Rating: 
Summary: Both classic and contemporary
Review: Computer books written in 1997 are either obsolete or classics. This one is a classic and a timeless one at that because it gives a straightforward approach to development projects that is consistent with best practices. Best practices are usually born from lesson's learned from disasters. While there have been criticisms that this book might not be up to the realities of web development, I believe that the inverse is true: too many web development projects are initiated before they are properly planned, and are not effectively controlled because of unskilled project managers. But that's a personal opinion. What you will find in this book that is applicable to any development project, regardless of whether the goal is a web- or e-commerce-based system, client/server or host-based. What you get is a structured approach to planning and estimating using proven methods (as opposed to pulling numbers out of thin air), excellent advice on organizing and motivating (and protecting) a project team, and how to manage delivery and release of a quality product. What I particularly like is the life-cycle framework, the controls provided to manage scope and product integrity and the emphasis on testing, release and quality. However, much of this can be mined from other books. What sets this book apart and makes it a classic is the wealth of tips and checklists and the way the author weaves his experiences into the approach. What makes this book effective is the copious advice given throughout about dealing with politics, people issues and other project and career killers. This book is about surviving projects and if the advice liberally sprinkled throughout is heeded it will go a long way towards helping you to do just that.
Rating:
Summary: Five Stars
Review: It is an example on how an insipid topic like software project management can be made interesting. It is a great book for software project managers who are new to the job and wish to learn. You can use this book as gateway to reading more advanced books on this topic.
Rating:
Summary: A Must For Dev Managers
Review: This book is a must for development managers (those who manage software development projects)! Read it cover to cover and highlight the important summary paragraphs throughout the book for easy reference later. If you're a senior manager, then read it and get all of your development managers a copy for reference.
Rating:
Summary: A Complete Vision for Managing Software Projects
Review: This book is a wonderful resource for the frustrated developer attempting to understand the software management process. It is filled with little understandings which illuminate different aspects of broken process. This book made be laugh and cry with recognition as I read it. I couldn't put it down. What is useful about this book, is that it presents a complete process model. This book is a great vision reference for a group. It's completeness, is it's realy strength. Rather than focusing on what goes wrong, this book explains how to do things right, and points out what failures that prevents. This book deserves all five stars, for it's completeness and focus, although I think a more appropriate title might be "A Complete Vision for Managing Software Projects." This book is not really about individual survival for Software Projects, it's about team survival. In that sense, this book is designed with the Manager in mind, rather than the individual developer. The resources provided by the Author's website (and other books) raise the bar for what it means to be a software professional, and in that sense, this book is inspirational for the developer wishing to become an expert in their field. I intend to have every co-worker in my group read this book.
Rating:
Summary: Brilliant for expectation adjustment ...
Review: Despite what you might read elsewhere, the number one critical success factor in any development project is appropriately setting the customer's expectations, right from the start. And that is exactly where this book can do its best work. This book has been directly responsible for reducing project stake-holder induced stress on many projects I have been involved with. Every developer has encountered the 'customer from hell' who knows it all ... but knows nothing about the reality of the software development process. Here is a book that if you can make them read it, you might be able to maintain your sense of humour. Even the interfering pain in the neck (albeit well meaning) customer will find it extremely difficult to ignore the undeniable common sense that is presented in this book. The survival guide is not a prescriptive software project management process manual, rather its an easily digested overview of sound software project management principles, what to avoid and the implications of worst practice. The fact is, if key project decision makers have unrealistic expectations from the outset then your project is in trouble. You may believe it is already too late, however a dose of this book has worked wonders for projects I have worked on and it may just be the reality pill someone around your project needs too. Even if this book does nothing more than help to convey to decision makers an understanding of the complex nature of software development and the requirement to accept that any project is statistically unlikely to come in on time, on budget and meet quality expectations, then you are way in front.
Rating: 
Summary: ... all things being equal
Review: This book is about surviving your first project as a new team leader/project manager-just-promoted-from-team-leader - as long as you're in a relatively stable environment. Many of the recipes and check-lists are helpful for the new and even the not-so-new project manager but like other reviewers here, I wonder about the "survival" tag. Having managed various web projects over the past five years, and now getting my first Internet Startup experience, I find Yourdon's "Death March" and DeMarco's "The Deadline" more attuned to the chaos that is my experience in web development, even though both books were written before McConnell's. I still give it 4 stars, because for a beginner, it's an excellent reference on project control and that's the hardest lesson to learn.
Rating:
Summary: Fine for what it is...
Review: This book is most appropriate for the programmer or analyst who finds himself in an internal organization in charge of his first big project. It's full of management advice, potential pitfalls, and sample forms you might otherwise have to write from scratch. (McConnell is also a big fan of pushing software to a releasable state periodically during development, and he gives a good talk about what that's likely to cost and achieve.) But I concur with the earlier reviewer that what many of us need now is a book on guerilla project management--how to bring a project to success in spite of management's lack of understanding of or interest in these principles, or at least some advice on how to bring them around. This is not that book. The Guide also lacked useful advice on staffing and motivational issues. McConnell assumes that all team members are pulling in the same direction and are reasonably productive, and if they're not you should just get rid of them. While I sympathize, my experience is that in this economy successfully completing projects with the staff you have, whatever their level of talent and motivation, is the most important survival skill of all.
Rating: 
Summary: Survival Guide Lives Up To Its Title!
Review: The Survival Guide lives up to its title. It is a practical guide that is readily usable by projects on the factory floor. It succeeds by providing the minimum essential prescription for success in software projects. If you lack experience in managing a software project, the Survival Guide is there for you. Its fine grained checklists and succinct, well packaged essays chart a course you can actually follow. Team members will bring this book to project meetings; so should you.
Rating:
Summary: Great Book Author quick to respond to questions
Review: As a new Manager of an outsourcing IT program. I'm living the "anti-mangers life" that Mcconnel points out in this book. While reading this book several of the situations in this book were happing in "real-time" to me. i.e., "test addiction", non-existent requirements, et al. I've seen proof of what McConnel outlines in this book-when you don't do a good job of gathering requirements early on you pay for it much more later. I also like the fact that when questioned about a definition in this book, the author reqponded within an hour! Impressive
Rating:
Summary: Should Be Required Reading for Development Managers
Review: A great read! The author outlines a systematic and controlled approach to software development, explaining why each step is necessary and the consequences of NOT doing them. Having worked in development shops which had no formal process, I found an amazing laundy list of everything that we had done wrong! The book does not go in depth on how to perform each of the steps of a successful Dev process, but it is excellent for getting a Manager (or programmer) to understand the benefits of each part of the process, and the pitfalls of NOT doing them. It also offers an excellent reference list of other dev. process books including some with more in-depth coverage on the how-to's.
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