ABSTRACT
We start with a single basic question: What is distinctive about software design? How does it differ from any other design? This question assumes that one can, in fact, distinguish software design from any other type of design considering the ubiquity of the computer these days. The difference, if one exists, may be only a historical one: How is today’s design process different from that of, say, 1950? Yet as we saw in our survey sample described in chapter 4, many professionals define themselves as specialists in software design, as opposed to a different (hardware) design, however ambiguous that other type of design is. This suggests that they feel a difference, whatever that difference is.
