This is the sixth in our Software Delivery InFocus series of podcast episodes, starring Bola Rotibi - the Principal Analyst of MWD's Software Delivery competency area. In this episode, she explores the issue of software security - and how security can be "baked in" to applications during the development process - with guests John Colley (EMEA Managing Director for (ISC)²) and Alessandro Moretti (Executive Director of IT Security Risk at UBS Investment Bank).

In today's environment, security is a precious commodity that influences at multiple levels – from organisational to national and international concerns. We are now in an age where communications, online connections and software technology have broadened the reach of our social and business interactions, and have enabled new types of software applications to emerge. With the rise of Internet usage, workforce mobility, use of mobile devices and the pervasiveness of software applications in all aspects of our modern life, software security becomes a top line consideration that impacts both the safety of software and the ability to prevent cybercrime. Ultimately, delivery of secure software code should be as much a software quality focus as is the delivery of core functionality.

This is the fifth in our Software Delivery InFocus series of podcast episodes, starring Bola Rotibi - the Principal Analyst of MWD's Software Delivery competency area. In this episode, she explores the emerging topic of Software Product Lines with guests James Cezo of Lockheed Martin and Dale Churchett of HomeAway (a leading vacation rentals company).

The concept of Software Product Lines (SPL) is designed to help organisations identify and manage variation and commonality in software deliverry - so that it's possible to efficiently deliver multiple variations of a software product or service, each of which shares common elements.

Here, Bola talks to her guests about the concept of SPL; what each company is doing with SPL and how they're making SPL work for them; and what the main challenges that they've each experienced in implementing SPL.

This is the fourth in our Software Delivery InFocus series of podcast episodes, starring Bola Rotibi - the Principal Analyst of MWD's Software Delivery competency area. In this episode, she discusses the thorny issue of software quality. This is something the IT industry has talked about for decades - so why is it still so patchy? Bola's guests are Madelyn Bryant McIntire, Principal Group Manager, PQO Product Quality Management, Microsoft; and Justin Spencer, Development Manager at Lend Lease (a large publicly listed international property group). Producing quality software code is undoubtedly a desired goal of any software delivery team - irrespective of whether the delivered application is for commercial sale or internal business use. Software quality is regularly placed in the top five demand requirements of the software delivery team, yet the quality of software is regularly highlighted as a major failure point and the basis for much end user dissatisfaction. Here, Bola talks to her guests about the main points of failure in software delivery processes; the actions that Microsoft and Lend Lease take to improve the quality of delivered software in a business-driven environment; where the next challenges will come from; and what tools suppliers could do better.

This is the third in our Software Delivery InFocus series of podcast episodes, starring Bola Rotibi - the Principal Analyst of MWD's Software Delivery competency area. In this episode, she discusses the opportunities and challenges associated with using cloud-based software development services. Bola's guest is Debbie Ashton, Product Director for CODA - a provider of both on-premise and SaaS-hosted financial management applications.

Although there is a lot of hype surrounding the concept of "cloud computing", there also appears to be real value to be gained in some usage scenarios. The obvious financial benefit of renting software service (being able to remove up-front capital expenditure and instead account for software as an operating expense) is coupled with the scalability that's possible (you can pay as you go, and pay as you grow) and together it looks like cloud-based offerings will be especially attractive in the tougher economic climate that nearly all of us look likely to be experiencing for quite a while. Many organisations today are tempted to think only of the quick advantages of Cloud – partly as a result of the hype coming from the vendor community. However, whilst the potential and advantages are well documented and clear for people to see, the disadvantages or the challenges of use are not. In this podcast we look specifically at the challenges of developing applications for delivery from cloud-based software platforms. What practices if any should organisations take on board in developing applications and solutions using cloud-based development services? What processes and methods should organisations be putting into practice to get the most out of cloud development services?

As with all the episodes in this podcast series, we've also published a companion report which summarises the discussion and "key takeaways". You can find it here, and it's free to download for all MWD's Guest Pass research subscribers (joining is free).