53 Quotes by Steve McConnell

Trying to improve software quality by increasing the amount of testing is like trying to lose weight by weighing yourself more often. What you eat before you step onto the scale determines how much you will weigh, and the software-development techniques you use determine how many errors testing will find.

Building software implies various stages of planning, preparation and execution that vary in kind and degree depending on what's being built. [...]Building a four-foot tower requires a steady hand, a level surface, and 10 undamaged beer cans. Building a tower 100 times that size doesn't merely require 100 times as many beer cans.

Heuristic is an algorithm in a clown suit. It’s less predictable, it’s more fun, and it comes without a 30-day, money-back guarantee.

The big optimizations come from refining the high-level design, not the individual routines.

A good estimate is an estimate that provides a clear enough view of the project reality to allow the project leadership to make good decisions about how to control the project to hit its targets.

[...] you shouldn't be uneasy about any parts of the architecture. It shouldn't contain anything just to please the boss. It shouldn't contain anything that's hard for youto understand. You're the one who'll implement it; if it doesn't make sense to you, howcan you implement it?

Global data is generally subject to two problems: routines operate on global data without knowing that other routines are operating on it, and routines are aware that other routines are operating on the global data but they don't know exactly what they're doing to it.

The software engineering research really does not bear out this idea." ()

Selecting the best available plan is a complex decision and family caregivers and friends will benefit greatly from this tool as a supplement to other information available on the Web." ()