software engineering
Refactoring a Live SaaS Environment
We decided to refactor and re-implement almost all of our back-end and UI. This is how we went through the design and implementation. You can experience the new design by trying ShiftLeft ...
Cybersecurity Lessons from the Pandemic – Positive and Negative Feedback
Systems use negative feedback in order to converge to stability and equilibrium (a positive quest). Positive-feedback systems diverge, which leads to instability and sometimes surging out of control (usually a negative outcome) ...
Another Boeing Software “Glitch”
How I hate the word “glitch,” which is commonly used to describe faulty software in press reports, blogs, and the like. In my opinion, it trivializes serious software errors. So, when the ...
Software Architecture with Shortest Time-to-Market Consideration
Survival of the Fastest Today, everything is getting faster. With social media and our smartphones, we expect immediate responses to our messages. When searching for the answer to a question, the internet ...
Outsourcing, Cost Cutting and the Boeing 737 Max Debacle
When we thought that Boeing had come up with ways to mitigate the risks that resulted in two major air crashes, we learn that Boeing has been outsourcing their software development to ...
AI Bias Validated!
In my BlogInfoSec column “Is A.I. For, or Against, Cybersecurity?” posted on June 18, 2018, I asserted that developers are introducing their personal biases into the design of AI (artificial intelligence) systems ...
Cybersecurity and Safety of AI and Robots
The article in The New Yorker of May 14, 2018 by Tad Friend with the title “Superior Intelligence: Do the perils of A.I. exceed its promise?” describes two schools of thought with ...
Securing the Critical Infrastructure—Two Lost Decades
On May 22, 2018, it will have been 20 years to the day since President Bill Clinton issued PDD 63 (Presidential Decision Directive No. 63: Protecting America’s Critical Infrastructure). The PDD laid ...
QOTD Grady Booch
Grady Booch on Technical Debt "The concept of technical debt is central to understanding the forces that weigh upon systems, for it often explains where, how, and why a system is stressed ...
