[computerdork]

Haven't read this, but based on looking through the table of contents (so take what I'm saying with a grain of salt), I agree with your choice. You mentioned that you've been programming for awhile, you might have heard of Grady Booch and "Object-Oriented Analysis and Design with Applications." Object oriented techniques has fallen a little out of fashion now, which may be part of the reason why this book isn't as popular, but it was big around 20 years ago. It also discusses on the many topics of your choice: - Complexity, what it is and how to manage it - Encapsulation (Information Hiding). - Interfaces - contracts for your encapsulated code - Abstraction

And am certain that Grady Booch's book was itself mostly based on older material.

I also really like any really good book on doing requirements (they all have 80% of the same info). Getting the true needs of all your stakeholders (your users, the business people, the devs themselves, and the technical needs of the system) is probably the step that is done the poorest in most organizations, and the one that could save project the most time and money if done well.