The Mythical Man-Month Ch 13 - 15

Summary

Chapter 13 – The Whole and The Parts – this chapter is about integration of system component and how hard this can be. The chapter explains several methodologies we can follow to make the process easier. It talks about top-down design and how this type of design can avoid bugs. Also, time-shared debugging and system debugging can make the process much easier.

Chapter 14 – Hatching a Catastrophe – this chapter is about the importance of concrete milestones in the development of software to avoid major problems. The chapter discusses how essential is to have a schedule and to keep pert charts updated. Also, managers must reduce role conflict in order to get accurate information from their employees and avoid future disasters.

Chapter 15 – The Other Face – this chapter is about documentation and its importance. Different levels of documentation are required for different users and the programmers who write the documentation must understand that. The chapter also talks about flow-charts and how they are not as useful as they seem to be. One last thing the chapter talks about is self-documentation. Programs should be easy to read and understand without the need to understand every line of code.

Discussion

I enjoyed chapter 14 because it talks about the importance of communication in teams. We can see how bad communication can affect a project outcome all the time. If the manager of a project is open, not giving orders all the time, and easily approachable then the project will be much more successful. I think this is a really key point in project development. Also, I found really interesting how the book downplays the function of flow-charts in projects. I mostly agree with the book but I do believe they can also be useful, it all depends on how you develop them and for what do you use it for.