development lifecycles

Geographically Distributed Development (GDD) is a common strategy in the software world today. Organizations are gaining experience in developing software globally and are discovering that the competitive demand for best-in-class, high quality applications requires greater agility in quality management. Unfortunately, IT budgets are not keeping up with the staff required for quality management and the response is to accelerate quality management by leveraging global teams. This article compares and contrasts agile GDD testing strategies for affecting quality management.

Sometimes the user, project sponsor, and other key stakeholders haven't provided in the requirements documentation all the expectations of the software you're building. Instead, these expectations are only implied. In a perfect requirements-gathering process, there would be no such thing as an "implied requirement" because every requirement would be captured in the document. But no process is perfect, in theory or in practice. This article should help you look for and recognize the presence of implied requirements and learn how to capture them and convert them to documented requirements.

Linda Hayes has always found software development metrics to be problematic. The data either skews perceptions of the project or the actions of the team members. In this article, Linda explains that by turning down the volume of what is being said and measured and simply watching what is actually happening, you can strip away the assumptions and biases that often obscure the truth.

Because so much of what we do in software and project management is abstract, metaphors are particularly important communication tools. When I heard Peopleware author Tim Lister describe reducing project scope as "throwing cargo overboard," I adopted it immediately. If you are worried about getting to port on time with the fuel available, consider throwing low-value or optional cargo overboard; your voyage might still be considered an overall success.