Alan M. Davis
McGraw Hill, 1995
(ISBN 0070158401 Boards)
Alan M. Davis
McGraw Hill, 1995
(ISBN 0070158401 Boards)
Buy it from Amazon.com (commission paid)
Buy it from Amazon.co.uk (commission paid)
Alan Davis is a professor of Software Engineering
(at Colorado). On the evidence of this book, he is a
sharp observer of what really goes on in the processes
often laughably described as engineering in the software
world.
201 Principles is just what it says: a page to each one, each
with a short memorable exhortation ("Write to read top-down"),
a scant paragraph of justification, and a proper reference to a
scientific paper or book on the subject.
Like me, you may read some of Davis' principles with glee.
Principle 30, Follow the Lemmings with Care,
references his own IEEE paper of 1993, gloriously entitled
"Software Lemmingineering". Who has not seen colleagues
plunging headlong into
the latest fashionable technique?
The book is a model of the principles it preaches. It is
organised simply, according to the phases of the software
life-cycle, a chapter to each, with supporting chapters on
general principles, management, and product assurance.
The chapter on
requirements engineering
is especially satisfying, given the long neglect of this crucial part of
the development process. For example, "Record why
requirements were included."
This is not the book for the reader who needs extended
in-depth arguments, pages of logic proofs, or quantities of
object-oriented diagrams. It is not the best buy for
salesmen in search of jazzier marketing slogans, buzzwords,
and superhighway-hyperbole. And needless to say, one cannot
learn how to be an engineer from a book, no matter how terse,
accurate, and pithy it may be.
But it might be an excellent and valuable purchase for
the busy software engineer or manager who can snatch the
occasional moment to pick up a principle or two. And even the
student, Davis suggests, may find the book useful as a set
of documented pointers to the world's best papers on the
many subjects alluded to here.
201 Principles is handsomely bound and printed,
small enough to fit an overcoat pocket, and as enjoyable
as a well-crafted novel: a book for the train or airport,
perhaps even to be propped up in front of the exercise
machine.
It is beautifully and thoughtfully illustrated with crisp,
almost three-dimensional drawings of welding torches in action,
spanners turning bolts, and carpenters' tools. These splendours
of engineering perfectly set off the short but muscular text
of each chapter.
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