.</p></li> </ol> <p>The Kata touch on a variety of common problem domains in software development. There are the standard programming 101 issues including <a href="http://codekata.pragprog.com/2007/01/kata\_eleven\_sor.html">Sorting it Out</a> and <a href="http://codekata.pragprog.com/2007/01/kata_two_karate.html">Karate Chop</a>. And there are several design exercises like <a href="http://codekata.pragprog.com/2007/01/kata_ten_hashes.html">Hashes vs. Classes</a> and <a href="http://codekata.pragprog.com/2007/01/code_kata_one_s.html">Supermarket Pricing</a>.</p> Thu, 22 Feb 2007 14:50:00 +0000 urn:uuid:5824f9b9-4acf-4b15-8308-1b778b2def35 Mike Blake http://www.martinicity.net/articles/2007/02/22/how-do-you-get-to-silicon-valley Create CodeKata Dave Thomas Programming Musician Tony Macaluso