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ABSTRACT: Recognized as one of the trends of the 21st century, globalization of the world economies brought significant changes to nearly
all industries, and in particular it includes software development. Many companies started global software engineering (GSE)
to benefit from cheaper, faster and better development of software systems, products and services. However, empirical studies
indicate that achieving these benefits is not an easy task. Here, we report our findings from investigating empirical evidence
in GSE-related research literature. By conducting a systematic review we observe that the GSE field is still immature. The
amount of empirical studies is relatively small. The majority of the studies represent problem-oriented reports focusing on
different aspects of GSE management rather than in-depth analysis of solutions for example in terms of useful practices or
techniques. Companies are still driven by cost reduction strategies, and at the same time, the most frequently discussed recommendations
indicate a necessity of investments in travelling and socialization. Thus, at the same time as development goes global there
is an ambition to minimize geographical, temporal and cultural separation. These are normally integral parts of cross-border
collaboration. In summary, the systematic review results in several descriptive classifications of the papers on empirical
studies in GSE and also reports on some best practices identified from literature.
Empirical Software Engineering 04/2012; 15(1):91-118. · 1.85 Impact Factor
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ABSTRACT: So far, only few in-depth studies focused on the direct comparison of process models in general, and between plan-driven and
incremental/agile approaches in particular. That is, it is not made explicit what the effect is of moving from one model to
another model. Furthermore, there is limited evidence on advantages and issues encountered in agile software development,
this is specifically true in the context of large-scale development. The objective of the paper is to investigate how the
perception of bottlenecks, unnecessary work, and rework (from hereon referred to as issues) changes when migrating from a
plan-driven to an incremental software development approach with agile practices (flexible product backlog, face-to-face interaction,
and frequent integration), and how commonly perceived these practices are across different systems and development roles.
The context in which the objective should be achieved is large-scale development with a market-driven focus. The selection
of the context was based on the observation in related work that mostly small software development projects were investigated
and that the investigation was focused on one agile model (eXtreme programming). A case study was conducted at a development
site of Ericsson AB, located in Sweden in the end of 2007. In total 33 interviews were conducted in order to investigate the
perceived change when migrating from plan-driven to incremental and agile software development, the interviews being the primary
source of evidence. For triangulation purposes measurements collected by Ericsson were considered, the measurements relating
to unnecessary work (amount of discarded requirements) and rework (data on testing efficiency and maintenance effort). Triangulation
in this context means that the measurements were used to confirm the perceived changes with an additional data source. In
total 64 issues were identified, 24 being of general nature and the remaining 40 being local and therefore unique to individual’s
opinions or a specific system. The most common ones were documented and analyzed in detail. The commonality refers to how
many persons in different roles and across the systems studied have mentioned the issues for each of the process models. The
majority of the most common issues relates to plan-driven development. We also identified common issues remaining for agile
after the migration, which were related to testing lead-time, test coverage, software release, and coordination overhead.
Improvements were identified as many issues commonly raised for the plan-driven approach were not raised anymore for the incremental
and agile approach. It is concluded that the recent introduction (start in 2005 with the study being conducted in the end
of 2007) of incremental and agile practices brings added values in comparison to the plan-driven approach, which is evident
from the absence of critical issues that are encountered in plan-driven development.
KeywordsIncremental-Agile-Plan-driven-Case study-Migration
Empirical Software Engineering 04/2012; 15(6):654-693. · 1.85 Impact Factor
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Softw., Pract. Exper. 01/2011; 41:975-996.
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6th IEEE International Conference on Global Software Engineering, ICGSE 2011, Helsinki, Finland, August 15-18, 2011; 01/2011
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Empirical Software Engineering. 01/2010; 15:654-693.
