Global Software Development: Introduction

by Ed Yourdon

For the past several years, it has become increasingly evident that software is a global industry. Not only can software be developed in any country, but it requires very little capital to create a software industry that can provide high-value exports for its host country. Thus developing nations such as India, which find themselves at the mercy of deflationary prices for commodities and low wages for assembly-line jobs, have the opportunity to dramatically change their fortunes by focusing on software. But equally important, organizations in North America and Western Europe have become increasingly intrigued with the concept of offshore programming as a way of providing round-the-clock service to their clients, as well as supporting massively parallel development teams. We've investigated the issues associated with global programming in previous issues, and we felt that it was time to revisit the topic to see what has changed.