DEV Community

Developer on Fire

Episode 123 | James Coplien - Concern for the Human Being

Jim Coplien talks with Dave Rael about software and humans, multidisciplinary insight, Orwellian tendencies, and rethinking everything

Jim “Cope” Coplien has enjoyed mastering several careers starting as a computer operator and moving on to development at AT&T, and then on to fundamental research in Bell Labs. His research helped establish the foundations of the software pattern discipline, of Scrum (Daily Standups come out of his process work), and of many staples and leading advances in object-orientation, including joint work with Trygve Reenskaug (treegve rinskauv) on the DCI paradigm, and is the creator of the trygve programming language.. He has written numerous books and scores of papers. Cope has been writing software since about 1971 and was the first user of C++ outside Bell Labs Research. He continues to deliver code mainly in Objective-C, which he tolerates; Java, which he hates; and Ruby, which he loves. He’s a Mac guy. He has also worked in VLSI CAD, academia, and executive consulting, and for the past 20 years, concern for the human being has been at the core of his work. When he grows up he wants to be an anthropologist.

Jim's top 3 tips for delivering more value:
  1. Understand the value proposition of your client
  2. Meet with your clitentele face to face
  3. Use empathy - take an acute sense of social responsibility

Episode source