A distributed development environment for embedded software

The HAGAR project is building a high-performance disk controller. It is an embedded system for which many hundreds of thousands of lines of embedded software will have to be developed concurrently with the development of the hardware. We found existing methods for embedded software development, such as simulation and remote cross development, to be inadequate for us. To meet our special needs, we developed a distributed development environment that combines and extends the capabilities of existing methods while fixing their drawbacks. Our environment is based on a processor-pool architecture, in which multiple hardware sets are pooled and managed systematically. It supports embedded software development for many programmers at different sites. It allows for the emulation of non-existing hardware adaptor cards and for the integration of embedded software testing with hardware simulation. The environment provides a single system image, hiding many hardware and configuration details from its users. From the perspective of the programmers, our environment makes developing embedded software for special hardware systems as easy as developing application programs for a UNIX workstation.     

From integration to composition: On the impact of software product lines, global development and ecosystems

Three trends accelerate the increase in complexity of large-scale software development, i.e. software product lines, global development and software ecosystems. For the case study companies we studied, these trends caused several problems, which are organized around architecture, process and organization, and the problems are related to the efficiency and effectiveness of software development as these companies used too integration-centric approaches. We present five approaches to software development, organized from integration-centric to composition-oriented and describe the areas of applicability.     

A case study in use of framework technology as the basis for a software engineering environment

In order to investigate the capabilities of varous types of integration infrastructure, the CASE Environments project at the Software Engineering Institute has conducted a series of studies integrating a variety of tools using framework technologies. This paper discusses one of these studies, in which a Software Engineering Environment was first modeled using a number of process notations and then constructed using control- and data-oriented frameworks. Public domain, commercial, and custom tools were integrated in support of the defined process scenario.     

基于WEB数据库环境的软件工程教学模式改革研究

软件工程教学过程中如何运用基于信息库的软件为学生提供直观的理解方法是目前该领域研究的热点问题.本文研究利用在web结构下基于数据库和配置库的共享性信息平台进行软件工程教学模式研究,将软件开发活动分为用户、角色、任务和产品四种要素,并借助开发式的信息共享方法开放系统接口,为该系统的扩展提供了条件.通过实验表明,本系统在软件工程教学改革方面取得了明显效果.     

Software development and integration in a computer supported cooperative work environment

This paper presents a prototype computer supported cooperative work (CSCW) environment that supports the engineering design process. In particular, this environment provides collaborative tools that support computer-aided design (CAD) and computer-aided software engineering (CASE). This paper takes an high level look at the system as a whole and then focuses on the method used to implement the CASE support. It addresses how group members can simultaneously work on coding a program and then integrate their work to form a single program inside this environment. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Experimental evaluation of software development tools for safety-critical real-time systems

Since the early years of computing, programmers, systems analysts, and software engineers have sought ways to improve development process efficiency. Software development tools are programs that help developers create other programs and automate mundane operations while bringing the level of abstraction closer to the application engineer. In practice, software development tools have been in wide use among safety-critical system developers. Typical application areas include space, aviation, automotive, nuclear, railroad, medical, and military. While their use is widespread in safety-critical systems, the tools do not always assure the safe behavior of their respective products. This study examines the assumptions, practices, and criteria for assessing software development tools for building safety-critical real-time systems. Experiments were designed for an avionics testbed and conducted on six industry-strength tools to assess their functionality, usability, efficiency, and traceability. The results some light on possible improvements in the tool evaluation process that can lead to potential tool qualification for safety-critical real-time systems.     

TBus：一种CASE环境体系结构风格研究与实现

CASE(Computer Aided Software Engineering计算机辅助软件工程)环境作为一类复杂的系统软件，其体系结构至关重要。本文在工具总线(ToolBus)的基础上，从软件体系结构的角度，提出了一种基于工具总线的CASE环境体系结构风格TBus，对体系结构模型、系统行为进行了形式化描述，以及相应的工具结构模型、工具适配器结构模型、工具集成机制等方面进行了深入的研究与分析。建立TBus体系结构风格，对于促进分布式CASE环境和软件平台开发具有重要的指导意义。     

A method to elicit architecturally sensitive usability requirements: its integration into a software development process

In the Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) community, software usability has primarily been concerned with the presentation of information, more precisely with the user interface. However, some usability problems can prove costly to fix if the changes require modifications that reach beyond the presentation layer, namely those that cannot be easily accommodated by the software architecture. Taking into account some usability requirements earlier in the software development cycle, specifically prior to the architectural design phase, can reduce the cost of these modifications. There is a scarcity of methods and guidelines with the scope to direct users in eliciting the usability requirements that can impact the software architecture. This paper proposes a usability-driven adaptation of the quality attribute workshop (QAW) to assist software development organizations in discovering and documenting usability requirements. It shows how this method can be integrated into a software development process, by discussing how the existing software framework workflows can be adjusted to take this new activity into consideration. A preliminary exercise was conducted to help discern the utility and the limits of the proposed method. Participants with different levels of knowledge of usability and comprehension of the system being developed found the method constructive, as it guided them in identifying the architecturally relevant usability requirements. It also helped determine the usability aspects that would not necessarily have been defined if this technique had not been employed.     

