In our white paper The Software Reality Check: Diagnosing Software Projects in Crisis, we describe some of the symptoms and causes of failure in software projects, and explain the process we use to diagnose troubled projects. No doubt, the paper provokes well-intentioned readers to reflect on the health of their own software projects and ask [...]
Top Ten Ways to Torpedo Your Software Project
|June 23, 2010
5 Exceptions to the Agile Rule
|June 21, 2010
After reading our white paper “Agile Software Development: A Smart Choice for Outsourced Projects”, you may have come away with the impression that Agile is the best thing since sliced bread. We certainly think so. Here’s a humorous look at a list of 5 situations where Agile should not be used to develop software.
Top 5 Ways to Win Friends and Influence People with Spam
|June 9, 2010
As you probably know, our white paper “Hit the Target with E-mail Marketing: One to One Best Practices” describes the advantages of targeted e-mail marketing and offers some helpful guidelines for mounting one-to-one campaigns. However, it also takes a dim view of spamming, which probably didn’t sit well with dyed-in-the-wool spam followers. What about us, [...]
How to Outsource Your Software Project to Vegas and Win Big!
|June 4, 2010
So you’ve read our white paper “Home Ice Advantage: Local Software has a Competitive Edge” and you’re still thinking about offshoring your software project even though hiring local makes all kinds of sense. Well, don’t make up your mind just yet because we’ve come up with a third option: Vegas. Yes, consider onshoring your software [...]
Whitepaper: The Importance of Software Architecture
|June 3, 2010
Since architecture is a vital part of any software development process, business leaders should understand its purpose and value before hiring a development firm. Proper architecture is a system framework that, among other things, guides development efforts and helps to reduce the overall cost of software. In Agile development, some of the key architectural decisions [...]
Test Deficit Disorder: A Silent Killer of Software
|June 2, 2010
TDD is a serious problem. An outbreak of this uniquely degenerative disease can have a debilitating effect. In fact, it often proves deadly to software applications. A development team infected with Test Deficit Disorder exhibits a marked aversion to testing their software. Often, they put off testing to the last possible moment, and then rush [...]
Whitepaper: Test-Driven Development – A Commitment to Quality
|June 1, 2010
When hiring a development firm, clients have a right to expect great software that works. Some firms are unable to satisfy this expectation because their approach to software development is not focused on quality. However, a firm that incorporates test-driven development (TDD) into its development process is able to prevent most software defects from being [...]
MarketingTO: The digital customer experience
|May 27, 2010
People often want the latest shiny object, resist the temptation to give in to their demands. It will save you lots of pain and frustration in the long-term. Anybody can become a practitioner of user experience design regardless of resources and time. In fact, you can be a UX designer with the right tools to [...]
Agile People Are…
|May 22, 2010
All experienced software professionals know that it is people, not technology, not process that builds great solutions. This is something that is core to our culture at Architech. We live it, we breathe it, and write about it… Great Team, Great Software. Agile as a methodology, a mind-set, a philosophy is based on this fundamental [...]
Salesforce.com data storage costs and the dark side of multi-tenancy
|May 18, 2010
Anyone who has developed on the Salesforce.com platform will tell you that it has many limitations. For example, if your application is particularly data heavy, the limits on data storage will quickly become a problem. Salesforce.com has implemented a seemingly arbitrary data storage minimum of 2Kb / record, meaning it only takes 500,000 records to [...]
