This book gives an overview of the phases in object oriented systems development. The life cycle of analysis, design and testing is explained and the diagrams are drawn using UML. The text is not always to the point about what it tries to explain. Readers new to the subject might not pick up some of the details.

The book is divided in five parts. Part one is an introduction to the development life cycle and explains what objects and classes are. In part two the Unified Modelling Language is explained. Part three is on analysis, explaining use cases and classes and their relationships. Part four is on design, mainly class design. Some of the guidelines are slightly abstract. This part contains two useful chapters on the access layer and view layer of software. Part five touches on testing and software quality.

The case study, which runs throughout the book, does not show the iterative object oriented development process. All diagrams are just given, there is no reflection on, or review of them.

The answers to the review questions at the end of each chapter are literally in the text. The reader is not encouraged to reflect on the material. The long list of references at the end of each chapter are not annotated and are not referring selectively to the good books for further reading.