A solution for estimates in software development projects

The Corporate world is becoming more and more competitive. This leads organisations to adapt to this reality, by adopting more efficient processes, which result in a decrease in cost as well as an increase of product quality. One of these processes consists in making proposals to clients, which necessarily include a cost estimation of the project. This estimation is the main focus of this project. In particular, one of the goals is to evaluate which estimation models fit the Altran Portugal software factory the most, the organization where the fieldwork of this thesis will be carried out. There is no broad agreement about which is the type of estimation model more suitable to be used in software projects. Concerning contexts where there is plenty of objective information available to be used as input to an estimation model, model-based methods usually yield better results than the expert judgment. However, what happens more frequently is not having this volume and quality of information, which has a negative impact in the model-based methods performance, favouring the usage of expert judgement. In practice, most organisations use expert judgment, making themselves dependent on the expert. A common problem found is that the performance of the expert’s estimation depends on his previous experience with identical projects. This means that when new types of projects arrive, the estimation will have an unpredictable accuracy. Moreover, different experts will make different estimates, based on their individual experience. As a result, the company will not directly attain a continuous growing knowledge about how the estimate should be carried. Estimation models depend on the input information collected from previous projects, the size of the project database and the resources available. Altran currently does not store the input information from previous projects in a systematic way. It has a small project database and a team of experts. Our work is targeted to companies that operate in similar contexts. We start by gathering information from the organisation in order to identify which estimation approaches can be applied considering the organization’s context. A gap analysis is used to understand what type of information the company would have to collect so that other approaches would become available. Based on our assessment, in our opinion, expert judgment is the most adequate approach for Altran Portugal, in the current context. We analysed past development and evolution projects from Altran Portugal and assessed their estimates. This resulted in the identification of common estimation deviations, errors, and patterns, which lead to the proposal of metrics to help estimators produce estimates leveraging past projects quantitative and qualitative information in a convenient way. This dissertation aims to contribute to more realistic estimates, by identifying shortcomings in the current estimation process and supporting the self-improvement of the process, by gathering as much relevant information as possible from each finished project.

Software evolution: a graph based model

A model based on graph isomorphisms is used to formalize software evolution. Step by step we narrow the search space by an informed selection of the attributes based on the current state-of-the-art in software engineering and generate a seed solution. We then traverse the resulting space using graph isomorphisms and other set operations over the vertex sets. The new solutions will preserve the desired attributes. The goal of defining an isomorphism based search mechanism is to construct predictors of evolution that can facilitate the automation of ’software factory’ paradigm. The model allows for automation via software tools implementing the concepts.

Software evolution: a graph based model

A model based on graph isomorphisms is used to formalize software evolution. Step by step we narrow the search space by an informed selection of the attributes based on the current state-of-the-art in software engineering and generate a seed solution. We then traverse the resulting space using graph isomorphisms and other set operations over the vertex sets. The new solutions will preserve the desired attributes. The goal of defining an isomorphism based search mechanism is to construct predictors of evolution that can facilitate the automation of ’software factory’ paradigm. The model allows for automation via software tools implementing the concepts.

Fábrica de Software : um estudo de caso na Dataprev, sob a ótica da estrutura organizacional

The aim of this case study was to investigate how the evolutionary process of the development of software, especially the change of paradigm for the factory software, has affected the structure of the Board of Relacionamento, Desenvolvimento e Informações - DRD at a public company called Dataprev and also reflecting or not a return to the model taylorist-fordist of the organization on production. For this study, there were interviews and a questionnaire applied, as well as documentary and literature review on the following topics: organizational structure, factory software, taylorism and fordism. From the data collected and analyzed, in the perspective studied, it was understood that there is not a return to the model taylorist-fordist to organize the production in the process of adopting the concept of a software factory in Dataprev. In addition to that, there was a flexibility in the organizational structure of its units of development - the softwares factories Dataprev.

