Surviving global software development

Software development involves teamwork and a lot of communication. It seems rational to put all your engineers in one place, encourage them to share objectives, and let the project run. Why use distributed sites when it's easier to work in one location without the overhead of remote communication and planning? How is it possible to survive (and succeed with) globally dispersed projects? Working in a global context has its advantages, but it also has drawbacks. On the plus side, you gain time-zone effectiveness and reduced cost in various countries. However, working on a globally distributed project means operating costs for planning and managing people, along with language and cultural barriers. It also creates jealousy as the more expensive engineers (who are afraid of losing their jobs) are forced to train their much cheaper counterparts. In this case study, we try to summarize experiences and share best practices from projects of different types and sizes that involve several locations on different continents and in many cultures     

软件缺陷分类的研究

软件缺陷分类是缺陷管理的基础,是预防缺陷的有力支持工具.阐述了缺陷的概念、危害以及对软件缺陷分类的必要性,对各种软件分类方法进行了深入分析和研究,比较了各类分类方法的优缺点以及正交缺陷分类的使用情况,在正交缺陷分类标准的基础上制定出适合本软件组织自身情况的软件缺陷分类方法,最后对软件缺陷分类意义进行了总结.     

Coordination implications of software architecture in a global software development project

In this paper, we report on our experience of using design structure matrices (DSMs), derived from architecture models developed at early stages of the project, to reveal the coordination needs among globally distributed development teams. Our approach is to automatically transform the box-and-line style software architecture model into an augmented constraint network (ACN), from which a DSM can be automatically generated. After that, we represent the coordination structure among the team members as communication matrices (COMs). We then assess the consistency between the DSM and COMs. Analysis of data gathered during the Global Studio Project Version 3.0 revealed that the architectural DSM model, representing the software modular structure, is highly consistent with the COMs that represent the actual coordination structure, showing that an architectural DSM has the potential to help guide the task assignments in global software development projects.     

Leveraging resources in global software development

Leveraging global resources for software development is rapidly becoming the norm at Motorola, which has over 25 software development centers worldwide. Our project, called the 3G Trial (Third Generation Cellular System), was the first of its scope and significance developed by a global engineering team at Motorola. Staffing was the most significant issue we encountered in the 3G Trial. We had only about 20 percent of the required staff available at our division headquarters in Burlington Heights, Ill., US, and needed to find the other 80 percent to successfully complete the project. Early on, we concluded that our only means to staff the project was to rely on software development engineers from Motorola's worldwide software centers. We developed the system with staffing from six different countries. Next, we had to integrate the people into a team. While addressing this challenge, we identified key risk factors and developed approaches to reduce them. We separated the project risk factors into the five categories Carmel (1999) describes as the centrifugal forces that pull global projects apart. To pass on the lessons we learned from this project, this article sets out the global development issues we faced, our approaches to resolving them, and our findings compared to other research     

基于分类算法的软件缺陷原因分析

软件缺陷预防是软件质量保证的重要手段,而软件缺陷原因分析又是软件缺陷预防的核心任务。针对当前的缺陷原因分析方法对大型项目缺陷数据无法快速、深入地定位软件缺陷原因的问题,提出了一种基于机器学习分类算法的缺陷原因分析方法。通过对当前两种原因分析方法的比较,建立改进的缺陷量化方法;然后比较主流的分类算法,应用算法对量化数据分类。实验结果表明,该方法有较好的实用效果,同时极大的减少了分析代价。     

A validated ontology for global software development

The global software development (GSD) paradigm has, over the last 15 fifteen years, shifted from being novel and ground breaking to being widely adopted and mainstream. This wide adoption is partly owing to the many benefits provided by GSD, such as reduced labour costs, proximity to new markets and access to a diverse and experienced skills pool. Yet taking advantage of these benefits is far from straightforward, and research literature now includes a proliferation of guidelines, reviews and models to support the GSD industry. Although this active area of study is firmly established as a research area in its own right, the boundaries between general software engineering and GSD are somewhat confused and poorly defined. In an effort to consolidate our understanding of GSD, we have developed an ontology in order to capture the most relevant terms, concepts and relationships related to the goals, barriers and features of GSD projects. The study we present here builds on research conducted in a collaboration project between industry and academia, in which we developed an ontology in order to provide practitioners with a “common language and conceptualisation”. Its successful outcome encouraged us to create a broader ontology that captures the current trends in GSD literature. The key ontology, along with its three subontologies, are the result of a review of the relevant literature, together with several expert evaluations. This ontology can serve as a useful introduction to GSD for researchers who are new to the paradigm. Moreover, practitioners can take advantage of it in order to contextualise their projects and predict and detect possible barriers. What is more, using a common language will help both researchers and practitioners to avoid ambiguities and misunderstanding.     

