Enduring Ideas in the Realm of Software
“Software is a great combination of artistry and engineering.” — Bill Gates Is building software the same as manufacturing a physical product? Can you really create an assembly line for software? In today’s world, software plays an increasingly important role in our lives. From the apps we use on our smartphones to the complex systems …
One of my earlier projects on the patterns & practices team at Microsoft was originally called Life-Cycle Practices. Later, I renamed it to Life-Cycle Templates. Finally, I settled on Engineering Practices. Engineering Practices became a key organizing theme for our work and served as the foundation for our ALM frame. Knowledge AreasThe Engineering Practices Frame …
This is one of my favorite figures that shows how we do solution engineering in patterns & practices at Microsoft: Architectural Scenarios It all starts with a scenario. It has to be a meaningful problem. You can’t evaluate an architecture in a vacuum. In order for us to build useful baseline architectures, we need …
Extreme Programming (XP) is a lightweight software development methodology based on principles of simplicity, communication, feedback, and courage. I like to be able to scan methodologies to compare approaches. To do so, I create a skeleton of the activities, artifacts, principles, and practices. Here are my notes on XP: Activities Coding Testing Listening Designing Artifacts …
The Microsoft Solutions Framework (MSF) provides people and process guidance—the proven practices of Microsoft—to help teams and organizations become more successful in delivering business-driven technology solutions to their customers. Note that this MSF is not the same as the MSF Agile process included in VSTS. I like to be able to scan process methodologies. To …
