Additional Resources

Armstrong, J. Scott, ed. Principles of forecasting: A handbook for researchers and practitioners. Boston, MA: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2001. Armstrong is one of the leading researchers in forecasting in a marketing context. Many of the observations in this book are relevant to software estimation. Armstrong has been a leading critic of overly complex estimation models.

Boehm, Barry, et al. Software Cost Estimation with Cocomo II. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 2000. Boehm was the first to popularize the Cone of Uncertainty (he calls it a funnel curve). This book contains his most current description of the phenomenon.

Cockburn, Alistair. Agile Software Development. Boston, MA: Addison-Wesley, 2001. Cockburn's book introduces Agile development approaches, which are especially useful in environments characterized by highly volatile requirements.

Laranjeira, Luiz. "Software Size Estimation of Object-Oriented Systems," IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering, May 1990. This paper provided a theoretical-research foundation for the empirical observation of the Cone of Uncertainty.

Tockey, Steve. Return on Software. Boston, MA: Addison-Wesley, 2005. Chapters 21 through 23 discuss basic estimation concepts, general estimation techniques, and allowing for inaccuracy in estimates. Tockey includes a detailed discussion of how to build your own Cone of Uncertainty.

Wiegers, Karl. More About Software Requirements: Thorny Issues and Practical Advice. Redmond, WA: Microsoft Press, 2006.

Wiegers, Karl. Software Requirements, Second Edition. Redmond, WA: Microsoft Press, 2003. In these two books, Wiegers describes numerous practices that help elicit good requirements in the first place, which substantially reduces requirements volatility later in a project.