From: cpcahil@virtech.uucp (Conor P. Cahill)
Subject: Re: Do Software Engineers Actualy Do So Badly?
Organization: Virtual Technologies Inc.
Date: Sat, 10 Oct 1992 13:46:03 GMT

bushell@fox.nstn.ns.ca (Tom Bushell) writes:



>In Brad Cox's book: "Object Oriented Programming" from 1986, he
>quotes an inquiry carried through by the U.S. Government
>Accounting Office in 1979, in which a breakdown of software costs versus
>actual results is performed (FGMSD-80-4). The results at that time were:

>Software paid for but not delivered: 47%
>Software delivered but not used:     29%
>Software abandoned or reworked:      19%
>Software used after change:           3%
>Software used as delivered:         2%

>If I read this right, only 5% of software written for Uncle Sam
>before 1979 was ever used.  That seems a little extreme, but food
>for thought, nonetheless.

The problem is that you don't have info on the reasons for these
statistics.  Therefore you can't reasonably use the statistics to 
substantiate your opinion that "software engineers are doing real bad".

The reasons for not delivering the software can be just about anything
including the fact that the government may have decided that they 
didn't want it after they paid to have it built.  We (as in VTI) have
been called in by clients to work on two contracts that have "gone
bad". In both cases the Govt had decided that they no longer wanted 
the software that was being put together and in one of the cases they
were actively trying to pick any reason that they could which would 
justify not having to pay for the work that had been done.

Other factors not mentioned above, but which would probably sway the
results heavily are:

	1. does this only include custom software?  If so, then it is
	   automatically cutting out a major component in software 
	   purchases made by the govt.

	2. How much of the work was for prototypes that were not intended
	   to be delivered, but rather used for deciding if the project
	   could go forward.
	
	3. How much of it was for software research as opposed to a 
	   specific application.  You don't expect to have a 100% 
	   recovery factor for research

	4. What was the size of the sample and what was the distribution
	   of the numbers across the various agencies

	5. How much of the non-use is due to the fact that many people
	   out there still refuse to work with computers?

etc, etc.


>Now, I don't know about you folks, but I find this extremely
>alarming.  I have first hand experience with the uncertainties of
>software development - a few years back I worked on a project 
>that was originally estimated at $1M, and (I'm told) actually
>cost closer to $4M when it finally went into production, at least
>a year late.

Again you state a fact, but no reason for the fact.  The real question
that needs to be answered is what caused the cost to balloon to $4M.
Is it because they decided to add new features to remain competitive?
Is it because the seriously underestimated the effort required? Is it
because the requirements changed?

>Anyway, while other engineering disciplines have their failures,
>they seem much less frequent than in software development.  30%
>of all bridges don't collapse, and 50% all planes don't crash -
>even the prototypes.

We have been building bridges for millennia, and planes for close 
to 100 years.  If you go back to the early stages of either of those
two engineering disciplines, I would bet that you find that there were
many more failures than there are today.  


>She concluded that we were just making the transition from craft
>to commercial practice.  So maybe we don't have to be _too_ hard
>on ourselves - it's early yet.  But we damn well better work hard
>towards that goal of true engineering.  It's our professional
>responsibility - modern society is becoming too dependent on
>computers for anything less to be acceptable.

I do agree with this sentiment entirely.

-- 
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Conor P. Cahill              (703)430-9247            cpcahil@virtech.vti.com
Virtual Technologies, Inc.  46030 Manekin Plaza          Dulles, VA 20166 
Newsgroups: comp.software-eng