Write software design documents

After so many years of software development work, I 've moved from a broken software code engineer to a project manager's name and started some system design and project management work, I have always thought that software design documentation is my biggest weakness. I have spent a lot of energy exploring it in this regard. I always hope to find a method suitable for writing software design documents, but I have never found it, and I have tried to set up some document templates such as the national standard. But I always feel that there are some design ideas, but I cannot write documents, there is no way to reflect the design ideas of the system and sub-modules in the document. It is also often because of the fact that the system and sub-modules are not satisfactory, if you can clearly convey what you want to express to others, it means that you have a really good understanding of this thing. It seems that my true weakness is not in the design document, however, my system design is still very lacking, so that I can't express my design ideas clearly in words.

 

Of course, in these exploration processes, we have not completely failed. Basically, we have figured out some basic principles for writing documents. I am really at home today. I will summarize this accumulation, save tomorrow and forget again.

 

At the early stage of learning to write documents, I always wanted to set up some documentation templates for national standards. After a long time, I often found that the documents I wrote were not even understood by myself. Therefore, we also come up with a basic principle: migrating some document templates, mechanically filling out the document templates cannot get the design documents that the system really needs.

 

Writing design documents plays two roles:

1. The system is considered comprehensively in the process of writing design documents. Because the design documents are also subject to requirement analysis, system design, and detailed design, therefore, this helps system designers think about the system from different perspectives. It is very helpful to thoroughly organize the entire system and discover some potential problems. This is a very important process of system development.

2. We all know that software development in enterprises is generally not carried out by one person from start to end. Most systems have a team for design and development. At this time, the design document plays a very important role in information transmission and communication. After the system is developed and delivered, there will be a lot of maintenance work in the future. At this time, the document is even more useful.

 

Based on the above two roles, I think you should understand the following points when writing a document:

1. We understand what document we are writing, what its role is, and what content it should contain. This is the basic prerequisite for writing a document.

2. Writing documents must not be in the pay-as-you-go mode. You must think carefully. Otherwise, you will lose this good thinking process.

3. Documents are intended to express information, not to conform to certain standards. Therefore, do not adapt to certain standards too much. However, if some common document specifications can be used, it is better to clearly express the information.

3. The document format should be clear and clear. To let people look at the directory outline, the overall distribution of the document should be clear,

4. Content expression focuses on clarity. The key is to express the design ideas. Do not write too many redundant texts and try to match some graphics to express your thoughts, people absorb image information faster than text.

 

The so-called cutting tool without mistake, writing a document is a sharpening process, the knife is a cutting tool, the design document is also a basic tool for software system design, the ancients did not have a brilliant conclusion: "If you want to do something well, you must first facilitate the system." In the early stage of system development, if we have completed these tasks, the system development will be smoother and the project success rate will be higher, later maintenance will be easier. Therefore, the design document is also a feature of the contemporary era. We must pay attention to the work in QIQIU.