Head First Software Development

Chapter 12. The Real World: Having a process in life

You’ve learned a lot about software development. But before you go pinning burn-down graphs in everyone’s office, there’s just a little more you need to know about dealing with each project—on its own terms. There are a lot of similarities and best practices you should carry from project to project, but there are unique things everywhere you go, and you need to be ready for them. It’s time to look at how to apply what you’ve learned to your particular project, and where to go next for more learning.

Pinning down a software development process

You’ve read a lot of pages about software development process, but we haven’t pinned down exactly what that term really means.

A software development process is a structure imposed on the development of a software product.

Note

Wikipedia’s definition of a software development process.

Notice that definition doesn’t say “a software development process is four-week iterations with requirements written on index cards from a user-focused point of view...” A software development process is a framework that should enable you to make quality software.

There is no silver-bullet process

There’s no single process that magically makes software development succeed. A good software process is one that lets your development team be successful. However, there are some common traits among processes that work:

Develop ...