Pragmatic software metrics for iterative development

Abstract

The primary themes of modern iterative development processes tackle the central management issues of complex software: 1. Managing risks; 2. Getting the design right; 3. Reducing the complexity of the developed system; 4. Making software progress and quality tangible; 5. Automating the overhead/bookkeeping activities and streamlining the productivity of creating, maintaining and assessing intellectual products. Items number 4 and 5 above are the subject of this talk. The purpose of software metrics is to objectively measure the activities and products of the software development/integration process. Any software process whose metrics are collected through procedures and/or human intensive activities will have very limited success. In a modern development process the most important software metrics are simple, objective measures of how various perspectives of the product/project are changing. The absolute measures are usually much less important than the relative changes with respect to time.