About Steve Maguire

 
Steve Maguire graduated from the University of Arizona with a degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering, but he always gravitated towards work in computer software. Steve programmed professionally for almost three decades in both Japan and the United States. In the late 1970s Steve regularly contributed developer tools, applications utilities, and the occasional video game to the Processor Technology and NorthStar users'' groups.

Steve has been responsible for numerous projects since then, including valFORTH in 1982, an award-winning FORTH development system that enabled Atari programmers to write high-quality graphics applications and video games.

In 1986 Steve joined Microsoft Corp. for the opportunity to work on high-end Macintosh applications. Steve helped develop Microsoft's Excel spreadsheet program and led the development of Microsoft's Intel-hosted MC680x0 Macintosh cross development system. He was the driving force behind Microsoft''s switch to a cross-platform shared code strategy in its applications development and is perhaps best known in the company for his efforts to increase the utility and quality of shared code libraries.

As a veteran software design engineer and project lead, Steve spent several of his years at Microsoft working with troubled products--enabling teams to work effectively and, not incidentally, to enjoy their work.

Debugging the Development Process is the second of several books Steve has written to give programmers practical guidelines for developing professional, high-quality software. His first book, the critically acclaimed Writing Solid Code (Microsoft Press, 1993), focused on strategies that programmers can use to write bug-free programs. It won a prestigious Software Development Jolt Productivity award and awards from the Society for Technical Communication in 1994.

Today, Mr. Maguire is an Executive Vice President for Storm Development, a website development company based in Cincinnati, Ohio, that focusses on the needs of small businesses. He specializes in helping small businesses comply with the many new Identity Theft laws that are now in force.

Mr. Maguire regularly gives talks to chamber organizations, civics groups, and networking organizations to educate business owners about the true nature of Identity Theft, its consequences to victims, and how it affects employers.

To schedule a presentation by Mr. Maguire, call (513)376-8820 and ask for Beth Mountjoy.


Software Development Books by Steve Maguire
 

 
Writing Solid Code
 

 
Writing Solid Code
 
 
Pages   288
User Level   All
ISBN   1-55615-551-4
Release date   07 June 1993



Winner of the Software Development Productivity Award—1994

Written by a former Microsoft developer and troubleshooter, this book takes on the problem of software errors by examining the kinds of mistakes developers typically make and includes Microsoft techniques for developing bug-free C programs.

With the growing complexity of software today and the associated climb in bug rates, it's becoming increasingly necessary for programmers to produce bug-free code much earlier in the development cycle, before the code is first sent to Testing. The key to writing bug-free code is to become more aware of how and why bugs come about. Programmers can gain this awareness by asking two simple questions for every bug they encounter: "How could I have prevented this bug?" and "How could I have automatically detected this bug?" The guidelines presented in this book are the result of programmers regularly asking these questions over a number of years.

WRITING SOLID CODE provides practical approaches to the prevention and automatic detection of bugs. Throughout, Steve Maguire draws candidly on the history of application development at Microsoft for cases in point—both good and bad—and shows you how to use proven programming techniques to produce solid code.

If you're serious about developing world-class code, you'll benefit from Maguire's experience and practical advice in WRITING SOLID CODE.


 

 

 
 

 
Debugging the Development Process:
Practical Strategies for Staying Focused, Hitting Ship Dates, and Building Solid Teams
 
 
Pages   183
User Level   All
ISBN   1556156502
Release date   July 1994



Winner of the Software Development Productivity Award—1995

In Debugging the Development Process, Maguire describes the sometimes controversial but always effective practices that enabled his software teams at Microsoft to develop high-quality software - on schedule. With the refreshing candor reviewers admired in Writing Solid Code, Maguire talks about what did and what didn't work at Microsoft and tells you how to energize software teams to work effectively - and to enjoy their work; why you might want to kick your star programmer off your team; how to avoid corporate snares and overblown corporate processes; which tiny changes produce major results; how to deliver on schedule and without overwork; how to pull twice the value out of everything you do; how to get your team going on a creative roll; and how to raise the average programmer level at your company.