Food for Thought - An e-newsletter published by Software Quality Consulting
December 2010, Vol. 7 No. 4 
Watts Humphrey - The Father of Software Quality 

What topics would you like to see in this newsletter?  Each month, this
newsletter tries to provide you with useful information.  This is a two-way
street and your feedback is important.  Please send your thoughts and comments
to [email protected].

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Welcome to Food for Thought(TM), an e-newsletter from Software Quality 
Consulting (http://www.swqual.com/index.html?Intro). I've created free
subscriptions for my valued business contacts. If you find this newsletter
informative, I encourage you to continue reading. Feel free to pass this
newsletter along to colleagues by clicking on the Forward Email link at the
bottom of this email. If you�ve received this newsletter from a colleague and
would like to subscribe, please click this Enter New Subscription link
(http://www.swqual.com/e_newsletter.html). If you don't wish to receive this
newsletter, click the SafeUnSubscribe(TM) link at the bottom of this newsletter,
and you won�t be bothered again.

Your continued feedback on this newsletter is most welcome. Please send 
your comments and suggestions to [email protected].

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

*** In This Issue ***

In This Month's Topic, I pay tribute to the enormous contributions made 
by Watts Humphrey.

Regular features to look for each month are: 

- Monthly Morsels
  Hints, tips, techniques and reference info related to this month�s topic

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

*** This Month�s Topic ***

WATTS HUMPHREY
THE FATHER OF SOFTWARE QUALITY

The software engineering community recently lost one of its most 
influential and dynamic leaders. On October 28, 2010, Watts A. Humphrey 
passed away � he was 83 years old. Watts was an inspiration to a 
generation of software engineers and software quality professionals. I 
have long considered Watts a mentor, a role model, and a person with a 
unique gift. He had the ability to make software engineering 
understandable to managers and executives. This gift has led to many 
significant changes in how software development work is managed. I feel 
privileged to have benefited from his wisdom and experience. 

This edition of my e-newsletter is dedicated to Watts and acknowledges the 
huge impact he has had on software engineering and the software quality 
profession.

A BRIEF BIOGRAPHY...

Born in Battle Creek, MI, Watts suffered with dyslexia and had trouble in 
public school. His family relocated to Connecticut, where schools were 
better able to help him overcome his dyslexia. He persevered and 
eventually graduated valedictorian of his high school class. 

After serving in the Navy, Watts earned a bachelor�s degree in physics 
from the University of Chicago, studying under Enrico Fermi. He then 
completed a master�s degree in physics from the Illinois Institute of 
Technology and an MBA degree, with an emphasis on manufacturing, from the 
University of Chicago. There, he later recalled, professor Judson Neff 
taught him the three most important things in manufacturing: planning, 
planning, and planning.

  �He said if you don�t plan, you can�t run a manufacturing operation,� 
  Humphrey explained. �That had an enormous impact on me.� 

Cost accounting also made an enormous impact on his later work. 

  �It�s a tremendously powerful field, the whole idea of measurement and 
  precision.� [1]

In 1953, he came to Boston and worked at Sylvania Labs designing circuits. He
attended a course on the Whirlwind computer(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Whirlwind_(computer)) at MIT. Wanting to learn more, he inquired about computer
courses at Northeastern University. At the time, there were none, so he was
asked to create and teach one � which he did. 

To prepare this course, he spent weeks at the Harvard and MIT libraries. 
His class consisted of employees from Honeywell Corporation who spent time 
actually building computers. Watts said this experience reinforced the 
philosophy that to manage or teach effectively, you need to respect the 
knowledge and experience of those who you are managing or teaching. 

In 1959, he began a long career at IBM where he worked initially as a 
hardware architect. He eventually became Vice President of Technical 
Development, where he oversaw over 4,000 engineers in 15 development labs 
spread over 7 countries. During his time at IBM, he was influenced by 
several people, including:

- Fred Brooks (author of The Mythical Man-Month)
  (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_Brooks)
- Barry Boehm (author of Software Engineering Economics)
  (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barry_Boehm)
- Michael Fagan (creator of the Formal Inspection process)
  (http://www.mfagan.com/)
- Harlan Mills (creator of Chief Programmer Teams and Cleanroom)
  (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harlan_Mills)
- Gerry Weinberg (author of Psychology of Computer Programming)
  (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerald_Weinberg)

When asked about his time at IBM, Watts said:

  �I discovered through this period that hardware management principles, 
  while sound, weren�t effective in a software setting. Software is 
  large-scale knowledge work. It�s hard to manage people when you don�t 
  understand what those people are doing.� [1]

In 1986, after retiring from IBM, he joined the newly formed Software
Engineering Institute (SEI - http://www.sei.cmu.edu/) at Carnegie Mellon
University in Pittsburgh. The SEI was established by the US Dept of Defense to
provide guidance to the military services in selecting capable software
contractors. [2]

It was at the SEI where he made an �outrageous commitment� to change the 
world of software development by developing sound management principles.

