CAST Software: On Quality Blog

Individual Code Quality in an Enterprise Software Development World

Pete Pizzutillo — Fri, 17 May 2013 17:56:24 +0000

Finding the right tools for the right challenge The growing cost of most software development efforts can be traced back to one underlying cause – the lack of visibility into the software. As the size and system complexity grows for business critical applications — along with the complexity of sourcing environments — there is an increasing need for app owners, architects, and developers to truly understand their codebases. Without visibility into the implementation, it is hard for a developer to understand all the nuances of the code. This explains the disproportional amount of time that is needed for developers to identify the root cause of defects. Other than wasting time, … Read More

Do I look like someone who needs representative measures?

Philippe Emmanuel Douziech — Wed, 15 May 2013 20:04:09 +0000

No offense, but I’m not addicted to representative measures. In some areas, I am more than happy to have them. Like when talking about the balance of my checking and savings accounts. In that case, I’d like representative measures, to the nearest cent. But I don’t need representative measures 100 percent of the time. On the contrary, in some areas, I strongly need non-representative measures to provide me with some efficient guidance. Risk level assessment One of those areas is software analysis and measurement; especially when you’re dealing with risk levels. Letting me know that an application is one billionth (1/1 billion) times better than another doesn’t help me. I … Read More

An Open Letter to Derivatives Exchange Operators

Danielle Azzara — Tue, 14 May 2013 19:20:40 +0000

Dear Technology Colleagues at Derivatives Exchanges, I’m sure you do not need me to inform you that the investment community is becoming more aware of the importance of dependable software operating our exchanges. Yet many of your competitors have fallen victim to the reputational damage caused by software glitches. Many of us, as technology professionals and as individual investors, are shocked to see the escalating pace of major software outages reported by the exchanges and major market makers. Perhaps this is because most enterprises fail to wake up to their software risk until shamed into it by a major public outage. By this point, whilst it may be possible to … Read More

Code Quality as a Service

Pete Pizzutillo — Mon, 13 May 2013 18:42:27 +0000

As the product manager for CAST Highlight, it’s refreshing to see a shift in discussions about the “quality of cloud solutions” to “cloud quality solutions.” Recently, there have been an increasing number of cloud-based static code quality analysis tools, or should I say services. A few that I’ve been watching include: Code Climate consolidates the results from a suite of Ruby static analysis tools into a real-time report, giving teams the information they need to identify hotspots, evaluate new approaches, and improve code quality. Codeq imports your Git repositories into a Datomic database, and then performs language-aware code quality analysis. By doing so, Codeq allows you to: track changes at … Read More

Does code quality really help the business?

Pete Pizzutillo — Mon, 06 May 2013 21:41:30 +0000

Most organizations have started to realize that code quality is an important root cause to many of their issues, whether it’s incident levels or time to value. The growing complexity of development environments in IT — the outsourcing, the required velocity, the introduction of Agile — have all raised the issue about code quality, sometimes to an executive level. Business applications have always been complex. You can go back to the 70s, even the 60s, and hear about systems that have millions of lines of code. But here’s the rub: In those days it was millions of lines of COBOL or some other language. But it was all one language. … Read More

Open source is wrapping its hands around the federal government’s infrastructure

Danielle Azzara — Thu, 02 May 2013 20:54:05 +0000

It’s no shocker that the federal government is turning to cost cutting measures in the middle of a down economy. But there’s a bigger problem looming on the horizon. The federal government has become very dependent on open source products; which wouldn’t be a problem if open source software was held to the same standard as custom commercial code. What government agencies fail to realize is that the open source components they’re using to cut costs are being integrated into their most crucial systems. They’re not standing alone. They’re right in the mix, integrated into various data feeds and sources. Don’t get us wrong, open source software is great. And … Read More

Who you gonna call when a fake AP tweet blows up Wall Street?

Danielle Azzara — Fri, 26 Apr 2013 12:24:53 +0000

Why our very own Lev Lesokhin, of course. If you were on Twitter Tuesday (or watching the market index), you no doubt saw AP’s fake tweet regarding an explosion at the White House that wounded the president, and the market and media frenzy that followed as a result. Not only was it remarkable to see the effect one rogue tweet could have on market stability (it temporarily wiped out $136B from the S&P 500), but the whole episode also underscored how fast paced the world of business has become. After the episode was over, news organizations scrambling to cover the story wanted to know how this could have happened, and … Read More

Technical Debt: Principal but no interest?

Philippe Emmanuel Douziech — Thu, 25 Apr 2013 22:01:56 +0000

Making technical debt visible … Making technical debt visible already proves to be quite a challenge, as it’s all about exposing the underwater part of the iceberg. But how deep underwater does it go? To know for sure, you would need the right diving equipment. To go just below the surface, you would start with a snorkel. But to go far down, you need a deep-sea exploration submersible. This is comparable to software. To know for sure how many issues you have under the hood, you need the right analysis equipment. Simple source code parsers help (like a snorkel). Finding cross-technology, cross-layer, system-level faulty patterns is another matter. … to … Read More

American Airlines computer glitch: The day AA customers stood still

Lev — Thu, 18 Apr 2013 14:17:50 +0000

Here we go again. You probably have heard, since it’s been reported everywhere, that American Airlines was grounded Tuesday, leaving passengers stranded for several hours due to a “computer glitch” in the reservation system. Because of the glitch, gate agents were unable to print boarding passes; and some passengers described being stuck for long stretches on planes on the runway unable to take off or, having landed, initially unable to move to a gate. It will be a while before the glitch’s impact on American Airlines’ reputation and revenue is fully understood. But it’s obvious the company is shifting into damage control mode. Take note of what they’re calling it. … Read More

Keep an eye on legacy apps, COBOL’s not dead!

Jerome Chiampi — Wed, 17 Apr 2013 13:12:29 +0000

Third-generation programming languages (3GL) like COBOL or PL/1 are seen as outdated languages for “has-been” developers, and do not interest new ones anymore (there were even predictions saying that COBOL was going to die in mid-term.) These new developers prefer more modern technologies, like J2EE or .NET, and, worryingly, educational organizations provide few learning opportunities for 3GLs. As a consequence, people who can create and maintain applications implemented in COBOL or PL/1 are not as common. Some shops have had to organize quick training sessions to maintain their manpower. In other words, there are few experts but the need is there! Fortunately, there are initiatives like those done by platform … Read More