Beware of oversimplification and mallards. — Software never does one thing and is never as simple as you think, even when you know that. Assuming requirements will be simple is a trap developers get caught in regularly and it leads to overpromising and underdelivering. It's like the development team starting a marathon 2 miles behind the…

You can’t stop problems, but you can prepare and recover — Good software development is where preparation, process, standards and discipline meet requirements I was in Taekwondo training; the instructor was discussing the importance of not just defending but attacking. He said if you only defend, then you have to be totally accurate every time you block. Assuming someone is trying…

You need to aim before you fire — “I’m not a great programmer; I’m just a good programmer with great habits.” by Kent Beck. Many developers add comments to bad code instead of rewriting it. Treat the symptom instead of the root cause. Developers are quick to act but slow to think. Many people waste a lot of…

Software development is hard work where you work hard — “Don’t be a hero. Don’t have an ego.” Paul Tudor Jones Creating software involves ruthless discipline to follow processes, add quality, reduce technical debt and dedication to do every step in creating software. Every shortcut gives the illusion of progress today, whilst creating problems later. Today's solutions are tomorrow's problems…

When Money Trumps logic — Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco is a book about the biggest leveraged buyout (LBO) in history of RJR Nabisco in 1989 and the story of greed and madness that followed. Read about it on Wiki — Barbarians at the gate. The bidding for software projects can…

The quality of software is important to the developer and the user — “When one person suffers from a delusion, it is called insanity. When many people suffer from a delusion it is called a software project.” It’s easy to get caught up being busy during a software project. We forget we are building code and software from requirements. We build software that…

It’s not size that counts but collaboration and survival — If there is something in nature you don’t understand, odds are it makes sense in a deeper way that is beyond your understanding. So there is a logic to natural things that is much superior to our own. Just as there is a dichotomy in law: ‘innocent until proven guilty’…

If you don’t change a running system, it will break itself — If you don’t change a running system, the environment will break it for you I have seen many companies have legacy software and have the approach of “don’t change a running system” which is basically “if it ain’t broken, don’t fit it” attitude. Software is like a plant, take care…

Even when you know the laws of software development — Today's solutions are tomorrow's bugs Software development is a riddle wrapped in mystery and shoved down the back of the sofa, stuck to a boiled a sweet. The rules and principles below describe why creating software takes longer than expected, even when we know the rules and principles of software…