The document discusses training individuals to become developers using Perl, emphasizing the importance of balancing technical and soft skills. It highlights the mentor's role in fostering responsibility and engagement, as well as effective methods for tracking progress and providing feedback. The document also suggests practical approaches for teaching Perl and encouraging community participation.

1. Turning humans into
developers (with Perl)
… and making sure they stay humans, too
Julien Fiegehenn (simbabque)
London Perl Workshop 2017
25th November 2017

2. Who of you is a developer?

3. Who of you has trained as a
developer?

4. Who did that NOT at university?

5. Apprenticeships in Germany
● Lasts 3 years
● Find a company, go to work
● Go to school
● Often no prior tech knowledge
● Company decides what tech you learn

6. Developer->new(name => “Julien”);
Think back to your very first day on your first job.

7. Developer->new(name => “Julien”);
Think back to your very first day on your first job.
Were you looking forward to the second?

8. Mentoring

9. Your roles as a mentor
● Teacher
● Manager
● Boss
● Role Model
● Motivator
● Parent
● Friend

10. How do I do that?
● Be available
● Lead by example
● Help them help themselves
● Know when not to help
● Give responsibility
● Build rapport
● Learn about the person
● Share details of yourself

11. ● Their work matters
● They matter to you
● Mix training and actual real life work
● They accomplish something
Motivation

12. Training

13. What defines a developer?
Hard skills
● Programming
● Data structures
● Project management
● Version control
● Toolchain (like tests)
Soft skills
● Independent thinking
● Curiosity
● Professionalism
● Playing well with others
● How to ask questions
● Business knowledge

14. How to keep track?
● Kick-off/Get-to-know
● “How do you feel” feedback talks
● Ticket analysis
● Final feedback/evaluation
● Announce meetings early
● Tell what to expect
● Ask for feedback about yourself
● Find solutions
● Don’t blame. Support!

15. Rule of two
There are more people than one master and one apprentice.
Make your trainees part of the team!
Be part of their group.

16. ● Version control
● Perl basics
● Frameworks
Do not reinvent the wheel on those.
Technical skills
● Code Review
● Whiteboard and diagrams
● Pair programming

17. Code Review
my $count = 0;
foreach my $talk ( $rs->all ) {
$count += 1;
}
return $count;
● Remember their technical level
● They don't know better yet
● Encourage thinking

18. Developing a developer
Individual project or part of the product?
Visualize with a ticket system.
JIRA, Trello, Sticky notes on a wall.

19. Developing a developer
Use user stories that they can relate to.
Try to build up complexity gradually.
Build an MVP.
Make sure they understand the WHY.

20. You promised Perl!
● Participate in IRC
● Read the CPAN
● Answer on Stack Overflow
● Pull Request Challenge
● Take them to conferences

21. Thank you!
Julien Fiegehenn
simbabque@cpan.org
@simbabque
simbabque
Questions?

23. Resources I like for teaching Perl
● Michael G Schwern: Git for ages 4 and up
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3m7BgIvC-uQ
● Learning Perl, 6th Edition by Tom Phoenix, Randal Schwartz, brian foy
● RJBS: Moose is Perl: a guide to the new revolution
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LKXvG6VKew4
● Catalyst::Manual::Tutorial
https://p3rl.org/Catalyst::Manual::Tutorial
● Dancer2::Tutorial
https://p3rl.org/Dancer2::Tutorial