Facts and Fallacies of Software Engineering

Introduction

This book is a collection of facts and fallacies about the subject of software engineering.

Sounds boring, doesn’t it? A laundry list of facts and fallacies about building software doesn’t sound like the kind of thing you’d like to kick back and spend an hour or two with. But there’s something special about these facts and fallacies. They’re fundamental. And the truth that underlies them is frequently forgotten. In fact, that’s the underlying theme of this book. A lot of what we ought to know about building software we don’t, for one reason or another. And some of what we think we know is just plain wrong.

Who is the we in that previous paragraph? People who build software, of course. We seem to need to learn the same lessons ...