In this series, I shall be examining the twelve principles of the Agile Manifesto, to tell you why they exist, for they did not appear out of thin air and are therefore in response to some need that we had or have. In the process, I shall also tell you why most of these principles are overly idealistic in their expression and what I think they really ought to say. I am not trying to tell anybody what is right or wrong, this is not a morality debate. I have a great deal of admiration for the ideals that are expressed in the twelve principles (or most of them anyway) it is just that they are misstated and are therefore widely misunderstood.

Have you ever had to contend with a demanding developer? A testy tester? A cantankerous customer? Why oh why do people act that way? Rather than wondering why they act that way, it can be helpful to consider the circumstances that might account for their behavior.

If you didn't already know that the key to reliably deploy quality software is to take a cross-functional, full-lifecycle approach, Jez Humble and David Farley's book "Continuous Delivery: Reliable Software Releases through Build, Test, and Deployment Automation" will help you to understand.

How does personality impact the implementation of industry Standards and Frameworks? It would seem that following the guidance in the IEEE 828 CM Planning standard is simply a matter of writing CM Plans and documenting your existing CM practices. The fact is that some people implement Standards and Frameworks successfully and others fail miserably. This article presents a popular and highly regarded psychology framework that will help you better understand how to implement Configuration Management.