Redefining technological debt

Redefining technological debt

By Michael Zedeler (‎mzedeler‎) from Copenhagen.pm
Date: Tuesday, 4 August 2009 10:00
Duration: 20 minutes
Target audience: Corporate Perl
Language:
Tags: backlog debt defects deficiencies management technical technological


Webserver stayed in production for a month after the sysadmin discovered it had been compromised.

Revision control not in use. One unique version of production code at each customer. Merging would take months if not years.

e-commerce system at large company not integrated with ERP because the ERP system hit end of life many years ago and is now completely unsupported. Up to 500 orders are manually entered into the ERP system every day.

The cases above probably sends shivers down the spine of most experienced developers. But how do you assess the impact of such diverse defects?

Technological debt is a term that can be used to provide a measurement of the deficiencies of any given software system. By defining the technological debt as the gap between the concrete implementation of a given system and the overall requirements, it is possible to carry out a proper cost/benefit analysis of fixing the deficiencies.

This talk will outline a new framework for better explaining non-technical people what the actual costs of various deficiencies are, as well as a roadmap for standardizing system requirements.


Attended by: Nicolas Mendoza (‎nicomen‎), osfameron, Henrik Hald Nørgaard, Michael Zedeler (‎mzedeler‎), Elizabeth Cholet (‎zrusilla‎), Bogdan Lucaciu (‎zamolxes‎), Gabor Szabo (‎szabgab‎), Adrian Arnautu, Ricardo Marques (‎ricmarques‎), Cosmin Budrica (‎cosmincx‎), Tiago Grego, Jacinta Richardson (‎jarich‎), Troels Liebe Bentsen (‎tlbdk‎), Henrik Tougaard (‎htoug‎), Henrique Alves (‎Halves‎), Jørgen Elgaard Larsen (‎elhaard‎), Giuseppe Maxia (‎gmax‎), David Leadbeater (‎dg‎), Sue Mynott (‎virtualsue‎), Andrew Beech, Sergio Arias,