Review
"Another masterpiece from the folks who brought you Peopleware. Anyone who has survived a software project or two will surely recognize many of these patterns and will be able to learn from most of them. Adrenaline Junkies and Template Zombies is a real joy." -- Joel Spolsky, author of Joel on Software
"People have always tried to understand themselves and each other. Our survival has depended on such understanding, as has the quality of that survival, from bare subsistence to deeply fulfilling livelihood. What people do individually, interpersonally, and within their institutional matrices, forms distinct frameworks of attitude and behavior. Perceiving the dynamics of these complexes (let's call them) confers both insight and power. Three attempts at such understanding leap to mind. The Chinese had the I Ching, or Book of Changes. Architects have had A Pattern Language. And medical psychology has had its Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. Brilliantly blending elements of all three (not least from that last one), Adrenaline Junkies and Template Zombies maps the patterns people create and follow--to their detriment and advantage--in the projects they engage within organizational contexts. Sharp, funny and dead-on-target, the book deserves a wide reading." -- Christopher Locke, coauthor of The Cluetrain Manifesto
"The 86 project patterns are grimly familiar to anyone who has worked in project-related organizations. Fortunately, some of the patterns are good ones, and should be encouraged. Sadly, though, many of the others are not only depressingly familiar, but astonishingly destructive to productivity, quality, and the morale of the project team."
-- Ed Yourdon, author of Death March
"Who else but these particular authors could mine 150 years of software team experience to capture memorable names for oft-encountered situations? I suspect you will start using these phrases in your work--I already have." -- Alistair Cockburn, author of Agile Software Development
About the Author
About the Authors: Collectively, the authors have published nearly twenty previous books, including Peopleware, Mastering the Requirements Process, The Deadline, Slack, Complete Systems Analysis, Waltzing With Bears, and Process for System Architecture and Requirements Engineering. Brief biographies: www.systemsguild.com.
