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Software design thoughts, part 1
Do's/Don'ts 
Tags: software design, helpdesk, tech support, software, developer
As a software troubleshooting expert, I am amazed at how many issues actually arise from design flaws. Here are a few thoughts on how to improve software design.
| | If you don’t want the user to do it, don’t give them a warning, don’t give them the ability to perform the transaction in the first place. |
| | The fewer workflow options and workflow process loops there are, the fewer points there are where things can go wrong. |
| | Ensure that default options are those for which the majority of transactions will follow. |
| | Make certain that there are backup and secondary backup flows for notifications and warnings. If the notification or warning isn’t important enough to have a “rule of threes” to ensure that it comes to a human’s attention in a timely manner, then it should probably be eliminated altogether. |
| | Implement controls so that top level approvals and tasks cannot be completed unless all children or critical path transactions are completed. Otherwise, your top level task dies and it becomes hard to figure out where the log jam is. |
| | Make error messages that are useful in figuring out what caused the error |
| | Where possible, make the error message tell the user how to actually FIX the error |
| | Make informational messages that DON'T look like catastrophic errors |
| | Remember that not all users have computer science degrees; write software for the rest of us |
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