Category: Project Management
Articles on project management in development teams, and how project managers can get the most out of their engineers’ work with NDepend.
How to Deliver Software Projects on Time
July 28, 2016 3 minutes read Someone asked me recently, almost in passing, about the keys to delivering software projects on time. In this particular instance, it was actually a...
Static Analysis Isn’t Just for Techies
July 21, 2016 2 minutes read I do a lot of work with and around static analysis tools. Obviously, I write for this blog. I also have a consulting practice...
Avoid Technical Debt with NDepend
July 14, 2016 2 minutes read The term “technical debt” has become ubiquitous in the programming world. In the most general sense, it reflects the idea that you’re doing something...
How to Get Developers to Adopt Coding Standards
June 2, 2016 2 minutes read If you’re a manager, there’s a decent chance that the subject of coding standards makes you want to bang your head against a wall...
Managing Risk in your Project with Static Analysis
May 26, 2016 2 minutes read When software developer talk about static analysis, it’s often in the context of craft improvement. Ask most developers in a group about static analysis...
4 Ways Custom Code Metrics Improve A Development Team
May 12, 2016 2 minutes read One of the things that has surprised me over the years is how infrequently people take advantage of custom code metrics. I say this...
The Biggest Mistake Static Analysis Could Have Prevented
May 5, 2016 2 minutes read As I’ve probably mentioned before, many of my clients pay me to come do assessments of their codebases, application portfolios and software practice. And,...
5 Reasons Architects and Developers Don’t Get Along
April 28, 2016 1 minutes read There’s a cute term for a blog post or article that advertises, in its title, a number of points of interest. For example, “9...
How to Add Static Analysis to Your Development Process
March 31, 2016 2 minutes read As a consultant, one of the more universal things that I’ve observed over the years is managerial hand-waving. This comes in a lot with the...
Legacy Code for Developers: Managing your Manager
March 24, 2016 2 minutes read Here’s a campfire horror story of legacy code that probably sounds at least somewhat familiar. One day, your manager strolls by casually, sipping a...
Static Analysis for Small Business
March 10, 2016 1 minutes read I was asked recently, kind of off the cuff, whether I thought that static analysis made sense for small business. I must admit that...
A Manager’s Guide to Legacy Code
March 3, 2016 2 minutes read If you have a sadistic streak and manage a team of software developers, it’s probably high entertainment to dredge up some old, dusty piece...
The Better Code Book – Our MVPs of 2015
February 24, 2016 3 minutes read We firmly believe spaghetti belongs on the dinner table and not in code. Our mission when starting NDepend was to create a tool to...
How Siemens Healthcare manages over 500 million lines of code – An NDepend Case Study
February 23, 2016 1 minutes read Siemens Healthcare produces imaging equipment for the medical sector in a variety of fields and is based in Germany. Looking to reduce development costs on...
Bridging the Communication Gap Between Developers and Architects
February 12, 2016 1 minutes read If you want to set off a ceaseless, spirited discussion, ask a roomful of people what makes some music good and other music bad....
The Case for the NDepend Dashboard Feature
January 14, 2016 2 minutes read If you hang around agile circles long enough, you’re quite likely to hear the terms “big, visible chart” and “information radiator.” I think both...
Visualizing Your (Real) Software Architecture
January 11, 2016 1 minutes read Diagrams of software architecture have a certain aesthetic appeal to them. They usually consist of grayscale or muted pastel colors and nice, soft shapes with...
With Code Metrics, Trends are King
December 31, 2015 2 minutes read Here’s a scene that’s familiar to any software developer. You sit down to work with the source code of a new team or project...
Be Careful with Software Metaphors
December 17, 2015 6 minutes read Over the years, there have been any number of popular software metaphors that help people radically misunderstand the realities of software development. Probably the...
Mistakes Dev Managers Make
November 26, 2015 2 minutes read Managing a team of software developers is a tall order. This is doubly true when the line management includes both org chart duties (career...
Refactoring is a Development Technique, Not a Project
November 12, 2015 2 minutes read One of the more puzzling misconceptions that I hear pertains to the topic of refactoring. I consult on a lot of legacy rescue efforts,...
NDepend Case Study: Increasing Development Efficiency in the Medical Laboratory Sector
November 11, 2015 2 minutes read Developing applications for use in the health care industry is stressful because the margin of error is almost non-existent. Whether your tool is for...
Software Rewrite: The Chase
October 29, 2015 3 minutes read Last week, a post I wrote, “The Myth of the Software Rewrite“, became pretty popular. This generated a lot of comments and discussion, so...
Relax. Everyone’s Code Rots
October 22, 2015 2 minutes read I earn my living, or part of it, anyway, doing something very awkward. I get called in to assess and analyze codebases for health...
Hidden Costs in Your Software
October 8, 2015 2 minutes read One of the things I remember most vividly from my CIO days was the RFP process for handling spikes in demands on my group’s time....
Bringing Objectivity to Clean Code
September 24, 2015 2 minutes read If you want to stir up a pretty serious amount of discussion-churn, wander over to where the software developers sit and ask for a...
The Myth of the Software Rewrite
September 17, 2015 2 minutes read “We can’t go on like this. We need to rewrite this thing from scratch.” The Writing is on the Wall These words infuriate CIOs...
A Software Architect’s Best Friend
July 29, 2015 5 minutes read To this day, I have a persistent nightmare about my time in college. It’s always pretty similar. I wake up and I have a...