Software Engineering: Features (Just the Quotes)

"Extra features were once considered desirable. We now recognize that 'free' features are rarely free. Any increase in generality that does not contribute to reliability, modularity, maintainability, and robustness should be suspected." (Boris Beizer, "Software Testing Techniques", 1990)

"Design bugs are often subtle and occur by evolution with early assumptions being forgotten as new features or uses are added to systems." (Fernando J Corbató, "On Building Systems That Will Fail", 1991)

"When you find you have to add a feature to a program, and the program's code is not structured in a convenient way to add the feature, first refactor the program to make it easy to add the feature, then add the feature." (Martin Fowler, "Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code", 1999)

"One of the purposes of planning is we always want to work on the most valuable thing possible at any given time. We can’t pick features at random and expect them to be most valuable. We have to begin development by taking a quick look at everything that might be valuable, putting all our cards on the table. At the beginning of each iteration the business (remember the balance of power) will pick the most valuable features for the next iteration." (Kent Beck & Martin Fowler, "Planning Extreme Programming", 2000)

"Putting a new feature into a program is important, but refactoring so new features can be added in the future is equally important." (Ward Cunningham, "Crucible of Creativity", 2005)

"Developing fewer features allows you to conserve development resources and spend more time refining those features that users really need. Fewer features mean fewer things to confuse users, less risk of user errors, less description and documentation, and therefore simpler Help content. Removing any one feature automatically increases the usability of the remaining ones." (Jakob Nielsen, "Prioritizing Web Usability", 2006) 

"Features have a specification cost, a design cost, and a development cost. There is a testing cost and a reliability cost. […] Features have a documentation cost. Every feature adds pages to the manual increasing training costs." (Douglas Crockford, "JavaScript: The Good Parts: The Good Parts", 2008)

"Features that offer value to a minority of users impose a cost on all users." (Douglas Crockford, "JavaScript: The Good Parts", 2008)

"In an ideal system, we incorporate new features by extending the system, not by making modifications to existing code." (Robert C Martin, "Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship", 2008)

"We see a lot of feature-driven product design in which the cost of features is not properly accounted. Features can have a negative value to customers because they make the products more difficult to understand and use. We are finding that people like products that just work. It turns out that designs that just work are much harder to produce that designs that assemble long lists of features." (Douglas Crockford, "JavaScript: The Good Parts", 2008)