Posts made in March, 2012

How can you grade and track the ‘goodness’ (or ‘badness’) of your code?

Posted by Eduardo Aguado on Mar 27, 2012 in Optimyth Software, Quality metrics, Quality model, Software quality | 0 comments

Let’s talk about code violations. Those tiny little itches in every developer’s back. Violations show us how badly we have coded according to a certain quality model somebody set long time ago.

But, just like life, things move fast. Code changes, mutates, vanishes, is versioned or grows. One day you have a class that computes your wage and tomorrow you develop a whole module to do so. Moreover, the quality manager can change the rules your organization applies and suddenly your barely-modified code has 1000 violations that were not there yesterday.  How can we keep a consistent track of the “grade” it gives to a software system?

Burring your dead code

Posted by Sebastián Revuelta on Mar 22, 2012 in Application inventory management, Optimyth Software, Quality metrics, Software quality | 0 comments

I still recall when my dad woke me those Sunday mornings in early spring and said: gear up, we are working in the garden today! That was far from what a teenager had in mind for a Sunday morning. Yeah, it was sunny and I got to spend some time with my dad chatting away, but it was still cold and it was hard work. It wasn’t a big garden: a bunch of grown trees, a small orchard with tomato plants, bushes around the fence, flower mounds and lawn.

A fresh approach to software metrics (V): The COCOMO model

Posted by Eduardo Aguado on Mar 13, 2012 in Economics, Quality metrics | 0 comments

If COCOMO rings a bell let’s make sure you are not thinking about sandy beaches in the pacific nor about the 80′s Beach Boys hit, Kokomo. Sorry to be a killjoy! COCOMO is a cost model developed in the late 70’s by Barry Boehm. It is based on empirical data and mathematical analysis by combining equations and expert judgement.

In previous articles of this series we have exposed our views on several widely used software metrics that can help you understand your code better such as cyclomatic complexity, function points or Robert martin’s metrics. Applying them within a comprehensive quality model can help you improve the overall quality of your software.

So, to continue with the series, in today’s post we are going to adopt a capitalist point of view with regard to software metrics. Yes, you are right, let’s talk about money!

The 10 Commandments of Software Quality

Posted by Luis Rodríguez on Mar 8, 2012 in CTO Corner, Software quality | 2 comments

It is customary to write down, in stone tablets for posterity, a set of rules (‘best practices’) that, when followed, blows you out of the fires of greed, hatred, and delusion, reaching the nirvana of highest software quality.

As commandments usually come in tens, lets take the biblical path…