Standards & Further Reading¶
Accuracy commitment
Every source listed here is a real, verifiable publication. This course does not cite invented statistics, quotations, or references. Where a source is periodically revised, verify the current edition before quoting it.
The course is self-contained: you do not need any of these to complete it. They are for going deeper, or for checking an idea against an authoritative source.
Standards and bodies¶
| Source | Publisher | What it covers |
|---|---|---|
| A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK® Guide) | Project Management Institute (PMI) | Widely used reference for project management concepts and practice |
| Agile Practice Guide | PMI | Applying agile and hybrid approaches in practice |
| ISO/IEC/IEEE 12207 — Software life cycle processes | ISO / IEC / IEEE | International standard for software life cycle processes |
| ISO/IEC/IEEE 29148 — Requirements engineering | ISO / IEC / IEEE | International standard for requirements engineering |
| ISO/IEC 25010 — System and software quality models (SQuaRE) | ISO / IEC | International standard defining software product quality characteristics |
| ISO 9001 — Quality management systems — Requirements | ISO | International standard for quality management systems |
| PRINCE2 | AXELOS / PeopleCert | A widely used project management method |
Standards are revised periodically. Always confirm the current edition and its exact title at the publisher's official site before citing it.
Agile and adaptive sources¶
| Source | Author / publisher | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Manifesto for Agile Software Development | Beck et al., agilemanifesto.org | The 2001 statement of four values and twelve principles |
| The Scrum Guide | Ken Schwaber and Jeff Sutherland, scrumguides.org | The definitive short definition of Scrum; revised periodically |
| Agile Estimating and Planning | Mike Cohn | Estimation and planning practices for agile teams |
| Accelerate | Nicole Forsgren, Jez Humble, and Gene Kim | Software delivery performance and its measurement |
| Martin Fowler's website (martinfowler.com) | Martin Fowler | Long-standing essays on agile, refactoring, and software design |
Software engineering and people¶
| Source | Author | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| The Mythical Man-Month | Frederick P. Brooks Jr. | Classic essays on the human factors of large software projects |
| Peopleware | Tom DeMarco and Timothy Lister | Classic work on teams, productivity, and the working environment |
| Software Engineering Economics | Barry W. Boehm | Foundational work on software cost estimation, including the COCOMO family of models |
Suggested readings by part of the course¶
You need none of these to complete the course. If you want one accompanying source per part, these are the most directly relevant, and all are real publications.
| Part | If you read one thing | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Foundations and life cycles | The Mythical Man-Month — Brooks | The essays on why software projects fail are still accurate, and they explain several course lessons from first principles |
| Initiation and planning | A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK® Guide) — PMI | The standard vocabulary for scope, schedule, cost, risk, and integration; useful as a reference, not a narrative |
| Agile and adaptive delivery | The Scrum Guide — Schwaber and Sutherland | Short, free, and the definitive statement of Scrum. Read it before any secondary description of Scrum |
| Estimation and cost | Software Engineering Economics — Boehm | The origin of cost models and of the idea that estimation is decision-making under uncertainty |
| Teams and people | Peopleware — DeMarco and Lister | The human factors — interruption, environment, team cohesion — that schedules ignore at their cost |
| Metrics and delivery | Accelerate — Forsgren, Humble, and Kim | The research programme behind delivery measures, and a caution against framework advocacy |
| Quality and requirements | ISO/IEC 25010 and ISO/IEC/IEEE 29148 | The reference definitions for quality characteristics and for requirements practice |
| Advanced practice | Advanced practice track | The course's own extension lessons, which name the limits of each technique |
How to use these sources¶
- Check before you quote. If you intend to cite a figure or a quotation, go to the source and confirm it. Do not rely on second-hand numbers.
- Prefer primary sources — the standard itself, or the book, rather than a summary of it.
- Note dates and editions. Practice in software project management changes over time; a source's date is part of interpreting it.
Contributing a source¶
If you add a source, it must be real and verifiable, and you should state what it covers. See CONTRIBUTING.md.