An empirical study of the impact of team size on software development effort

In this paper, we investigate the impact of team size on the software development effort. Using field data of over 200 software projects from various industries, we empirically test the impact of team size and other variables—such as software size in function points, ICASE tool and programming language type—on software development effort. Our results indicate that software size in function points significantly impacts the software development effort. The two-way interactions between function points and use of ICASE tool, and function points and language type are significant as well. Additionally, the interactions between team size and programming language type, and team size and use of ICASE tool were all significant.

Model-driven development of interactive groupware systems: Integration into the software development process

Modeling interactive groupware systems is a complex and multi-disciplinary task. It is necessary to provide designers and engineers with a set of methods, notations and tools to specify the different aspects to consider when designing this type of systems. In this work we present a methodological framework based on the integration of several notations and processes for modeling some of these aspects, in particular: interaction, collaboration and functionality. The objective of this work is to provide a more complete support to the design of groupware systems, considering different viewpoints and modeling perspectives of the several stakeholders involved in the development of such applications.     

Test criteria and coverage measures for software integration testing

The aim of this paper is to introduce a systematic approach to integration testing of software systems. Various test data selection criteria for integration testing are presented, coverage measures are introduced, and interconnection between them are discussed. The main principle is to transfer and adapt test criteria and coverage measures which are useful for unit testing to the level of integration testing. Test criteria help the tester to organise the test process. They should be chosen in accordance with the available test effort. Test coverage measures are defined as a ratio between the test cases required for satisfying the criteria and those of these which have been executed. The measures are used to obtain information about the completeness of integration tests. The approach is described for data flow and control flow oriented criteria and measures. The intention is to enable the tester to specify integration tests in advance in terms of effort, and to evaluate the results in terms of test completeness.     

Object configurations in software engineering databases

We consider the logical organization of database support for software engineering applications, which has to cope with such requirements as the adequate support of object composition and versioning, the derivation of (consistent) configurations, and the provision of application-specific transactions. A new approach to the organization, manipulation and management of multiversion objects in CASE databases is described and investigated, which clearly distinguishes four relevant concepts: documents, versions, configurations and databases. The approach is formally made precise using the concept ofAND/OR graphs, which renders it possible to cast operations on any of the concepts in terms of graph operations. The levels of abstraction distinguished and maintained throughout the exposition give rise to an appropriate transaction concept: transactions involve graph operations on specific types of objects only; conflicts between transactions can thus be easily identified, and consistency of objects is easily maintained.     

Four integration patterns: a socio-technical approach to integration in IS development projects

This paper aims to contribute to a theory of integration within the field of information systems (IS) project management. Integration is a key IS project management issue when new systems are developed and implemented into an increasingly integrated information infrastructure in corporate and governmental organizations. Expanding the perspective of traditional project management research, we draw extensively on central insights from IS research. Building on socio-technical IS research and software engineering research, we suggest four generic patterns of integration: big bang, stakeholder integration, technical integration and socio-technical integration. We analyse and describe the advantages and disadvantages of each pattern. The four patterns are ideal types. To explore the forces and challenges in these patterns, three longitudinal case studies were conducted. In particular we investigate the management challenges for each pattern. We find that the patterns are context-sensitive and describe the different contexts where the patterns are applicable. For IS project management, the four integration patterns are a contribution to the management of integration risks – extending the vocabulary for assessing and mitigating these risks in IS development. For practitioners the four integration patterns represent an analytical framework to be used in planning modern IS development projects.     

Using MDA for integration of heterogeneous components in software supply chains

Software product lines are increasingly built using components from specialized suppliers. A company that is in the middle of a supply chain has to integrate components from its suppliers and offer (partially configured) products to its customers. To satisfy both the variability required by each customer and the variability required to satisfy different customers’ needs, it may be necessary for such a company to use components from different suppliers, partly offering the same feature set. This leads to a product line with alternative components, possibly using different mechanisms for interfacing, binding and variability, which commonly occurs in embedded software development.     

