Software implementation knowledge management with technical debt and network analysis

Modern, fast-phased, iterative and incremental software development constantly struggles with limited resources and a plethora of frequently changing requirements. This environment often requires the development projects to intentionally — for example through implementing quick-and-dirty — or unintentionally — for example through misinterpretation of requirements — deviate from the optimal product state. While most of the deviation is caught through practices like customer reviews, the remainder stays hidden in the product. The undocumented remainder is difficult to remove, it expands uncontrollably and it negatively affects development as deviations are unexpectedly encountered and overcome. The term technical debt describes this process of accumulating hidden work. Management of technical debt can be expected to be a major factor in software development efficiency and sustainability and as such it should be an integral part of the software implementation's knowledge management. In addition to being difficult to capture, the continuous evolution of the implementation makes maintenance of gained information a challenge. This paper discusses applying technical debt management for software implementations including the entry points for knowledge discovery, network analysis for overcoming the maintenance challenges as well as the pursued outcomes.