Code Making

Code Making: How Software Engineering Became a Profession

Michael Davis, a senior fellow of CSEP, was a participant observer throughout the drafting of the Software Engineering Code of Ethics and afterwards wrote a detailed account of how the code was developed by the ACM and IEEE-CS committee. “Code Making” gives insight in how the profession of software engineering was formed and wrote its own code of professional ethics, and also looks at this project as a case study to see how other professional societies can better go about drafting and revising their own codes of ethics. The entire book is available for download under a Creative Commons license.

Full Edition of Code Making (1,735 kb)

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Title, Table of Contents, Preface (41 kb) 4

Chapter One: This History, Professions, and their Ethics (61 kb) 12

Part One: Slow Starts and Wrong Turns

Chapter Two: Before SEEPP, 1968-1994 (78 kb) 25

Chapter Three: SEEPP Begins, 1994 (110 kb) 44

Chapter Four: Failing—by the book, 1995 (87 kb) 68

Chapter Five: Version 1, The Miracle of ’96 (131 kb) 90

Chapter Six: The High Politics of 1996 (105 kb) 126

Part Two: 1997—Three Versions in One Year

Chapter Seven: Winter Whirlwind, Version 2.0 (161 kb) 156

Chapter Eight: English Spring, Version 2a-2.1 (169 kb) 194

Chapter Nine: Back in the USA, Version 3 (134 kb) 237

Chapter Ten: Slogging toward “Version 4.DONE” (164 kb) 271

Part Three: Looking for Closure

Chapter Eleven: The Long Process of Approval, 1998 (226 kb) 312

Chapter Twelve: End Game, Version 5.2, 1999-2000 (87 kb) 354

Epilogue: Lessons for Code Writers, Theorists, and Researchers (122 kb) 374

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