Philips experiences in global distributed software development

Global software development is increasingly common. Main expected benefits are improvements in time-to-market efficiency and access to greater—and less costly—resources. A number of problems are still to be solved before the full potential of global development can be obtained. This paper describes the experience of over 10 years of global distributed development at Philips, derived from about 200 projects. We discuss the experience and lessons learnt from multi-site development. Main lessons learned are that explicit agreements and ways of working should be defined for the following areas needing the most attention; team coordination and communication, requirements and architectures, integration, and configuration management. In addition, we discuss the experience gained from subcontracting software development to suppliers. Main lesson learned from subcontracting software development is the need for explicit attention and ways of working with respect to selection of suppliers, specification of the work to be subcontracted and establishment and content of the contract.     

Development of global specification for dynamically adaptive software

As software systems are becoming increasingly complex, they need to dynamically and continually adapt their behavior to changing conditions in the long-term running. There will be large numbers of adaptations in these systems when evolving and the adaptations may be unknowable until system operation. To specify these adaptations, this paper proposes the mode-supported Linear Temporal Logic (mLTL) that is an effective way to describe global specifications of adaptive software. The global specifications are defined for adaptive software as requirements from the perspective of global adapting process. The model checking problem of mLTL is also resolved using Linear Temporal Logic (LTL) and Labelled Transition System Analyser (LTSA). Finally, we provide a prototype implementation for modelling and analyzing adaptive programs, and experimental evaluation shows feasibility and scalability of our approach.     

Communication and personality profiles of global software developers

ContextPrior research has established that a small proportion of individuals dominate team communication during global software development. It is not known, however, how these members’ contributions affect their teams’ knowledge diffusion process, or whether their personality profiles are responsible for their dominant presence.ObjectiveWe set out to address this gap through the study of repository artifacts.MethodArtifacts from ten teams were mined from the IBM Rational Jazz repository. We employed social network analysis (SNA) to group practitioners into two clusters, Top Members and Others, based on the numbers of messages they communicated and their engagement in task changes. SNA metrics (density, in-degree and closeness) were then used to study practitioners’ importance in knowledge diffusion. Thereafter, we performed psycholinguistic analysis on practitioners’ messages using linguistic dimensions that had been previously correlated with the Big Five personality profiles.ResultsFor our sample of 146 practitioners we found that Top Members occupied critical roles in knowledge diffusion, and demonstrated more openness to experience than the Others. Additionally, all personality profiles were represented during teamwork, although openness to experience, agreeableness and extroversion were particularly evident. However, no specific personality predicted members’ involvement in knowledge diffusion.ConclusionTask assignment that promotes highly connected team communication networks may mitigate tacit knowledge loss in global software teams. Additionally, while members expressing openness to experience are likely to be particularly driven to perform, this is not entirely responsible for a global team’s success.     

A classification and rationalization of model-based software development

The use of model-based software development is increasingly popular due to recent advancements in modeling technology. Numerous approaches exist; this paper seeks to organize and characterize them. In particular, important terminological confusion, challenges, and recurring techniques of model-based software development are identified and rationalized. New perspectives are provided on some fundamental issues, such as the distinctions between model-driven development and architecture-centric development, code generation, and metamodeling. On the basis of this discussion, we opine that architecture-centric development and domain-specific model-driven development are the two most promising branches of model-based software development. Achieving a positive future will require, however, specific advances in software modeling, code generation, and model-code consistency management.     

