Mid(sorta)term
Due Wednesday, March 7 at 5pm
There are just two questions, and I will reduce the weight of the midterm in grading because it is so late in the term. (On the other hand, I think these are pretty hard questions. I'll be happy if you answer either one of them very well.)
How to turn in
Compose your answers in a text editor of your choice. Keep
each answer to no more than 300 words (and less than that may be
plenty). Then use the following link to start an email, and
paste your answers into the body (as plain text). The first
line of your message should be "Exam:
[Use this link to send exam email]
Questions
- Boehm claims the spiral model is especially suited to
large, complex, technically challenging projects. In what
ways does it seem less suited to smaller, more routine
projects? What parts or aspects of the model might
you
not want to use if you were managing a small project (say, a couple of months for two or three people), and why? Herbsleb and Grinter note several reasons that informal communication is needed to augment formal documentation of software design, and they describe obstacles to informal communication posed by physical and cultural separation of developers.
Temporal separation (that is, separation in time) presents another set of challenges. For example, one often needs to adapt a piece of software that was written by people who have left the organization. Temporal separation cannot be overcome using the practices recommended by Herbsleb and Grinter (e.g., we cannot use time-travel to bring in a developer from the past for a face-to-face meeting in the present). Can you think of any other approaches that might help? (I'm not looking for miraculous cures here, just anything that might help.)