The Limits of Software: People, Projects, and Perspectives

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Addison-Wesley, 1999 - Computers - 214 pages
The Limits of Software is the personal account of Robert Britcher -- software engineer, professor, executive, and participant in the greatest failed software project in history, the FAA's Advanced Automation System. With honesty and humor he imparts lessons that every software developer and manager should hear. Follow along as the FAA project is imagined, planned, and contracted, and watch as a compact, narrow project is transformed into all things to all people, and then into a disaster of mythical proportions that ruins reputations and careers as it careens towards collapse. Britcher shares essential lessons that cover the entire software cycle -- how software should be conceived, specified, organized, inspected, and managed -- and what we cannot expect our software to do for us.

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Contents

EARLY SYSTEMS
3
THEORIES OF PROGRAMMING
17
THE HUMAN ELEMENT
29
Copyright

17 other sections not shown

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About the author (1999)

Robert N. Britcher is retired from IBM. The author of numerous articles and papers on software, he teaches software, systems engineering, and management at Johns Hopkins University. 0201433230AB04062001

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