One of my favorite software-related quotes is the opening line of Anna Karenina: “Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.” It seems that every software project that goes off the rails is the result of its own unique set of...
Some days are hard. On my tax forms, I check the box that indicates that my job is “Sales.” That’s not exactly true but it’s easy. My father thinks I write contracts and negotiate business deals. The rest of my family sees me as a sort of extra-long titled...
I’ve worked with a lot of clients and potential clients over the past 10+ years. Sometimes, in conversation about a project, the client will roll out, oh-so-casually, one of about 10 pat statements that reveal a pernicious and erroneous belief about the process of...
Why would a reasonable person undertake one of the most difficult types of software development efforts out there? Very rarely the answer is because it just sounds like a wicked fun thing to do. Usually, the decision is driven by the realization that you, as a...
What are you doing? Stop it. Stop hitting yourself. Stop hitting yourself! But seriously, why are you doing that? Waterfall development, defined loosely as frontloading all specifications and performing all development with little-to-no iteration or deviation from the...
