Emergent Design: The Evolutionary Nature of Professional Software Development Hardback - 2008

For software to consistently deliver promised results, software development must mature into a true profession. Emergent Design points the way. Author Scott L. Bain integrates the best of today's most important development disciplines into a unified, streamlined, realistic, and fully actionable approach to developing software. Drawing on patterns, refactoring, and test-driven development, Bain offers a blueprint for moving efficiently through the entire software lifecycle, smoothly managing change, and consistently delivering systems that are robust, reliable, and cost-effective. Reflecting a deep understanding of the natural flow of system development, Emergent Design helps developers work with the flow, instead of against it. Bain introduces the principles and practices of emergent design one step at a time, showing how to promote the natural evolution of software systems over time, making systems work better and provide greater value. To illuminate his approach, Bain presents code examples wherever necessary and concludes with a complete case study project. This book gives developers, project leads, and testers powerful new ways to collaborate, to achieve their immediate goals, and to build systems that improve in quality with each iteration. The book covers How to design software in a more natural, evolutionary, and professional way How to use the open-closed principle to mitigate risks and eliminate waste How and when to test your design throughout the development process How to translate design principles into practices that actually lead to better code How to determine how much design is enough How refactoring can helpyou reduce over-design and manage change more effectively