"Producing Software, Professionally" was the theme of the inaugural Agile Singapore Conference 2013. The conference was a seminal event for the Agile community in Southeast Asia.
Jim McCarthy and David Hussman gave keynotes and Kent Beck's session was so popular it was moved to the keynote auditorium.
Tom Gilb, Kevlin Henney and Bas Vodde were some of the other 26 session speakers.
Discussion and networking opportunities were plentiful, with 400 participants from 21 countries exchanging ideas and sharing experiences throughout the two-day event.
Jim McCarthy opened proceedings with a passionate keynote on Culture Design and the coming era of magnificence. He expressed a strong conviction that multi-cultural teams are essential to delivering a great product. He took the conference as evidence of
"East meeting West in a vivid example of the triumphant post-national Software Culture's initial flowering everywhere in the world."
Jim took the audience by surprise by painting a vision in which Singapore could be the birthplace of the software renaissance.
In his very personal talk on "Ease at Work" Kent Beck astonished attendees by declaring he is not the best programmer at Facebook by a long shot, but he is comfortable in his skin and proud of his work. Kent pinpointed key thoughts and experiences demonstrating his professional attitude to producing software. He expressed a strong opinion that any energy invested into creating a false image of oneself is wasted. He boldly stated
"That is why my work matters. My code works. I make public commitments. I am accountable."
In his closing keynote address, David Hussman called on the audience to take Frank Zappa's challenge to "Shut Up and Play Yer Guitar". He meant it is time to stop talking about process adherence and start focusing on product delivery.
David spoke about selecting tools that foster measurable outcomes such as product sales or market change.
Videos of these sessions and others will be available on InfoQ.