Hi all. I am a financial analyst and I am in big time quandary. We are working on a make or break project to complete a very important module for a mega banking product.

Laugh at me or have pity, but I have somehow missed the bus so far as Information Technology is concerned. I know zilch about programming and all that stuff. But I can’t say no to my boss, can I? Also, my successful participation might just make me a more rounded professional.

So guys help me out. I have started lapping up whatever I could on the software development process and the technologies specific for this project. I have made my Indian friends (boy, do they know their stuff!) working with IT giants like Infosys, Wipro, Brickred etc. to help me out. But most of them are talking in a language that is Greek to me.

So all you people reading it, please help me out. Some of you may have gone through a similar stage. So you are in a better position to understand me and pry me out of this hole. So please start writing in – in simple English!.

I have been in a similar position in my career - I was always the person who would be asked to do special projects and many of those technology related. I am not sure of your role on the project are you heading it up? Responsible for just the IT portion etc.? The most important thing for you to realize is that there will always be people who know about IT a lot more than you do but given your background as an analyst, I am sure you probably have a better business background than them. Managing an IT project is not about your technical knowledge it is about your business knowledge, the techinical people are just a component of it.

When I ran large IT projects, people knew I was not an IT person so that allowed me the privilege of asking a lot of questions. Let me give you an example, you do not have to build macros on an excel spreadsheet but you do have to know the capability of excel. I would focus on the systems benefits/features so you know the full capability of the system rather than how to execute programming code. Good luck and welcome to the forum.

Hi Tom, you mentioned BrickRed in your post. Well I was employed with BrickRed. I understand that you want to know basics of software development process. I can also gathered that you have spoken to your friends in BrickRed regarding your query. Though it is not really clear, what exactly you want to know, but I’ll give you a little glimpse of typical process employed by the BRICKRED.COM.

It cannot be emphasized enough that a detailed and intelligent process is a must if you are developing software. Process means a guideline description of a repeatable procedure that describes the way that your organization develops software. It also defines your organization because it is the process that will be applied to the development of future projects.


Domain Analysis
It is usually the first step in attempting to design a new piece of software. It involves the investigation of the area such as: banking, marketing, retailing, insurance etc., where the software is to be employed.

Know Thy Client
The holy grail of any project, satisfy your client. For that you need to know, what is in his mind regarding his requirements. He is the best person to tell you, what they want. While skilled and experienced software engineers can fill in any incomplete, ambiguous or contradictory information.

Specification
Specification means precisely describing the software to be written in a rigorous way.

Software architecture
The architecture of a software system refers to an abstract representation of that system. Architecture is concerned with making sure the software system will meet the requirements of the product, as well as ensuring that future requirements can be addressed.

Implementation (or coding)
Reducing a design to code may be the most obvious part of the software engineering job, but it is not necessarily the largest portion.

Testing
Testing of parts of software is done by a software engineer to check out any bug or error.

Documentation
An important (and often overlooked) task is documenting the internal design of software for the purpose of future maintenance and enhancement.

In my next posting, I will discuss methodologies adopted to successfully develop and implement software projects. I hope this posting, though not enough by any stretch of imagination should give the beginners a little something.

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'True Partner' Approach