Fábricas de software e a academia: análise da formação acadêmica em informática no município do Rio de Janeiro

As Brazil wants to be perceived as a competitor in providing computer applications and system development services in the global market, the concept of Software Factory gains importance. The metaphor for the 'Factory', when applied to the activity of software development, is used to describe organizations which produce software with a minimum quality standard and at competitive costs. However, the term 'Factory' recalls Fordist concepts, which have been challenged for a few decades in the manufacturing industry. This study analyzed university curricula and how students and teachers perceive the concept of Software Factory and assessed them in relation to the Fordism ------------ post-Fordism /continuum/. It was observed that some of the teachers who have influence over curricula define Software Factories according to Fordist concepts. It was also observed that, despite opportunities for improvements, curricula are adequately structured with regards to the skills a professional at these organizations must possess. We conclude that education provided at the programs being analyzed is adequate, but that it must be supplemented by companies or by the professionals themselves so that the knowledge acquired in the programs may be put in practice.

Fábrica de software: até que ponto fordista?

Due to the crisis over rigid automation that occurred around 1960, management models essentially fordist, have gradually become more flexible. The software factories, however, that emerged in the nineties manufacturing the most advanced technological products, adopted eminently fordist controls and seem to be going contrary to the evolutionary cycle that organizations tend to follow. The alternation between rigid and flexible management models of these software factories, observed under continuum fordism (0) ______ (1) post-fordism, as well as the limitations of the metaphor that emerges given the nature of the software they manufacture, constitutes the object of the study.

Modelo institucional do processo de estruturação de empresas de desenvolvimento de software: um estudo de múltiplos casos

Some authors have shown the need of understanding the technological structuring process in contemporary firms. From this perspective, the software industry is a very important element because it provides products and services directly to many organizations from many fields. In this case, the Brazilian software industry has some peculiarities that distinguish it from other industries located in developed countries, which makes its understanding even more relevant. There is evidence that local firms take different strategies and structural configurations to enter into a market naturally dominated by large multinational firms. Therefore, this study aims to understand not only the structural configurations assumed by domestic firms but also the dynamic and the process that lead to these different configurations. To do so, this PhD dissertation investigates the institutional environment, its entities and the isomorphic movements, by employing an exploratory, descriptive and explanatory multiple cases study. Eight software development companies from the Recife's information technology Cluster were visited. Also, a form was applied and an interview with one of the main firm s professional was conducted. Although the study is predominantly qualitative, part of the data was analyzed through charts and graphs, providing a companies and environment overview that was very useful to analysis done through the interviews interpretation. As a result, it was realized that companies are structured around hybrids business models from two ideal types of software development companies, which are: software factory and technology-based company. Regarding the development process, it was found that there is a balanced distribution between the traditional and agile development paradigm. Among the traditional methodologies, the Rational Unified Process (RUP) is predominant. The Scrum is the most used methodology among the organizations based on the Agile Manifesto's principles. Regarding the structuring process, each institutional entity acts in such way that generates different isomorphic pressure. Emphasis was given to entities such as customers, research agencies, clusters, market-leading businesses, public universities, incubators, software industry organizations, technology vendors, development tool suppliers and manager s school and background because they relate themselves in a close way with the software firms. About this relationship, a dual and bilateral influence was found. Finally, the structuring level of the organizational field has been also identified as low, which gives a chance to organizational actors of acting independently

Towards model driven software development for Arduino platforms: a DSL and automatic code generation

