Last day of CSEE&T

The last day of CSEE&T started with a keynote by Lynda Northrop from the SEI. One of her points was that we aren't educated and trained in software architecture as we should be. Too much code, too little architecture. Also, that maybe functionality shouldn't be the driving force when it comes to devising a software architecture (at least that is my interpretation of what she said). She noted that every system has an architecture, intentionally or not, and that in general you can't just refactor code (i.e. XP-style) into an architecture. Here's the SEI software architecture group.

I'm also in a workshop on "Intellectual property law for software engineers". The workshop leader recommnded some basic documents on software intellectual property that look pretty good. Also, here is a short article about the state of software patents at the USPO.

One more thing I learned from CSEE&T: a couple of people said that they are seeing companies move away from agile methods and back to traditional waterfall models of development (and associated documentation) because of the Sarbanes-Oxley act I wrote about in the last paragraph of this blog entry.