Developers Don’t Fight The Last War

What worked in the past might not work in the future

Software development teams are always prepared to create software in the same way as the last project.

There is no magic formula when creating software, no approach that works every time. You must adapt your approach to be most effective in your project.

There is no one size fits all approach to software development because each software project is unique with different requirements, people, levels of skills, levels of knowledge, and different approaches to decision making.

What worked in previous projects is not guaranteed to work in future projects.

Don’t fight the last war

“there is a tendency in many armies to spend the peace time studying how to fight the last war” Lieutenant Colonel J. L. Schley

and

Generals are always prepared to fight the last war. Winston S. Churchill

The 1st world war was trench warfare, a war of attrition. Long, slow and deadly for the attacking army who would try to move forward through barbed wire, whilst being shot at by people hidden in trenches.

France had 800,000 person standing army, considered one of the most powerful in Europe. The Maginot Line built in 1930, was a chain of fortifications which was seen to be a key defence in holding back any attack from the Germans.

Winston Churchill toured the Maginot line and said.

“It cannot be broken at any point, except by an effort which would be enormously costly in life and take so much time that the general situation would be transformed while it was in progress.”

Based on WW1 and the previous war, the Maginot Line would be a huge deterrent to anyone attacking using WW1 attrition warfare. France could have defended themselves with fewer men and difficult to…