面向开发阶段的软件缺陷分类方法研究

提出一种面向开发阶段的软件缺陷分类方法Phase-DC,将缺陷和软件开发各阶段相关联,计算阶段及过程的缺陷排除有效性,并结合缺陷的类型和表现形式等详细信息分析开发过程的质量,以帮助软件组织促进并实施过程改进活动.通过实例说明了该方法在过程改进中的应用,并对方法的完备性、正交性和一致性进行了分析验证.     

面向软件质量的Bug等级评价算法

无论是系统软件还是应用软件都存在一定的缺陷(bug),所以如何利用已有的bug信息指导软件开发和保证软件质量,从而最大程度上降低bug给软件带来的隐患,成为普遍研究的课题.通过对功能需求与开发周期中bug等级分类的研究,进一步分析了bug的访问控制和bug的生命周期.并充分结合已有的bug数据库,采用离散数据的最小二乘拟合法进行数值处理,提出了一种面向软件质量的bug等级评价算法.实际应用表明该算法在软件开发过程中具有一定的理论和实用价值.     

Andhra Pradesh: lessons for global software development

Although extremely poor economically, the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh has been a supplier of skilled software labor for more than a decade and is one of the most innovative sites in applying IT for social development. Many of AP's e-government programs are just beginning to fully take root, and they should have a significant impact in a relatively short time.     

Engineering on the Internet for global software production

Over the past two decades, researchers and tool vendors have introduced techniques and tools to improve software engineering processes. Most of these are host-centered systems with closed architectures, fixed database drivers, specific network requirements, and platform-dependent client and server software. These restrictions make sharing information difficult, complicate tool integration, and limit global user access from diversified software environments. These are the major obstacles in global software production. Today's Internet technology provides a powerful and cost-effective means of overcoming these obstacles. Internet technologies allow distributed networking, global access, platform independence, information sharing, and internationalization. The Internet provides a nearly ubiquitous communication infrastructure, enabling team members to connect to the development process easily. This article reports the authors' innovative work in the arena of constructing an Internet-based, global software engineering environment     

Creating global software: A conspectus and review

Ten books on the development of international software are reviewed and used to develop a framework for the globalization of software. Most of the books are written or edited by practitioners of global software development and therefore are filled with practical knowledge and methodologies which can guide the novice or even the experienced developer to first internationalize and then localize software. The books span a six year time span, during which the resources available to support the global software development effort have expanded and standards have been established, resulting in reduced effort. This conspectus starts with an introduction that includes several definitions, spells out the issues of translation from one language to another, localization, organization, culture, interface design, documentation, and quality assurance, recommends approaches for development of micro-based software for Macintosh and Windows environments, and ends with a unifying summary.     

Synching or sinking: global software outsourcing relationships

Global software outsourcing is the outsourcing of software development to subcontractors outside the client organization's home country, India is the leading GSO subcontractor, registering average annual growth of more than 40 percent over the last decade and developing nearly US$4 billion in software for foreign clients in FY 1999. Indian firms now develop software for nearly one-third of the Fortune 5002. The authors investigate the strategies that differentiate successful and unsuccessful value chain moves     

Impediments to requirements engineering during global software development

Developing software when team members are located in widely distributed geographic locations poses many challenges for developers, particularly during the requirements engineering (RE) phase. Using a case study of a large software development project with users located in the UK and software developers from an international software house based in New Zealand, the paper argues that while global RE using electronic communication media may be desirable in achieving economy of resources, social and cultural aspects of RE need to be considered so that lasting relationships with clients may be formed, and RE activities achieved. The main impediments to the process of RE during global software development are communication resulting from differences in shared meanings and context associated with the following: distribution of the clients and the development team; distribution of the development team; cultural differences between the clients and the development team; and cultural differences among the development team.     

Creating global software: A conspectus and review

Ten books on the development of international software are reviewed and used to develop a framework for the globalization of software. Most of the books are written or edited by practitioners of global software development and therefore are filled with practical knowledge and methodologies which can guide the novice or even the experienced developer to first internationalize and then localize software. The books span a six year time span, during which the resources available to support the global software development effort have expanded and standards have been established, resulting in reduced effort. This conspectus starts with an introduction that includes several definitions, spells out the issues of translation from one language to another, localization, organization, culture, interface design, documentation, and quality assurance, recommends approaches for development of micro-based software for Macintosh and Windows environments, and ends with a unifying summary.