About once a year, my wife nags me about visiting the doctor for my annual checkup. I procrastinate as long as I can, because I know that the doctor is going to tell me that I'm 20 pounds overweight. Each year, I ask him, with the innocence of a saint, "Doctor, how could this have happened?" His answer is always the same: "One ounce at a time."

"But how can I get rid of this extra weight?" I ask, always hoping there will be a new answer.

But it's the same answer every year: "Eat less. Exercise more."

About once a year, my wife nags me about visiting the doctor for my annual checkup.

About once a year, my wife nags me about visiting the doctor for my annual checkup.

It's all changing around you. Customers, employees, technology, and management. Understanding this change is essential to business-IT alignment. Here are some clear trends in the way we think about products, services, technology, and the application of technology.

It has been almost five years now since the US government started to divest itself of responsibility for the Internet, eliminating appropriate-use policies restricting Internet commerce and making possible a new ind

In the Eighties I wrote a newsletter on Expert Systems.

In the last issue of OOS, I considered OO Visual Application Development Tools that were appropriate for departmental development.

At the end of last year, Hewlett-Packard (HP) introduced a new component-based approach to application development that I mentioned briefly in the January OOS.

Toward the end of 1997 I completed a survey of the use of object technology. In general, the results indicated that companies are investing in OT and will be investing more in the next few years.

Many companies today are making packaged applications -- particularly SAP AG's SAP R/3 system -- the backbone of their corporate Enterprise Resources Planning (ERP) systems.

A contract is a kind of specification. Instead of describing a new system, it describes a business agreement. A contract suffers from some of the same difficulties that plague a specification: neither is ever entirely clear, entirely "right," or entirely free from interpretation. None of these problems is fatal when there is good will and a commonality of interests between the parties.

A contract is a kind of specification. Instead of describing a new system, it describes a business agreement. A contract suffers from some of the same difficulties that plague a specification: neither is ever entirely clear, entirely "right," or entirely free from interpretation. None of these problems is fatal when there is good will and a commonality of interests between the parties.

A contract is a kind of specification. Instead of describing a new system, it describes a business agreement. A contract suffers from some of the same difficulties that plague a specification: neither is ever entirely clear, entirely "right," or entirely free from interpretation. None of these problems is fatal when there is good will and a commonality of interests between the parties.

Software development and maintenance have been troublesome technologies for more than 50 years. When actual results are compared to the desired and originally anticipated results, a majority of large software projects tend to run late, exceed their budgets, or even get canceled without being completed at all.

Software development and maintenance have been troublesome technologies for more than 50 years. When actual results are compared to the desired and originally anticipated results, a majority of large software projects tend to run late, exceed their budgets, or even get canceled without being completed at all.

There's an old saying: "Don't borrow trouble," meaning don't worry about problems until they become real. Unfortunately, that's a recipe for disaster in today's litigious software development climate.

There's an old saying: "Don't borrow trouble," meaning don't worry about problems until they become real. Unfortunately, that's a recipe for disaster in today's litigious software development climate.

Copyright 1998 by Gregory S. Barsh. All rights reserved.

Copyright 1998 by Gregory S. Barsh. All rights reserved.

Disclaimer: This article should not be construed as providing any legal advice or legal opinion, and it does not purport to give a summary of the law nor a comprehensive analysis of the legal issues raised therein. Do not act or rely upon legal information or views in this article without consulting an attorney. Copyright 1998 by Herb Krasner. All rights reserved.

Disclaimer: This article should not be construed as providing any legal advice or legal opinion, and it does not purport to give a summary of the law nor a comprehensive analysis of the legal issues raised therein. Do not act or rely upon legal information or views in this article without consulting an attorney. Copyright 1998 by Herb Krasner. All rights reserved.