Breaking the language barrier
Tom DeMarco · ACM SIGMETRICS Performance Evaluation Review · 1980
The systems analyst and the user are not independent entities; each depends on the other. When communication problems get in their way, however, the relationship can turn adversary.The real problem in most system or program development efforts may be that English, left to itself, is too subtle, too open to personal interpretation, to be appropriate in the structured world of DP.Tom DeMarco shows how to impose limits on our native language so analysts, designers, programmers and users can safely use it to define what they are trying to develop. This week he starts by giving some hints on that most basic of DP jobs, setting up the system.