Better Software Magazine Archive:

April 2007

IN THIS ISSUE

Rising Above the 7 Percent Rule
By Jason Cohen

Afraid of what you're missing by testing only 7 percent of your code? Forget your formal code inspections; Jason Cohen enlightens us on the merits of bringing lightweight code inspection to your organization.

Evidence for Evolution
By Brian Marick

What important lessons can we learn from the evolution of the programming language Lisp? Brian Marick recounts the environment that enabled its creation and recommends we incorporate some of the Lisper practices into our own projects.

Know What's at Stake
By Julian Harty
Isabel Evans, Stuart Reid

Everyone knows the importance of well-defined functional requirements. We want our products to work, don't we? But how many of us are paying as much attention to defining our non-functional requirements? In this historically focused feature, we learn from past mistakes the potentially disastrous results of inadequately tested NFRs.

PMBOK to Agile
By David Christiansen

Extreme Programming has increased in popularity in recent years, but shifting your organization away from the Project Management Body of Knowledge to agile methodologies can be a real challenge. David Christiansen has outlined three common obstacles to incorporating agile and offers ways to overcome them.

The Right Stuff: Four Small Steps for Testers One Giant Leap for Risk Mitigation
By Barton Layne
Rex Black

In the countdown to a product release, leaving load testing for last is a risky maneuver. In this month's cover story, Rex Black and Barton Layne present a case study of a project on which they adhered to a four-step strategy. By following these four steps, they were able to alleviate those nasty, end-of-project performance surprises.

Seasons of Software Development
By Peter Clark

In this installment of Management Chronicles, Peter Clark introduces us to a programmer who is trying unsuccessfully to complete a project mired in underestimation. Find out what you can do to keep your estimates in the free and clear.

The Roof Is Going to Go
By Chuck Allison

As one poor German tourist can attest, idioms don't translate. But Chuck Allison thinks programmers should become "native speakers" of the programming languages they use. This includes using and understanding them, idioms and all.

The Magic 8 Ball of Testing
By Michael Bolton

Have you ever wished for a tool to help you define and refine requirements and make your programs more testable? OClear could be the tool you've been waiting for.

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