Measuring effectiveness of HCI integration in software development processes

Integrating human-computer interaction (HCI) activities in software engineering (SE) processes is an often-expressed desire. Two metrics to demonstrate the impact of integrating HCI activities in SE processes are proposed. Usability Goals Achievement Metric (UGAM) is a product metric that measures the extent to which the design of a product achieves its user-experience goals. Index of Integration (IoI) is a process metric that measures the extent of integration of the HCI activities in the SE process. Both the metrics have an organizational perspective and can be applied to a wide range of products and projects. An attempt has been made to keep the metrics easy to use in the industrial context. While the two metrics were proposed mainly to establish a correlation between the two and thereby demonstrate the effectiveness of integration of HCI in SE processes, several other applications seem likely. The two metrics were evaluated in three independent studies: a classroom-based evaluation with two groups of students, a qualitative feedback from three industry projects, and a quantitative evaluation using 61 industry projects. The metrics were found to be useful, easy to use, and helpful in making the process more systematic. Our studies showed that the two metrics correlate well with each other and that IoI is a good predictor of UGAM. Regression analysis showed that IoI has a somewhat greater effect on UGAM in projects that use the agile process model than the waterfall process and in the projects that are executed as a contracted software development service than in the projects in product companies. UGAM also correlated well with the traditional usability evaluations.     

A software integration approach for designing and assessing dependable embedded systems

Embedded systems increasingly entail complex issues of hardware-software (HW-SW) co-design. As the number and range of SW functional components typically exceed the finite HW resources, a common approach is that of resource sharing (i.e., the deployment of diverse SW functionalities onto the same HW resources). Consequently, to result in a meaningful co-design solution, one needs to factor the issues of processing capability, power, communication bandwidth, precedence relations, real-time deadlines, space, and cost. As SW functions of diverse criticality (e.g. brake control and infotainment functions) get integrated, an explicit integration requirement need is to carefully plan resource sharing such that faults in low-criticality functions do not affect higher-criticality functions.On this background, the main contribution of this paper is a dependability-driven framework that helps to conduct the integration of SW components onto HW resources such that the maintenance of system dependability over integration of diverse criticality components is assured by design.We first develop a clustering strategy for SW components into Fault Containment Modules (FCMs) such that error propagation via interaction is minimized. Subsequently, the rules of composition for FCMs with respect to error propagation are developed. To allocate the resulting FCMs to the existing HW resources we provide several heuristics, each optimizing particular attributes thereof. Further, a framework for assessing the goodness of the achieved HW-SW composition as a dependable embedded system is presented. Two new techniques for quantifying the goodness of the proposed mappings are introduced by examples, both based on a multi-criteria decision theoretic approach.     

Evaluation of integrated software development environments: Challenges and results from three empirical studies

Evidence shows that integrated development environments (IDEs) are too often functionality-oriented and difficult to use, learn, and master. This article describes challenges in the design of usable IDEs and in the evaluation of the usability of such tools. It also presents the results of three different empirical studies of IDE usability. Different methods are sequentially applied across the empirical studies in order to identify increasingly specific kinds of usability problems that developers face in their use of IDEs. The results of these studies suggest several problems in IDE user interfaces with the representation of functionalities and artifacts, such as reusable program components. We conclude by making recommendations for the design of IDE user interfaces with better affordances, which may ameliorate some of most serious usability problems and help to create more human-centric software development environments.     

Monetary pricing of software development risks: A method and empirical illustration

The ability to price (monetize) software development risks can benefit various aspects of software development decision-making. This paper presents a risk pricing method that estimates two parameters for every individual risk factor: extra cost incurred per unit exposure, and project sensitivity, to that factor. Since variability is a widely used measure of risk in finance and decision sciences, the method derives risk pricing parameters by relating variability in risk factors to variability in project cost. This approach rests on the fact that a parametric cost estimator predicts project cost by adjusting the “nominal” cost of a project based on the expected values of risk factors (cost drivers), but the actual project cost often deviates from prediction because the actual values of risk factors normally deviate from expectations. In addition, to illustrate the viability of the method, the paper applies the method empirically with COCOMO data, to approximate risk pricing parameters for four risk factors (Personnel Capability, Process Maturity, Technology Platform, and Application Task). Importantly, though, the method could work equally well with data recorded based on other parametric cost estimators. The paper also discusses several areas that can benefit from benchmark risk pricing parameters of the kind we obtain.