Introduction to Software Engineering
Status: This book is still under construction.
This book is an introduction to the art of software engineering. It is intended as a textbook for an undergraduate level course.
Software engineering is about teams and it is about quality. The problems to solve are so complex or large, that a single developer cannot solve them anymore. Software engineering is also about communication. Teams do not consist only of developers, but also of testers, architects, system engineers, customer, project managers, etc. Software projects can be so large that we have to do careful planning. Implementation is no longer just writing code, but it is also following guidelines, writing documentation and also writing unit tests. But unit tests alone are not enough. The different pieces have to fit together. And we have to be able to spot problematic areas using metrics. They tell us if our code follows certain standards. Once we are finished coding, that does not mean that we are finished with the project: for large projects maintaining software can keep many people busy for a long time. Since there are so many factors influencing the success or failure of a project, we also need to learn a little about project management and its pitfalls, but especially what makes projects successful. And last but not least, a good software engineer, like any engineer, needs tools, and you need to know about them.
So we invite you to join us on the journey through the mazes of software engineering!