Software Engineering RFC and Design Doc Templates

June 27, 2022

#95 – June 27, 2022

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RFCs - requests for comment - or Design Docs are a common tool that engineering teams use to build software faster, by clarifying assumptions and circulating plans earlier. There are some similarities between writing automated tests for your code, and writing RFCs before you start working on a non-trivial project.

His good news was that his new company provides essential services and regardless of how much they stumbled they were going to be in business for a long time. But the bad news was that the company wasn’t keeping up with new technologies and new competitors who were moving faster. And the fact that they were an essential service made the internal cultural obstacles for change and innovation that much harder.

Software architecture needs to be wrested from committees of people disconnected from developing, and to put it in the hands of the people who can actually make it real and executable, the developers. Only then will we achieve the resilience and sustainability that we need from today’s applications

There are two projects, both deemed important by the business, and both need a UI developer. Unfortunately, only one UI developer is available. The manager has an idea though: why not just let the UI developer split his time across both projects. Sure, this will slow the pace a bit for each project, but at least they'll be moving in the right direction.

Many software teams describe desired product capabilities as a product backlog: a list of user stories. These stories capture who needs the work, what the work is, and why it's needed. Too often teams expect a product owner to be the sole source of the backlog, but anyone could (and should) write user stories

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