Peopleware Papers: Notes on the Human Side of Software, The

Chapter 29. Up the Waterfall

Do androids dream of electric sheep? Do managers on software projects have nightmares about plunging over waterfalls?

In the traditional view of the software development life cycle, a linear series of stages are completed in sequence, passing from requirements definition through analysis, design, construction, and testing. High-level design is completed before detailed design can be started. Problems are to be thoroughly analyzed and designed before questions about coding are considered. The development process proceeds smoothly from high levels of abstraction to low-level details, from the general and abstract to the specific and concrete.

Of course, it never really works this way. Still, the so-called “waterfall” model ...