Why Vista Had To Be Rebuilt From Scratch

iliketrash writes "The Wall Street Journal has a long front-page article describing how Jim Allchin approached Bill Gates in July, 2004, with the news that then-Longhorn, now-Vista, was 'so complex that its writers would never be able to make it run properly.' Also, the article says, 'Throughout its history, Microsoft had let thousands of programmers each produce their own piece of computer code, then stitched it together into one sprawling program. Now, Mr. Allchin argued, the jig was up. Microsoft needed to start over.' And start over they did. The article is astonishing for its frank comments from the principles, including Allchin and Gates, as well as for its description of Microsoft's cowboy spaghetti code culture."

Comments

Re:Anarchy of Development

[Jugalator]

I personally would like to hear more about the software development procedures and methodologies used in other large projects - how successful different types of development are.

Not sure if this is what you were interested in, but I think Paul Thurott has some great lengthy and detailed articles, along with some interviews with Microsoft engineers for some insight in the stress, problems, and achievements with various large Windows projects, and also with pictures of their build labs and test machines. :-)

For example:

Windows 2000

• The Road to Gold: The development of Windows 2000 Reviewed

Windows XP SP2

• Windows XP Service Pack 2: The Inside Story

Windows Server 2003

• Windows Server 2003: The Road To Gold, Part 1: The Early Years
  
• Windows Server 2003: The Road To Gold, Part 2: Developing Windows
  
• Windows Server 2003: The Road To Gold, Part 3: Testing Windows

A disclaimer bias-wise is that Paul Thurott is a guy who wants Microsoft to do well, but he's not afraid of criticizing them harshly when he doesn't agree with their decisions, so I think it's still not a case with "inside stories" being too biased to be useful. He was for example the guy behind the quote that Windows Vista had the markings of a shipwreck after seeing Beta 1. Although he has had some missteps IMO such as saying Windows Me should be far more reliable than Windows 98. ;-) I guess he had to eat his own words there...