  �Changing the world of anything is an outrageous personal commitment. 
  That�s what makes it outrageous. I felt it needed to be done. I knew I 
  couldn�t do it alone, and I wanted an environment where I could work 
  with folks and do that,� Watts explained in a 2010 interview [1].

SIGNIFICANT CONTRIBUTIONS:

Let�s look at just a few of the major contributions Watts has made...

One of his first books � Managing the Software Process, published in 1995, 
was a direct result of work on the DoD project to provide guidance to DoD 
in selecting capable software contractors. This book describes �technical 
and managerial topics that assessments have found most critical for 
improvement� [3] and has roots in the work of Demming and Juran 
(statistical process control). 

In this book, Watts suggests we assess the software development process by 
asking three questions:

- How good is my current software process?
- What must I do to improve it?
- Where do I start?

This book also provides basic principles for process assessment. These 
include:

- Major changes to software process must start at the top
- Ultimately, everyone must be involved
- Effective change requires a goal and knowledge of current process
- Change is continuous
- Software process changes will not be retained without conscious effort 
  and periodic reinforcement
- Software process improvement requires investment

In this book, Watts talks about process assessment and process improvement 
and reinforces the notion of measurement. With regard to process 
improvement, he states:

  �If you don�t know where you are a map won�t help.� [3]

Watts also identifies the key goals of Software Quality Assurance:

- To improve software quality by appropriately monitoring both the 
  software and the development process that produced it

- To ensure full compliance with the established standards and procedures 
  for the software and the software process

- To ensure that inadequacies in product, process, or standards are 
  brought to management�s attention so they can be fixed [3]

In his book, Winning with Software: An Executive Strategy, published in 
2001, Watts used his unique gift to explain why management techniques used 
to manage manufacturing are not effective in managing software development 
work. In this book, he identified several reasons why executives should 
insist that software quality be measured and managed:

- Poor quality software can cause major property damage and even kill 
  people

- Quality work saves time and money

- If you don�t manage software quality, nobody else will

He also identified the five most common causes of project failure:

- Unrealistic schedules

- Inappropriate staffing

- Changing requirements

- Poor quality work

- Believing in magic

CMM AND CMMI

The development of the CMM and CMMi represents the most significant 
advancement in software engineering and software quality in the past 50 
years.

While often viewed with skepticism, the CMM established a consistent way 
of assessing (measuring) software development processes. CMM assessments 
provided management with:

- a way to identify what to do and how to do it
- guidance on where to start (Key Process Areas - KPAs)
- focus on data and measurements

The CMM and CMMi provided ways to make use of data and measurements along 
with well-known process improvement tools such as Plan-Do-Check-Act to 
enable organizations to achieve remarkable improvements in repeatability, 
consistency, and quality. 

Shortly after the CMM and CMMi were established, Watts was honored as the 
first Fellow of the Software Engineering Institute. With this honor, he 
was now free to investigate any topics that were of interest to him. 

What followed is truly remarkable... 

THE PERSONAL SOFTWARE PROCESS (PSP)

In his book the Personal Software Process (PSP - http://www.sei.cmu.edu/library/
abstracts/reports/00tr022.cfm), Watts undertook to better understand the
personal characteristics and behaviors of software engineers that lead to higher
quality software. He did this in a unique way � he gave himself a challenge � to
develop software and document the practices he determined would lead to better
quality. This book and the accompanying training courses Watts developed and
taught have helped improve software engineering skills and software quality
throughout the world. 

THE TEAM SOFTWARE PROCESS (TSP)

After creating the PSP, Watts recognized that the PSP was not sufficient since
software was developed by teams not by individuals. Watts then developed the
Team Software Process (TSP - http://www.sei.cmu.edu/reports/00tr023.pdf) as an
outgrowth of the PSP. 

THE QUALITY ATTITUDE

After creating the PSP and TSP, Watts continued his work at the SEI. He 
began writing a series of newsletters called Watts New. 

  In an attempt to make Watt�s wisdom accessible to as wide an audience as
  possible, the SEI has published a compilation of many of his articles
  originally published in the SEI Newsletter Watts New (http://www.sei.cmu.edu/
  library/abstracts/newsletters/wattsnewcompiled.cfm). 

One of my favorite issues of this newsletter was one titled "The Quality
Attitude" [6 - http://www.sei.cmu.edu/library/abstracts/news-at-sei/
wattsnew20043.cfm]. In this article, Watts states the importance of having an 
attitude that reinforces quality. He said:

- Every developer must view quality as a personal responsibility and 
  strive to make every product element defect free. [6]

This article also introduces the notion of the testing footprint:
 
What he pointed out was that the shaded area is the area covered by system 
testing. However, once software is released, customers often use software 
in ways that were not covered by system testing. When this happens, 
customers find defects not found in system testing. Knowing your testing 
footprint and how it differs from how your customers use your software is 
critical to reducing the number of defects customers find. 

