Microsoft Research applied this notion to the study of  software engineering as a whole In Exploding Software-Engineering Myths,   MSR explores a number of research projects carried out with the intent of applying cold empirical evidence to the field of sofware development.

A few take aways:

1. More Isn’t Always Better
   1. “It is more beneficial to achieve higher code coverage of more complex code than to test less complex code at an equivalent level. ”
2. Write Test Code First
   1. “The research team found was that the Test Driven Development (TDD) teams produced code that was 60 to 90 percent better in terms of defect density than non-TDD teams. They also discovered that TDD teams took longer to complete their projects—15 to 35 percent longer.”
3. Proving the Utility of Assertions
   1. “The team observed a definite negative correlation: more assertions and code verifications means fewer bugs.”
   2. And interestingly, “The research team believes that enforcing the use of assertions would not work well; rather, there needs to be a culture of using assertions in order to produce the desired results.”
4. Organization Structure Does Matter – a lot
   1. “Organizational metrics, which are not related to the code, can predict software failure-proneness with a precision and recall of 85 percent.”
5. Geographical Distance Doesn’t Matter – much
   1. Researchers asked engineers who’d they’d prefer to talk to when faced with issues: “Most people preferred to talk to someone from their own organization 4,000 miles away rather than someone only five doors down the hall but from a different organization. Organizational cohesiveness played a bigger role than geographical distance.”

But what if I wanted to read the WSJ from my laptop… Visit mobile2.wsj.com, you’re instantly redirected to the main page and asked to subscribe. So here’s a little workaround:

1. Install FireFox 3
2. Install the Modify Headers  add-on
3. Restart Firefox
4. Go to Tools > Modify Headers.
5. Set the following fields
   1. Modify
   2. user-agent
   3. Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows CE; IEMobile m.n)
   4. [Leave Blank]
6. Click Save
7. Navigate to mobile2.wsj.com

Now Mr. Murdoch believes you’re using an antiquated browser and doesn’t mind you reading his content. Enjoy!

Mr. Bezos, moreover, has become a proponent of kaizen, which means “continuous improvement” in Japanese…

For Amazon and Mr. Bezos, that balance has always been there. Experiments were encouraged, then the results measured. This combination of loose thinking and tight analysis seems to be very productive.

NYTimes: Curious at Amazon, but Not Idle

This seems a powerful combination. Solid metrics can be eye opening, but they can also stifle innovation. Cultivating a positive, failure friendly environment is key.

To me, driving is not an end in itself. It is just a tool for solving the problem of getting from point A to point B. The less I have to learn about how to accomplish this task the better.

My goal is not to become a car expert. My goal is to get to my destination conveniently. I don’t want to “have greater control over the experience”; I don’t want “more power”; heck, depending on where I’m going, I often prefer to take the bus, where I have no control over the experience at all!

It occurred to me as I read commenter after commenter try to convince me that my own personal priorities were incorrect that I drive a car the same way most people use a computer. They don’t want to know about the difference between ROM and RAM or how many floppy disks you can store in a 6 megabit cable modem. They just want to surf the web, send email, and look at pictures of their grandchildren. (Okay, they may want to do other stuff too, but knowing the difference between PIO and DMA is definitely not on the list.)

The New Old Thing > I Drive a Car the Way Most People Use a Computer

Lately I’ve been noticing a curiously awesome side effect. Our bandwidth usage is at an all time low. I don’t have metrics for it (yet), but the application loads noticeably faster. I did a little googling and found others getting as much as 73% performance increases. Pretty cool stuff. It’s nice to see something so hyped up actually deliver.