La tesi ha lo scopo di esplorare la produzione di sistemi software per Embedded Systems mediante l'utilizzo di tecniche relative al mondo del Model Driven Software Development. La fase più importante dello sviluppo sarà la definizione di un Meta-Modello che caratterizza i concetti fondamentali relativi agli embedded systems. Tale modello cercherà di astrarre dalla particolare piattaforma utilizzata ed individuare quali astrazioni caratterizzano il mondo degli embedded systems in generale. Tale meta-modello sarà quindi di tipo platform-independent. Per la generazione automatica di codice è stata adottata una piattaforma di riferimento, cioè Arduino. Arduino è un sistema embedded che si sta sempre più affermando perché coniuga un buon livello di performance ed un prezzo relativamente basso. Tale piattaforma permette lo sviluppo di sistemi special purpose che utilizzano sensori ed attuatori di vario genere, facilmente connessi ai pin messi a disposizione. Il meta-modello definito è un'istanza del meta-metamodello MOF, definito formalmente dall'organizzazione OMG. Questo permette allo sviluppatore di pensare ad un sistema sotto forma di modello, istanza del meta-modello definito. Un meta-modello può essere considerato anche come la sintassi astratta di un linguaggio, quindi può essere definito da un insieme di regole EBNF. La tecnologia utilizzata per la definizione del meta-modello è stata Xtext: un framework che permette la scrittura di regole EBNF e che genera automaticamente il modello Ecore associato al meta-modello definito. Ecore è l'implementazione di EMOF in ambiente Eclipse. Xtext genera inoltre dei plugin che permettono di avere un editor guidato dalla sintassi, definita nel meta-modello. La generazione automatica di codice è stata realizzata usando il linguaggio Xtend2. Tale linguaggio permette di esplorare l'Abstract Syntax Tree generato dalla traduzione del modello in Ecore e di generare tutti i file di codice necessari. Il codice generato fornisce praticamente tutta la schematic part dell'applicazione, mentre lascia all'application designer lo sviluppo della business logic. Dopo la definizione del meta-modello di un sistema embedded, il livello di astrazione è stato spostato più in alto, andando verso la definizione della parte di meta-modello relativa all'interazione di un sistema embedded con altri sistemi. Ci si è quindi spostati verso un ottica di Sistema, inteso come insieme di sistemi concentrati che interagiscono. Tale difinizione viene fatta dal punto di vista del sistema concentrato di cui si sta definendo il modello. Nella tesi viene inoltre introdotto un caso di studio che, anche se abbastanza semplice, fornisce un esempio ed un tutorial allo sviluppo di applicazioni mediante l'uso del meta-modello. Ci permette inoltre di notare come il compito dell'application designer diventi piuttosto semplice ed immediato, sempre se basato su una buona analisi del problema. I risultati ottenuti sono stati di buona qualità ed il meta-modello viene tradotto in codice che funziona correttamente.

Modelo institucional do processo de estruturação de empresas de desenvolvimento de software: um estudo de múltiplos casos

Some authors have shown the need of understanding the technological structuring process in contemporary firms. From this perspective, the software industry is a very important element because it provides products and services directly to many organizations from many fields. In this case, the Brazilian software industry has some peculiarities that distinguish it from other industries located in developed countries, which makes its understanding even more relevant. There is evidence that local firms take different strategies and structural configurations to enter into a market naturally dominated by large multinational firms. Therefore, this study aims to understand not only the structural configurations assumed by domestic firms but also the dynamic and the process that lead to these different configurations. To do so, this PhD dissertation investigates the institutional environment, its entities and the isomorphic movements, by employing an exploratory, descriptive and explanatory multiple cases study. Eight software development companies from the Recife's information technology Cluster were visited. Also, a form was applied and an interview with one of the main firm s professional was conducted. Although the study is predominantly qualitative, part of the data was analyzed through charts and graphs, providing a companies and environment overview that was very useful to analysis done through the interviews interpretation. As a result, it was realized that companies are structured around hybrids business models from two ideal types of software development companies, which are: software factory and technology-based company. Regarding the development process, it was found that there is a balanced distribution between the traditional and agile development paradigm. Among the traditional methodologies, the Rational Unified Process (RUP) is predominant. The Scrum is the most used methodology among the organizations based on the Agile Manifesto's principles. Regarding the structuring process, each institutional entity acts in such way that generates different isomorphic pressure. Emphasis was given to entities such as customers, research agencies, clusters, market-leading businesses, public universities, incubators, software industry organizations, technology vendors, development tool suppliers and manager s school and background because they relate themselves in a close way with the software firms. About this relationship, a dual and bilateral influence was found. Finally, the structuring level of the organizational field has been also identified as low, which gives a chance to organizational actors of acting independently

Modelo institucional do processo de estruturação de empresas de desenvolvimento de software: um estudo de múltiplos casos

