Walkthroughs, Code Reviews, and Inspections

Abstract

Here’s a shocker: your main quality objective in software development is to get a working program to your user that meets all their requirements and has no defects. That’s right: your code should be perfect. It meets all the user’s requirements and it has no errors in it when you deliver it. Impossible, you cry? Can’t be done? Well, software quality assurance is all about trying to get as close to perfection as you can - albeit within time and budget. (You knew there was a catch, didn’t you?)

Our objective with Inspections is to reduce the Cost of Quality by finding and removing defects earlier and at a lower cost. While some testing will always be necessary, we can reduce the costs of test by reducing the volume of defects propagated to test. —Ron Radice (2002)

When you catch bugs early, you also get fewer compound bugs. Compound bugs are two separate bugs that interact: you trip going downstairs, and when you reach for the handrail it comes off in your hand. —Paul Graham (2001)