Webster & Associates LLC

[From Pitfalls of Modern Software Engineering by Bruce F. Webster (forthcoming)]
Categories: managerial
Various industry studies cite the productivity gap between the best and the worst developers. While there is some controversy over the ranges often cited (such as the famous 26:1 figure), anyone who has managed a diverse group of developers won’t argue [...]

[From Pitfalls of Modern Software Engineering by Bruce F. Webster (forthcoming)]
Categories: managerial
That which gets measured gets accomplished or, at least, evaluated. That’s why various software metrics are used as an indication of progress and accomplishment. The best known and easiest to compute is lines of code (LOC), usually measured as thousands of [...]

[From Pitfalls of Modern Software Engineering by Bruce F. Webster (forthcoming)]
Categories: managerial
Self delusion and group delusion are all too common in software development projects. Several factors combine to bring this about. One is the natural optimism prevalent among software engineers, particularly when they are not allowed, encouraged, or required to spend sufficient [...]

[From Pitfalls of Modern Software Engineering by Bruce F. Webster (forthcoming)]
Categories: managerial
What are the risks in modern software development? Look at the pitfalls listed in this book to start. Kind of makes you want to take up gardening, doesn’t it? On the other hand, being able to identify those risks and then manage [...]

[From Pitfalls of Modern Software Engineering by Bruce F. Webster (forthcoming)]
Categories: managerial
This is a classic pitfall in software engineering. Typically, insufficient time is allocated for the problem specification, research, design, architecture, and review that should occur before coding and during each development cycle. Likewise, software quality assurance (SQA) is often given little [...]

I’ve been working for some time on a book called Surviving Complexity. Many of my posts over at brucefwebster.com have adapted from materials I’m writing for that book.
Well, now I’ve been hired by Ziff Davis Enterprises to write a weekly column on IT Management for the online version of Baseline. That column is [...]

[From Pitfalls of Modern Software Engineering by Bruce F. Webster (forthcoming)]
Categories: managerial
The impulse to constantly add new and incremental features to a software program certainly isn’t unique to modern software develoment, or to a particular technology or methodology. It derives largely from three sources. Upper management and marketing want, and sometimes need, those [...]

[From Pitfalls of Modern Software Engineering by Bruce F. Webster (forthcoming)]
Categories: managerial
Let’s start by freely acknowledging that, with rare exceptions, software of any complexity changes between original specification and actual delivery. This is to be expected, and to a certain extent encouraged, when the changes represent a refinement of our understanding of the problem domain [...]

[From Pitfalls of Modern Software Engineering by Bruce F. Webster (forthcoming)]
Categories: managerial
If your organization is adopting some new technology or methodology (the “TOM”), it is likely because of wonderful claims about how it will improve your software engineering efforts: faster development time, higher quality, lower complexity, and so on. Leaving aside the likelihood of [...]

[From Pitfalls of Modern Software Engineering by Bruce F. Webster (forthcoming)]
Categories: managerial
Why would the use of a new technology or methodology (the “TOM”) cause managers and developers to neglect or even abandon solid software engineering practices? Because those practices are under pressure from the start. Many engineers don’t know them and aren’t willing to spend [...]