Specify requirements

Yeah, the building metaphor is dain bramaged. Not all software projects fail because of weak specifications, of course, but that mistake does account for a lot of them. I’m not sure who’s to blame for that – customers who let development begin before they really know what they want, or developers who being projects without making sure the customer really understands what they’re going to be creating. Using XP when you could have gotten a good specification up front will result in wasted time. Classical interior design software development – where you specify requirements, do a design on paper, and ship the first implementation to a satisfied custom – actually does work and it works really well. Extreme programming is all about coping with shifting specifications – making it easy to relocate elevator shafts.