Karl Wiegers - Software Development Pearls: Lessons from Fifty Years of Software Experience

This is a collection of lessons that Karl has learned over his long and, I can say this honestly, distinguished career. It is a retrospective of all the good things (and some of the bad) he picked up along the way. However, this is not a recollection of It was like this in my day aphorisms, but lessons that are relevant and will benefit anybody involved, even tangentially, in software development today. The book is surprising. It is not simply a list of pearls of wisdomeach lesson is carefully argued and explained. Each one carries an explanation of why it is important to you, and importantly, how you might bring the lesson to your reality.

James Robertson, Author of Mastering the Requirements Process

Wouldnt it be great to gain a lifetimes experience early in your career, when its most useful, without having to pay for the inevitable errors of your own experience? Much of Karl Wiegerss half-century in software and management has been as a consultant, where hes often been called upon to rectify debacles of other peoples making. In Software Development Pearls, Karl lays out the most common and egregious types of maladies that hes run into. Its valuable to know where the most expensive potholes are and which potholes people keep hitting time and time again.

Not just a disaster correspondent, Karl is well versed in the best techniques of business analysis, software engineering, and project management. So from Karls experience and knowledge youll gain concise but important insights into how to recover from setbacks as well as how to avoid them in the first place.

Forty-six years ago I was lucky enough to stumble onto Fred Brookss classic The Mythical Man-Month, which gave me tremendous insights into my new career. Karls book is in a similar vein, but broader in scope and more relevant for todays world. My own half-century of experience confirms that hes right on the money with the lessons that hes chosen for Software Development Pearls.

Meilir Page-Jones, Senior Business Analyst, Wayland Systems Inc.

Karl has created yet another wonderful book full of well-rounded advice for software developers. His wisdom will be relatable to all development professionals and studentsyoung and old, new and experienced. Although Ive been doing software development for many years, this book brought timely reminders of things my team should do better. I cannot wait to have our new-to-the-job team members read this.

Software Development Pearls is rooted in actual experiences from many years of real projects, with a dose of thorough research to back up the lessons. As with all of Karls books, he keeps it light and engaging, chock-full of relatable stories and a few funny comments. You can read it from front to back or just dive into a particular section thats relevant to the areas youre looking to improve today. An enjoyable read plus practical adviceyou cant go wrong!

Joy Beatty, Vice President at Seilevel

Karls Software Development Pearls achieves the challenging goal of capturing and explaining many insights that youre unlikely to be exposed to in your training, that most practitioners learn through the school of hard knocks, and yet are critical to developing great software.

While the books structure compels you to connect with your experience and identify how to shift your behavior as a result, its the content that shines: a collection of 59+1 lessons that cover the broad landscape of the software development ecosystem. These insights will help you save time, collaborate more effectively, build better systems, and change your view on common misconceptions. Software Development Pearls is an easy read and is backed by a wide range of references to other experts who have discovered these same insights in their travels.

These lessons truly are Pearls: timelessly valuable elements of wisdom to make you better at developing great software, regardless of your role. Consider getting two copies of the book: one for yourself, and one to leave where others on the team can pick it up and discover their own pearls.

Jim Brosseau, Clarrus

This is an excellent book for anyone involved in software development. One of the brilliant (and unusual) aspects of the book is the way it is organized into self-contained lessons.Once you read them, they work like memesmemorable chunks of distilled knowledge that spring to mind when you need them. This happened to me recently when I was discussing the need for a requirements competency on agile projects with a senior executive and immediately thought of Lesson 8, The overarching objective of requirements development is clear and effective communication.

From personal experience, I can attest to the value of lessons like #22, Many system problems take place at interfaces, but only because I was burned badly by not paying enough attention to them. Anyone in software development eventually accumulates hardwon lessons like these about what to doand not doin the future. This book will get you there with much less pain. As Karl says in Lesson 7, The cost of recording knowledge is small compared to the cost of acquiring knowledge. Not only is that good advice for practitioners, it also neatly captures why you should buy this book.

Howard Podeswa, Author of The Agile Guide to Business Analysis and Planning: From Strategic Plan to Continuous Value Delivery

Software Development Pearls

Lessons from Fifty Years of Software Experience

Karl Wiegers

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