Thoughtworks Technology Podcast Thoughtworks

Given the variety of architectural styles — and the unique technology landscapes at every organization — how can you develop a set of metrics that can reliably guide your organization to improve? Andrew Harmel-Law has been grappling with this question for some time. We catch up with him to hear how he thinks DORA’s Four Key Metrics provide invaluable guardrails that can empower teams and improve the software delivery process.

Thoughtworks regularly emphasises the importance of culture in building and maintaining high-quality software when working with clients. So, for episode 100 of the Thoughtworks Technology Podcast, we wanted to reflect on how the organization — and its leaders — has gone about trying to build a culture of innovation over the last couple of decades. Featuring CTO Rebecca Parsons and Chief Strategy Officer Chad Wathington, this episode offers an insight into some the successes, failures, and characters that have shaped Thoughtworks over the years.

The idea of best practices is becoming an anachronism — given today’s complex technology landscape, the notion that there can be a single best way of doing anything seems fanciful. Our crew explore the thinking behind sensible defaults: that there may be some practices which act as de facto starting points on any given project because they’re effective — practices such as pair programming, TDD or continuous integration. But context is vital and there may be circumstances which makes the default choice invalid — or at least suboptimal.

Mutation testing has long been a proven method for driving software quality in a way unit testing can't. But it can be a long, expensive and computationally intensive process. Our podcasters explore effective strategies for mutation testing and how to establish when it's right for your projects.

In the second part of our exploration of legacy displacement, we look at the practicalities of making upgrades work, from strategies for decomposing huge monoliths into manageable chunks as well as the methods for delivering those parts now that you've broken your monolith up. 

Updating legacy systems has been a common feature of enterprise IT. But — strangler-fig pattern aside — there’s little written about how to do it effectively. We explore the ideas of legacy replacement — and even legacy displacement — with a group of colleagues that are writing an article series on the topic for martinfowler.com. In the first episode of this two-part series, we look how they’ve come up with patterns for legacy displacement.