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Proceedings of the Third International Symposium on Empirical Software Engineering and Measurement, ESEM 2009, October 15-16, 2009, Lake Buena Vista, Florida, USA; 01/2009
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35th Euromicro Conference on Software Engineering and Advanced Applications, SEAA 2009, Patras, Greece, August 27-29, 2009, Proceedings; 01/2009
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ABSTRACT: Recent empirical studies have been conducted identifying a number of issues and advantages of incremental and agile methods. However, the majority of studies focused on one model (Extreme Programming) and small projects. To draw more general conclusions we conduct a case study in large-scale development identifying issues and advantages, and compare the results with previous empirical studies on the topic. The principle results are that (1) the case study and literature agree on the benefits while new issues arise when using agile in large-scale and (2) an empirical research framework is needed to make agile studies comparable.
Journal of Systems and Software. 01/2009;
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Proceedings of the Second International Symposium on Empirical Software Engineering and Measurement, ESEM 2008, October 9-10, 2008, Kaiserslautern, Germany; 01/2008
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ACM SIGSOFT Software Engineering Notes. 01/2008; 33:29-32.
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3rd IEEE International Conference on Global Software Engineering, ICGSE 2008, Bangalore, India, 17-20 August, 2008; 01/2008
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Journal of Systems Architecture - Embedded Systems Design. 01/2008; 54:576-593.
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Proceedings of the Second International Symposium on Empirical Software Engineering and Measurement, ESEM 2008, October 9-10, 2008, Kaiserslautern, Germany; 01/2008
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ABSTRACT: Software requirements are often formulated on different levels and hence they are difficult to compare to each other. To address
this issue, a model that allows for placing requirements on different levels has been developed. The model supports both abstraction
and refinement of requirements, and hence requirements can both be compared with each other and to product strategies. Comparison
between requirements will allow for prioritization of requirements, which in many cases is impossible if the requirements
are described on different abstraction levels. Comparison to product strategies will enable early and systematic acceptance
or dismissal of requirements, minimizing the risk for overloading. This paper presents an industrial evaluation of the model.
It has been evaluated in two different companies, and the experiences and findings are presented. It is concluded that the
requirements abstraction model provides helpful improvements to the industrial requirements engineering process.
Requirements Engineering 06/2007; 12(3):163-190. · 0.97 Impact Factor
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Requirements Engineering: Foundation for Software Quality, 13th International Working Conference, REFSQ 2007, Trondheim, Norway, June 11-12, 2007, Proceedings; 01/2007
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[show abstract]
[hide abstract]
ABSTRACT: Software requirements are often formulated on different levels and hence they are difficult to compare to each other. To address this issue, a model that allows for placing requirements on different levels has been developed. The model supports both abstraction and refinement of requirements, and hence requirements can both be compared with each other and to product strategies. Comparison between requirements will allow for prioritization of requirements, which in many cases is impossible if the requirements are described on different abstraction levels. Comparison to product strategies will enable early and systematic acceptance or dismissal of requirements, minimizing the risk for overloading. This paper presents an industrial evaluation of the model. It has been evaluated in two different companies, and the experiences and findings are presented. It is concluded that the requirements abstraction model provides helpful improvements to the industrial requirements engineering process.
Requirements Engineering 01/2007; · 0.97 Impact Factor
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[show abstract]
[hide abstract]
ABSTRACT: Software requirements arrive in different shapes and forms to development organizations. This is particularly the case in
market-driven requirements engineering, where the requirements are on products rather than directed towards projects. This
results in challenges related to making different requirements comparable. In particular, this situation was identified in
a collaborative effort between academia and industry. A model, with four abstraction levels, was developed as a response to
the industrial need. The model allows for placement of requirements on different levels and supports abstraction or break
down of requirements to make them comparable to each other. The model was successfully validated in several steps at a company.
The results from the industrial validation point to the usefulness of the model. The model will allow companies to ensure
comparability between requirements, and hence it generates important input to activities such as prioritization and packaging
of requirements before launching a development project.
Requirements Engineering 02/2006; 11(1):79-101. · 0.97 Impact Factor
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32nd EUROMICRO Conference on Software Engineering and Advanced Applications (EUROMICRO-SEAA 2006), August 29 - September 1, 2006, Cavtat/Dubrovnik, Croatia; 01/2006
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International Journal of Software Engineering and Knowledge Engineering. 01/2006; 16:795-818.
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IEEE Software. 01/2006; 23:88-95.
