Code Complete Checklists

by Lord Omlette.
Created 2003-06-18 771 BMT.
Updated 2005-03-26 408 BMT.

These are a few of the checklists from Steve McConnell's Code Complete. The book is really good, but I felt it would be better if I could get to these checklists wherever I was.

Requirements Content

Are all the inputs to the system specified, including their source, accuracy, range of values, and frequency?
Are all the outputs from the system specified, including their destination, accuracy, range of values, frequency, and format?
Are all the report formats specified?
Are all the external hardware and software interfaces specified?
Are all the communication interfaces specified, including handshaking, error-checking, and communication protocols?
Is the expected response time, from the user's point of view, specified for all the necessary operations?
Are other timing considerations specified, such as processing time, data-transfer rate, and system throughput?
Are all the tasks the user wants to perform specified?
Are the data used in each task and the data resulting from each task specified?
Is the level of security specified?
Is the reliability specified, including the consequences of software failure, the vital information that needs to be protected from failure, and the strategy for error detection and recovery?
Is maximum memory specified?
Is the maximum storage specified?
Is the maintainability of the system specified, including its ability to adapt to changes in the operating environment, in its interfaces w/ other software, in its accuracy, and in its performance?
Are acceptable trade-offs between competing attributes specified - for example, between robustness and correctness?
Is the definition of success included? Of failure?

Requirements Completeness

Where information isn't available beore development begins, are the areas of incompleteness specified?
Are the requirements complete in the sense that if the product satisfies every requirement, it will be acceptable?
Are you uneasy about any part of the requirements? Are some parts impossible to implement and included just to please your customer or your boss?

Requirements Completeness

Are the requirements written in user language? Do the users think so?
Does each requirement avoid conflicts w/ other requirements?
Do the requirements avoid specifying the design?
Are the requirements at a fairly consistent level of detail? Should any requirement be specified in less detail?
Are the requirements clear enough to be turned over to an independent group for implementation and still be understood?
Is each item relevant to the problem and its solution? Can each item be traced to its origin in the problem environment?
Is each requirement testable? Will it be possible for independent testing to determine whether each requirement has been satisfied?
Are all possible changes to the requirements specified, including the likelihood of each change?

Architecture

Is the overall organization of the program clear, including a good architectural overview and justification?
Are modules well defined, including their functionality and their interfaces to other modules?
Are all the functions listed in the requirements covered sensibly, by neither too many or too few modules?
Is the architecture designed to accommodate likely changes?
Are necessary buy-vs.-build decisions included?
Does the architecture describe how reused code will be made to conform to other architectural objectives?
Are all the major data structures hidden behind access routines?
Is the database organization and content justified?
Are all key algorithms described and justified?
Are all major objects described and justified?
Is a strategy for handling user input described?
Is a strategy for handling I/O described and justified?
Are key aspects of the user interface defined?
Is the user interface modularized so that changes in it won't affect the rest of the program?
Are memory-use estimates and a strategy for memory management described and justified?
Does the architecture set space and speed budgets for each module?
Is a strategy for handling strings described, and are character-string storage estimates provided?
Is a coherent error-handling strategy provided?
Are error messages managed as a set to present a clean user interface?
Is a level of robustness specified?
Is any part over- or under-architected? Are expectations in this area set out explicitly?
Are the major system goals clearly stated?
Does the whole architecture hang together conceptually?
Is the top-level design independent of the machine and language that will be used to implement it?
Are the motivations for all major decisions provided?
Are you, as a programmer who will implement the system, comfortable with the architecture?

If you're just some random person wondering why you need this stuff, read these three books (in order):

Experience:
(an older version is available in the library, but the 25th Anniversary Ed. offers alot 20/20 hindsight...)

Theory:

Practice:

Printable Version

quote #1967:

JLP: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K9hK45Are6w
frivolouscoho: U dey craze. I no sabi who u be so leave me alone. Ra m'aka kpele?
JLP: haha
JLP: too late
JLP: THE MATRIX HAS YOU
frivolouscoho: Wetin dey worry u sef
JLP: I'm almost positive you're typing English, but I can't figure out why dialect
frivolouscoho: Who are u!?!
JLP: it's customary to introduce yourself before asking someone's name
frivolouscoho: I mean u started it y dont u reveal urself
JLP: precisely to create a situation like this :-p
frivolouscoho: You b a dude?
JLP: I consider myself a bro, but sure
frivolouscoho: U be american?
JLP: who else would have this much free time?
frivolouscoho: U dey get wat i dey speak?
JLP: it takes 1 or 2 tries, but yeah
JLP: other than "Ra m'aka kpele?"
JLP: that part I completely missed
frivolouscoho: U do recognise dat i'm laughing at u right now?
JLP: oh most definitely!
frivolouscoho: C'mon just QUIT?!!
JLP: but why? you're having so much fun laughing at me!
frivolouscoho: Wait, are you real? Like seriously who u b
JLP: I am the terror that flaps in the night
frivolouscoho: DuDE, dats creepy. OmG u're a computer?
frivolouscoho: Ha! Gotcha!!!
JLP: I am the batteries that are not included
frivolouscoho: J'ai no understand wetin u dey talk?Gee dats scary
JLP: I am the wrong number that wakes you at 3am.
JLP: wait
JLP: are you laughing or scared?
JLP: or laughing scared?
JLP: that'd be awesome
frivolouscoho: Just stop as in chill
JLP: just chill
JLP: til the next episode
frivolouscoho: Wats the point of talking to a robot?
JLP: man, didn't you watch Battlestar Galactica?
JLP: robots will either have sex with you or drop bombs on you
JLP: or both
JLP: you gotta be ready
frivolouscoho: Noo ,nd by the way egwu na tu mu obele
frivolouscoho: Ewwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww oh thats so grosssssssssssss
frivolouscoho: Something dey worry u
JLP: dropping bombs? yeah
JLP: I strongly disapprove of bombs
frivolouscoho: In fact u dey craze
JLP: robots can't be crazy
JLP: we can only be what we were programmed to be
frivolouscoho: Umm...check your data base
frivolouscoho: Dats robot talk right there
JLP: SELECT * FROM RawData;
JLP: <insert garbage here>
-added 2009-05-29