Tim,
After enthusiastically accepting Jimbo's offer to provide me
with "developer access", I quickly soured on having any
hands-on participation.
It was as I feared: no requirements documents, nothing about
architecture or detailed design. The hardest-working, most
universally respected developer(s) kept basically saying
"just read the code".
So I've kept on the sidelines. I've been a cheerleader and
catalyst (for speed tweaks) and for many months a sort of
chief sysop (carrying out bans and promotions).
As for your request for suggestions, I think the best thing
would be to adopt some sort of "best practices" methodology.
I don't care if it's XP, CMM, or just a checklist of common-
sence guidelines from Steve McConnell's "Rapid Development".
Adopt some mutually agreeable (and useful!) guiding
principles, and follow them: that's what I suggest.
Ed Poor
Highly Paid Professional Software Engineer