Some authors have shown the need of understanding the technological structuring process in contemporary firms. From this perspective, the software industry is a very important element because it provides products and services directly to many organizations from many fields. In this case, the Brazilian software industry has some peculiarities that distinguish it from other industries located in developed countries, which makes its understanding even more relevant. There is evidence that local firms take different strategies and structural configurations to enter into a market naturally dominated by large multinational firms. Therefore, this study aims to understand not only the structural configurations assumed by domestic firms but also the dynamic and the process that lead to these different configurations. To do so, this PhD dissertation investigates the institutional environment, its entities and the isomorphic movements, by employing an exploratory, descriptive and explanatory multiple cases study. Eight software development companies from the Recife's information technology Cluster were visited. Also, a form was applied and an interview with one of the main firm s professional was conducted. Although the study is predominantly qualitative, part of the data was analyzed through charts and graphs, providing a companies and environment overview that was very useful to analysis done through the interviews interpretation. As a result, it was realized that companies are structured around hybrids business models from two ideal types of software development companies, which are: software factory and technology-based company. Regarding the development process, it was found that there is a balanced distribution between the traditional and agile development paradigm. Among the traditional methodologies, the Rational Unified Process (RUP) is predominant. The Scrum is the most used methodology among the organizations based on the Agile Manifesto's principles. Regarding the structuring process, each institutional entity acts in such way that generates different isomorphic pressure. Emphasis was given to entities such as customers, research agencies, clusters, market-leading businesses, public universities, incubators, software industry organizations, technology vendors, development tool suppliers and manager s school and background because they relate themselves in a close way with the software firms. About this relationship, a dual and bilateral influence was found. Finally, the structuring level of the organizational field has been also identified as low, which gives a chance to organizational actors of acting independently

Managing FOSS during development: preventive and curative approaches

Today, most software development teams use free and open source software (FOSS) components, because it increases the speed and the quality of the development. Many open source components are the de facto standard of their category. However, FOSS has licensing restrictions, and corporate organizations usually maintain a list of allowed and forbidden licenses. But how do you enforce this policy? How can you make sure that ALL files in your source depot, either belong to you, or fit your licensing policy? A first, preventive approach is to train and increase the awareness of the development team to these licensing issues. Depending on the size of the team, it may be costly but necessary. However, this does not ensure that a single individual will not commit a forbidden icon or library, and jeopardize the legal status of the whole release... if not the company, since software is becoming more and more a critical asset. Another approach is to verify what is included in the source repository, and check whether it belongs to the open-source world. This can be done on-the-fly, whenever a new file is added into the source depot. It can also be part of the release process, as a verification step before publishing the release. In both cases, there are some tools and databases to automate the detection process. We will present the various options regarding FOSS detection, how this process can be integrated in the "software factory", and how the results can be displayed in a usable and efficient way.

Proyecto de innovación educativa: aplicación de la herramienta aprender pensando nivel universitario (hapu) adaptada a formato electrónico

La presente comunicación quiere dar a conocer una importante experiencia de innovación docente desarrollada en el curso 2009/2010 en la que participan 53 profesores y 785 estudiantes. A partir del uso de una herramienta de autoevaluación del aprendizaje del alumnado universitario, a la que se denominó Aprender Pensando nivel Universitario (HAPu) adaptada a formato electrónico por parte de BIP Asesoría Tecnológica y Logiciel Software Factory en colaboración con la Universidad de Valladolid. El objetivo perseguido es promover la mejora del proceso de aprendizaje a partir del entrenamiento en autorregulación

CALV3 - Uma linguagem específica de domínio para segurança em sistemas corporativos: um estudo de caso sistemático na indústria

The academic community and software industry have shown, in recent years, substantial interest in approaches and technologies related to the area of model-driven development (MDD). At the same time, continues the relentless pursuit of industry for technologies to raise productivity and quality in the development of software products. This work aims to explore those two statements, through an experiment carried by using MDD technology and evaluation of its use on solving an actual problem under the security context of enterprise systems. By building and using a tool, a visual DSL denominated CALV3, inspired by the software factory approach: a synergy between software product line, domainspecific languages and MDD, we evaluate the gains in abstraction and productivity through a systematic case study conducted in a development team. The results and lessons learned from the evaluation of this tool within industry are the main contributions of this work

