Well here it is at last. The start of the giant software development project to end all projects. Ok, maybe not that grande, but definitely one I’ve been fighting for years to get.

This project is essentially two large projects in one (with several smaller sub-projects). Each of these two large projects is actually version 4.0 of the software. I was the project lead on the version 3.0’s back in 2002-2004. So, at a macro level, here’s what’s going to be different this time around (without disclosing too much):

Now the big task is starting. Here there is always a tendency (that I think is common among many programmers) to just start diving in to the code. That’s the fun stuff. Unfortunately, this is generally frowned on in my industry. This is because the end-product requires regulatory approval, and as part of that approval we have to show a proper design and development process was used in creating the product.

Now a process of this type generally dictates that we start with a project plan and set of requirements and other docs ad nauseam until at last we are officially ready to code. I still desperately want to dive in, but first I must produce a project plan (which, at this stage, is mostly bullcrap) and then we start risk analysis, use cases and detailed specs, detailed designs, etc… And on the side, of course, I start diving in…

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