US Patent Office Invites Public to Help Improve Software PatentsIn an effort to improve the quality of software-related patents, the United States Patent and Trademark Office issued an invitation for the software community to join a software partnership and share feedback, experiences, and insights on ways to improve the quality of software patents.
Why the Demand for Usability Will Continue to GrowUsability is an important aspect of any software system. It is often a driving factor in the popularity of software today. Yet, usability is only just in its infancy in terms of the importance it will play in future software systems.
What the Boeing Dreamliner 787 Team Can Learn from Agile MethodsThe Boeing 787 Dreamliner’s grounding issue is currently the talk of the town. Venkatesh Krishnamurthy lists the issues surrounding Boeing's airplane problems and how agile methods could have benefited the company's development team.
Why Does the Agile Manifesto Ignore Testing and Quality?Joe Townsend revisits the Agile Manifesto and discovers that the words test and quality were never mentioned. What does this mean? Surely the original signatories of the Agile Manifesto had to have quality in mind when they met. Didn’t they?
Look at Everyday Products to Improve SoftwareDesigners are always looking at ways to improve software by making it fun and engaging to visitors. However, to reach the next level, we need to slightly change our focus. We need to look not just at other pieces of software but also at everyday products—like doors and the signs that go on them.
The Sad Truth about Cyber SecuritySoftware security is a hot topic right now, but if we’re not careful, we could make things worse—much, much worse. In many ways today, there is nothing more important than developing secure software that works well in the real world.
Is Software Testing a Thankless Job? QA teams often get blamed for things that are out of their control. These three issues are the biggest pain points: missed bugs, missed deadlines, and poor quality
Making Process Changes in Days or Weeks, Not Months or YearsBusiness process improvement and the resulting change management are not for the faint of heart. Laura Brandenburg makes the case that BAs not only need to support organizations in changing more complex, decision-rich processes, but also in doing so faster—in days or weeks, not month or years.
