Abstract: The term Technical Debt has undeniably become part of the everyday vocabulary of software engineers. We know that it concerns compromises to the internal quality of a system, made either deliberately or inadvertently. We understand that it’s not all bad, as it may have served the purpose of expediency at some point. But, it is associated with a clear risk especially for large and complex systems: if we do not manage Technical Debt, it threatens to “bankrupt” those systems. Action must be taken before we reach the point of no return. In this talk we revisit the state of the art in managing Technical Debt, we identify challenges and discuss promising future directions.

Bio: Dr. Paris Avgeriou is Professor of Software Engineering at the University of Groningen, the Netherlands where he has led the Software Engineering research group since September 2006. He is the Editor in Chief of the Journal of Systems and Software, as well as an Associate Editor for IEEE Software. He also sits on the editorial board of Springer Transactions on Pattern Languages of Programming (TPLOP). He has co-organized several international conferences and workshops (mainly at ICSE). His research interests lie in the area of software architecture, with strong emphasis on architecture modeling, knowledge, evolution, patterns and technical debt. He champions the evidence-based paradigm in Software Engineering research and works towards closing the gap between industry and academia.

Dr. Paris Avgeriou is Professor of Software Engineering at the University of Groningen, the Netherlands where he has led the Software Engineering research group since September 2006. Before joining Groningen, he was a post-doctoral Fellow of the European Research Consortium for Informatics and Mathematics. He is the Editor in Chief of the Journal of Systems and Software, as well as an Associate Editor for IEEE Software. He also sits on the editorial board of Springer Transactions on Pattern Languages of Programming (TPLOP). He has co-organized several international conferences and workshops (mainly at ICSE). His research interests lie in the area of software architecture, with strong emphasis on architecture modeling, knowledge, evolution, patterns and technical debt. He champions the evidence-based paradigm in Software Engineering research and works towards closing the gap between industry and academia.