Over forty years of working in information technology (IT) have taught me how few people have ever actually read some of the most important books in software engineering and IT project management. I teach a senior-level class in Software Engineering (CS 428) at Brigham Young University, and my students have to read a few of […]
[The third in a series of posts on Readings in Software Engineering. Previous post: The Mythical Man-Month, Frederick J. Brooks Jr. (1975/1995).] Peopleware: Productive Projects and Teams. Tom DeMarco & Timothy Lister, Dorset House Publishing Co., New York, 1987, softbound, 188 pages. Original acquisition date unknown; replacement copy acquired 11 Oct 1995. Current version is […]
[The first of a planned series of posts on “Readings in Software Engineering“] [Version 1.1 of this post, revised/extended on 05/22/2012] The Psychology of Computer Programming, Gerald M. Weinberg, Van Nostrand Reinhold Company, New York, 1971. Hardbound, 288 pages. Personal acquisition date: 17 Oct 1978. Original edition out of print. The Psychology of Computer Programming […]
I have been collecting and reading books on software engineering since the 1970s, but I have found over the decades that the vast majority of programmers (and their managers) are unfamiliar with most of them. More’s the pity, for during the 38 years since I first started working in information technology (BYU Translation Sciences Institute, […]
The second personal computer I ever owned[1] was an Apple II, with no floppy drive. I bought it, along with a small color TV, from my close friend Robert Trammel while we were both living in Houston sometime around 1980.We had already spent hours together programming on it, then carefully (though not always successfully) saving […]
Classic patterns in disputed IT project: Hertz v. Accenture
Just ran across this article at the always-irreverent-but-usually-spot-on Register, an IT news site out of England. The standard patterns of a troubled IT project are so evident in this one report that I may well use it as a case study for my CS 428 (“Real-world software engineering”) class this fall. Here are some of […]
Neverending Story pattern: School District ERP system late, over-budget
A story a few days ago caught my eye, not because it was unusual, but because it follows so familiar a pattern. Here are a few excerpts from the article: MANATEE — Late nights, hefty contracts and humming computers are a norm in the district’s School Support Center, where employees are working to fix a […]
Minnesota DMV software project: Faulty Towers/Neverending Story patterns
In my 2000 white paper, “Patterns in IT Litigation: System Failure (1976-2000)” [PDF], which I researched and wrote while at PricewaterhouseCoopers, I describe six broad fact patterns to classify the types of software system implementation failure. One of those patterns I named “Faulty Towers”: The client buys the system from [or has the system developed […]
![The Meltdown/Spectre CPU bugs: a dramatic global case of the “Unintended Consequences” pattern [UPDATED 4/4/18]](http://bfwa.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/intel-cpu-150x150.jpg "The Meltdown/Spectre CPU bugs: a dramatic global case of the “Unintended Consequences” pattern [UPDATED 4/4/18]")
Back in 2000, PricewaterhouseCooper published my research white paper, “Patterns in IT Litigation: Systems Failure (1976-2000)” (PDF). This paper reflected research I and my staff had done over several months on roughly 120 two- or three-party lawsuits involving information technology. I found that almost all of these lawsuits fell into one or two of six […]