The Japanese and Software: is it a Good Match?

The key to the Japanese approach to software development is the separation of the planning and implementation phases. This article is a purely personal account, based on 18 months in Tokyo in a research organization consisting entirely of Japanese-speaking personnel, except for myself. It is not intended to be a systematic or scholarly study of the Japanese software industry. I had the good fortune to have an assignment within IBM to go to Japan to help Hisashi Kobayashi, director of the IBM Japan Science Institute, form a software technology research group. This institute is the newest member, now four years old, of IBM's worldwide research organization. My initial intention was to learn the Japanese language so as to be able to participate fully in the work. I already knew four languages fluently, including my native Hungarian. Since Hungarian does not have the same linguistic roots as the western European languages, I thought I would have a head start in learning Japanese. Alas, it didn't work out. I did learn about 400 Chinese characters and I did become able to converse with my Japanese language teacher after a fashion, but I did not become fluent enough to talk with my coworkers in Japanese. That was a disappointment. First, let me give you a brief rundown of the Japanese software industry. Perhaps the best known activity is the Fifth Generation Computer Project. It is primarily an architectural effort, but it includes the development of the software necessary to make the hardware complete. I don't believe this project is primarily aimed at improving the process of efficiently producing high-performance software. That is another issue. Still, ICOT, the institute managing the project, tends to be the gatekeeper between Japan and the rest of the world on the technologies having to do with computers. The real down-to-earth software technology effort resides in the Big Three or the Big Six companies. This effort is aimed at improving productivity and quality in an industrial everyday sense. The Big Three are the Nippon Electric Co., Hita-chi, and Fujitsu, and the other three are probably Toshiba, Oki, and Mitsubishi. In addition, there is a large effort, called the Sigma project, involving a combination of major customers and software houses. The effort started with a couple of dozen participants and is now close to 100. It is being standardized around Unix as the basis for developing software and is tying …