Agile Construction and Evolution of Product-Line Architectures

Software Product Line Engineering (SPLE) has proved to have significant advantages in family-based software development, but also implies the up¬front design of a product-line architecture (PLA) from which individual product applications can be engineered. The big upfront design associated with PLAs is in conflict with the current need of "being open to change". However, the turbulence of the current business climate makes change inevitable in order to stay competitive, and requires PLAs to be open to change even late in the development. The trend of "being open to change" is manifested in the Agile Software Development (ASD) paradigm, but it is spreading to the domain of SPLE. To reduce the big upfront design of PLAs as currently practiced in SPLE, new paradigms are being created, one being Agile Product Line Engineering (APLE). APLE aims to make the development of product-lines more flexible and adaptable to changes as promoted in ASD. To put APLE into practice it is necessary to make mechanisms available to assist and guide the agile construction and evolution of PLAs while complying with the "be open to change" agile principle. This thesis defines a process for "the agile construction and evolution of product-line architectures", which we refer to as Agile Product-Line Archi-tecting (APLA). The APLA process provides agile architects with a set of models for describing, documenting and tracing PLAs, as well as an algorithm to analyze change impact. Both the models and the change impact analysis offer the following capabilities: Flexibility & adaptability at the time of defining software architectures, enabling change during the incremental and iterative design of PLAs (anticipated or planned changes) and their evolution (unanticipated or unforeseen changes). Assistance in checking architectural integrity through change impact analysis in terms of architectural concerns, such as dependencies on earlier design decisions, rationale, constraints, and risks, etc.Guidance in the change decision-making process through change im¬pact analysis in terms of architectural components and connections. Therefore, APLA provides the mechanisms required to construct and evolve PLAs that can easily be refined iteration after iteration during the APLE development process. These mechanisms are provided in a modeling frame¬work called FPLA. The contributions of this thesis have been validated through the conduction of a project regarding a metering management system in electrical power networks. This case study took place in an i-smart software factory and was in collaboration with the Technical University of Madrid and Indra Software Labs. La Ingeniería de Líneas de Producto Software (Software Product Line Engi¬neering, SPLE) ha demostrado tener ventajas significativas en el desarrollo de software basado en familias de productos. SPLE es un paradigma que se basa en la reutilización sistemática de un conjunto de características comunes que comparten los productos de un mismo dominio o familia, y la personalización masiva a través de una variabilidad bien definida que diferencia unos productos de otros. Este tipo de desarrollo requiere el diseño inicial de una arquitectura de línea de productos (Product-Line Architecture, PLA) a partir de la cual los productos individuales de la familia son diseñados e implementados. La inversión inicial que hay que realizar en el diseño de PLAs entra en conflicto con la necesidad actual de estar continuamente "abierto al cam¬bio", siendo este cambio cada vez más frecuente y radical en la industria software. Para ser competitivos es inevitable adaptarse al cambio, incluso en las últimas etapas del desarrollo de productos software. Esta tendencia se manifiesta de forma especial en el paradigma de Desarrollo Ágil de Software (Agile Software Development, ASD) y se está extendiendo también al ámbito de SPLE. Con el objetivo de reducir la inversión inicial en el diseño de PLAs en la manera en que se plantea en SPLE, en los último años han surgido nuevos enfoques como la Ingeniera de Líneas de Producto Software Ágiles (Agile Product Line Engineering, APLE). APLE propone el desarrollo de líneas de producto de forma más flexible y adaptable a los cambios, iterativa e incremental. Para ello, es necesario disponer de mecanismos que ayuden y guíen a los arquitectos de líneas de producto en el diseño y evolución ágil de PLAs, mientras se cumple con el principio ágil de estar abierto al cambio. Esta tesis define un proceso para la "construcción y evolución ágil de las arquitecturas de lineas de producto software". A este proceso se le ha denominado Agile Product-Line Architecting (APLA). El proceso APLA proporciona a los arquitectos software un conjunto de modelos para de¬scribir, documentar y trazar PLAs, así como un algoritmo para analizar vel impacto del cambio. Los modelos y el análisis del impacto del cambio ofrecen: Flexibilidad y adaptabilidad a la hora de definir las arquitecturas software, facilitando el cambio durante el diseño incremental e iterativo de PLAs (cambios esperados o previstos) y su evolución (cambios no previstos). Asistencia en la verificación de la integridad arquitectónica mediante el análisis de impacto de los cambios en términos de dependencias entre decisiones de diseño, justificación de las decisiones de diseño, limitaciones, riesgos, etc. Orientación en la toma de decisiones derivadas del cambio mediante el análisis de impacto de los cambios en términos de componentes y conexiones. De esta manera, APLA se presenta como una solución para la construcción y evolución de PLAs de forma que puedan ser fácilmente refinadas iteración tras iteración de un ciclo de vida de líneas de producto ágiles. Dicha solución se ha implementado en una herramienta llamada FPLA (Flexible Product-Line Architecture) y ha sido validada mediante su aplicación en un proyecto de desarrollo de un sistema de gestión de medición en redes de energía eléctrica. Dicho proyecto ha sido desarrollado en una fábrica de software global en colaboración con la Universidad Politécnica de Madrid e Indra Software Labs.