Global Day Coderetreat 2021 at Codurance Spain

The Global Day Coderetreat is a day dedicated to writing code by experimenting, sharing experiences while practising kata in pairs and mixing people of different levels, so each one contributes their best professional version as far as software development is concerned.

It is a day to celebrate with the community because we never want to lose sight of our mission to raise the level of quality in the software industry through professionalism and technical excellence, and initiatives like the Global Day Coderetreat contribute to this.

This year we wanted to participate in person. However, we still prefer to be cautious and hold small-format meetings to ensure the maximum health security measures for everyone (antigen test, highly ventilated spaces ...). This time we have been a small group, but that has not prevented that the level of energy, the results and what we have shared have been exceptional.

As software craftspeople, we believe in continuous learning. This approach implies the desire to be an increasingly better professional, try to do things better, and continually push the professional limits of each one in search of excellence. The eternal journey to mastery. Only by being great professionals can we help our clients achieve amazing things.

08:30 AM meeting time

We find ourselves with some sleep and with the first coffees in hand. After the arrival of the whole group and some formalities, we got down to work. With a brief icebreaker that started the first laughs and an energizing breakfast, we started the day.

We were working with the famous Conway’s game of life. This game, widely used in the development community to propose different kata and iterations, is a classic of the Global Day Coderetreat. Its simplicity makes it ideal for anyone to participate in the challenges that arise. Still, we have been complicating the development environment by applying increasingly complex restrictions and posing new challenges to solve.

In the first iteration, the practice began and this time without restrictions. In the second, we address rules related to TDD (for some, the first contact with the exciting world of Test Driven Development). We kept moving forward, pairing, changing partners in each iteration, and it was time to work with a piece of paper and a pen. It was fascinating to see how the participants defended themselves with the new iteration in an unfamiliar environment for a developer.

After a break to eat, get to know each other better, share anecdotes and chat about our experiences, we returned to the computer. In the fourth iteration, we would introduce another classic: Object callisthenics. And to finish one last extreme iteration: test, commit, revert and start over in 3-minute loops.

And in this way, we reached the end of 6 long hours of coding and, after sharing our thoughts and ideas about how we had felt during the session, what had been the most interesting and checking our expectations, we gave each other a loud applause and said goodbye to the Global Day Coderetreat until next year. If there was a common denominator in the testimonies of all the participants, it was how interesting and enriching it is to work as a team, share ideas, solutions, problems, uncertainties; to help and to be helped and that without a doubt, that is what helps us to be better and better professionals. Pair programming is at the core of what we do; Hearing you highlight that aspect fills us with satisfaction.

We can only say that when the alarm goes off at 6 AM on a Saturday to go to the office you ask yourself some questions, but then, when you give us the opportunity to see your involvement, you make it worthwhile.

Thanks for your participation. Thank you for helping the profession improve. Here we leave you the slides that we use for the presentation.

Codurance's Rubber duck greets you. :)