Review of "Return on Software by Steve Tockey"; Addison Wesley, 2005
Mordechai Ben-Menachem · ACM SIGSOFT Software Engineering Notes · 2005
This book examines the issues concerning our investments in software systems and software-rich, embedded systems. As far as I can tell, every aspect of this difficult subject seems to have been covered. It is, I believe, the first time that such a book has appeared. Prof. Boehm's book is not only quite old by now; it examined economic aspects of systems from a totally different viewpoint and with different aims. A book on the economics of software has been needed for quite a long time. All analysts look at the economic aspects of what they propose to do -- if they don't they are certainly not professional; they are wasteful amateurs. However, it is unfortunately rare for this to be done well as very few technical analysts have the basic economic training to do so.