Thinking Inside a Bigger Box

Here are some of my favorite words.

Signs of danger

• ‘Just’: bad word, as in “can’t we just develop the greatest application ever”, “can’t we just replace the database with JavaSpaces”, “can’t we just expose the functionality to the world as a web service”.
• ‘Should’: bad word, as in “it shouldn’t take more than a few days to do that, should it,” “integrating two systems should be easy.” Listen for use of this word from people who … should know better.

Signs of thought

• ‘Awkward’: good word as in “It’s awkward to talk to your boss (who has way more experience than you do) about teaching her agile programming.”
• ‘Why’: good word, as in “why do you need to pass two parameters to this function?”, “why are we developing a login screen”, or “why did my change cause troubles for my colleague?”