Charlotte Java User Group

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Software Craftsmanship for Coding Agents: Taming the Dragon

Coding agents like Claude Code and Cursor promise to revolutionize how we build software, but in untrained hands, they're more like dragons—powerful, unpredictable, and likely to burn down your codebase. After building scalable, maintainable production applications with coding agents, I've learned that traditional software craftsmanship principles are not just relevant for AI-assisted development—they're essential for survival.

I'll show you how engineering practices like test-driven development, continuous refactoring, and working in small batches transform unpredictable coding agents into reliable, collaborative partners. Through hands-on coding agent collaboration, we'll build an application from scratch, showing how tight feedback loops and precise task breakdown turn chaotic AI output into production-ready code.

By the end of this session, you'll be able to:

- configure coding agents to enforce your team's coding standards
- use TDD to guide AI code generation and prevent technical debt
- collaborate with agents in small batches for production-ready code

About our speaker
Steven Diamante is a technical coach dedicated to helping software teams master technical excellence, reduce bugs, and build software they’re proud of. Through hands-on Samman Coaching, he teaches teams how to write high-quality, maintainable code using XP practices like TDD, refactoring, and collaborative programming. He helps teams build a culture of continuous learning and experimentation, making software development more rewarding, fun, and effective. Outside of coaching, he enjoys playing guitar in his local church, reading a non-fiction book, or hanging out with his wife and two kids.

Agenda
5:30pm – 6:00pm: Networking, food and drinks
6:00pm – 8:00pm: Talk session
8:00pm – 8:30pm: More networking