Watts reported that some development groups are now producing reasonably 
large-scale software products that have had no defects found by their 
users. While these products actually have latent defects, for all 
practical purposes, they are defect free. Today, Watts reported that there 
are but a few development teams can consistently produce such software.

Watts also collected some defect data from a group of 810 experienced 
software engineers who developed over 8,000 programs. An analysis of the 
date showed that:

GroupAvg.       |    No. defects injected per (KLOC) 
All             |    120.8 (~ 1 defect per 8 LOC)
Upper Quintile  |    61.9
Upper 10%       |    28.9
Upper 1%        |    11.2

What this analysis shows is that, on average, experienced software 
engineers inject about 1 defect for every 8 lines of code written. In many 
cases, about 95% of these defects are found prior to release. As a result, 
software is released with some known defects and a significant number of 
unknown defects. 

Given this, let�s look at a typical example consisting of one million 
lines of code:

- One million Lines of Code (LOC) = 1,000 KLOC

  If we assume average defect injection rate of 120 defects/KLOC, that 
  would result in about 120,000 defects injected. If we also assume that 
  95% are found, that results in 114,000 defects found

- Number of Unknown defects = defects injected � defects found
  = (120,000 � 114,000) 
  = 6,000 defects remaining

This means that there could be as many as 6,000 defects were not found in 
the released software. Watts recognized this and observed:

  �So, the first required attitude change for software professionals and 
  their managers is to accept the fact that testing alone will not produce 
  quality software systems. Also, since defective software cannot be 
  secure, testing alone won�t produce secure systems either.� [6]

WATTS HUMPHREY�S LEGACY

There have been only a handful of people who have made significant 
contributions to the state of the art in software engineering and software 
quality assurance. In my opinion, the contributions of Watts Humphrey are 
far and away the most significant. He has managed to achieve his 
�outrageous commitment� to change the way software development projects 
are managed by developing and applying sound management principles.

We will forever be indebted to his accomplishments, we will miss his 
wisdom and wit and his ability to change the course of software 
engineering.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

*** Monthly Morsels ***

Every month in this space, you�ll find additional information related to 
this month�s topic.

- An Interview with Watts Humphrey by Grady Booch, published at InformIT 
  Website (http://www.informit.com/promotions/promotion.aspx?
  promo=137746&WT.rss_f=Promotion&WT.rss_a=137746&WT.rss_ev=a).

- �A method for assessing the software engineering capability of 
  contractors,� SEI Technical Report SEI-87-TR-23, September 1987

- Humphrey, W., Managing the Software Process, Addison-Wesley, 1995.

- Humphrey, W., Winning with Software: An Executive Strategy, 
  Addison-Wesley, 2002

- Humphrey, W., A Discipline for Software Engineering, Addison-Wesley, 
  1995.

- Humphrey, W., �The Quality Attitude�, news@sei, Number 3, 2004

THE WATTS COLLECTION

The SEI has put together a comprehensive collection of the work that Watts 
has published called The Watts Collection (http://www.sei.cmu.edu/watts/
collection.cfm). I urge you to take advantage of this resource as it contains
the wisdom of one of the greatest software engineering minds of our time. 

COMPLETE LIST OF BOOKS BY WATTS:

Leadership, Teamwork, and Trust: Building a Competitive Software 
Capability (SEI Series in Software Engineering), Addison-Wesley, to be 
published 2011.

Reflections on Management: How to Manage Your Software Projects, Your 
Teams, Your Boss, and Yourself. Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA, 2010

TSP, Coaching Development Teams, Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA, 2006

TSP, Leading a Development Team, Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA, 2006

PSP, A Self-Improvement Process for Software Engineers, Addison-Wesley, 
Reading, MA, 2001

Winning with Software: An Executive Strategy, Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA, 
2001

Introduction to the Team Software Process, Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA, 
1999

Managing Technical People - Innovation, Teamwork and Software Process, 
Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA, 1997

Introduction to the Personal Software Process, Addison-Wesley , Reading, 
MA, 1996

A Discipline for Software Engineering. Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA, 1995

Managing the Software Process, Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA, 1989

Switching Circuits: With Computer Applications, McGraw-Hill, 1958

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

*** About SQC ***

Software Quality Consulting provides consulting, training, and auditing services
tailored to meet the specific needs of clients. We help clients fine-tune their
software development processes and improve the quality of their software
products. The overall goal is to help clients achieve Predictable Software
Development(TM) � so that organizations can consistently deliver quality
software with promised features in the promised timeframe. To learn more about
how we can help your organization, visit our web site (http://www.swqual.com/
index.html?AboutSQC) or send us an email ([email protected]).

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Food for Thought, Predictable Software Development, Act Like a Customer,
and ALAC are trademarks of Software Quality Consulting, Inc.
Copyright 2010. Software Quality Consulting, Inc. All rights reserved.
Graphic design by Sarah Cole Design.