The relative cost of fixing defects
I saw a very interesting chart today…
Source: http://www.riceconsulting.com/public_pdf/STBC-WM.pdf
If this doesn’t convince you of the value of unit tests, I don’t know what will. The cost to fix bugs in production could be dramatically higher than the cost to fix them in development, which is why having a suite of unit tests that you can run when you make changes is invaluable because it will prevent you from getting into these costly scenarios where you have to fix nasty bugs in production.
on November 21st, 2008 at 10:45 am
“If this doesn’t convince you of the value of unit tests, I don’t know what will.”
Absolutely. I am a sucker for nice 3D bar graphs, and basically believe anything they tell me.
Also….brown eyes. I never could resist them.
on December 13th, 2008 at 8:23 pm
Nice post. I wish I didn’t feel like I was signing a contract every time I made estimates. Regardless if the client says, ‘it’s just an estimate’ or not, as soon as you mention a number with the word hour(s), there is an expectation is still built.