#026 - Metrics Dashboards to the Rescue

Jacob Beningo concludes his embedded software modernization framework series by discussing the establishment of metrics scoreboards for embedded systems development. He explores various metrics categories including code quality, performance, and security, with a deep dive into cyclomatic complexity as a powerful but underutilized metric among embedded developers.

Key Takeaways:

• Metrics scoreboards provide visibility into quality, predictability, and improvement opportunities in embedded development
• Things that get measured get managed - tracking metrics helps identify root causes of development problems
• Avoid vanity metrics like commit frequency; focus on metrics aligned with project goals
• Cyclomatic complexity measures independent paths through functions and should stay below 10 for maintainable code
• Seven key metrics categories: code quality, reliability/safety, testing, performance, resource utilization, process/productivity, and security
• AI tools can significantly simplify dashboard creation and metrics analysis automation
• Code coverage is valuable but can be gamed - ensure tests actually validate functionality, not just execute code
• Compiler warnings should be eliminated or documented; aim for zero warnings in production code
• Metrics trends are more important than point-in-time values for identifying code quality decay
• Modern tools like Segger SystemView and Percepio Tracealyzer enable real-time performance metrics collection