Improving agile software development by the application of method engineering practices

Despite the vast attention and wide acceptance of the newly engineered agile methods for software development, those methods are seldom linked to the goals of software process improvement (SPI), an approach that aims to provide support for significant improvement of both the quality of those methods as well as the resultant software products. In this paper, we propose an extension to agile methods by adding extra characteristics in order for agile methods to better support SPI. We explain how agile methods can gain those extra attributes through the application of a method engineering approach along with our new tool (4-DAT) that assists method engineers and managers in selecting the most appropriate method fragments for their needed agile methods. Finally, we summarize a number of industrial case studies carried out over several years in order to test and improve the efficiency of our theory of adding SPI to an agile methodological approach

Transformations of Check Constraint PIM Specifications

Platform independent modeling of information systems and generation of their prototypes play an important role in software development process. However, not all tasks in this process have been covered yet, i.e. not all pieces of an information system can be designed using platform independent artifacts that are later transformable into the executable code. One of the examples is modeling of database check constraints, for which there is a lack of appropriate mechanisms to formally specify them on a platform independent level. In order to provide formal specification of check constraints at platform independent level, we developed a domain specific language and embedded it into a tool for platform independent design and automated prototyping of information systems, named Integrated Information Systems CASE (IIS*Case). In this paper, we present algorithms for transformation of check constraints specified at the platform independent level into the relational data model, and further transformation into the executable SQL/DDL code for several standard and commercial platforms: ANSI SQL-2003, Oracle 9i and 10g, and MS SQL Server 2000 and 2008. We have also implemented these algorithms in IIS*Case as a part of the process of generation of relational database schema

Refactorización sobre Programación Genérica en Lenguajes Orientados a Objetos

En el desarrollo del software, éste se degrada produciéndose la entropía software. Una de las labores fundamentales para su eliminación, es el mantenimiento perfectivo, y en particular, la refactorización. La independencia del lenguaje en la definición e implementación de refactorizaciones, así como la programación genérica en refactorización son dos importantes líneas abiertas de investigación en este campo. Con el objetivo de lograr cierta independencia en su definición e implementación se propone un metamodelo para la definición de los conceptos básicos y una plantilla para su definición, junto con un modelo de caracterización y proceso. Posteriormente se describe un nuevo catálogo de refactorizaciones en genericidad y se propone una arquitectura basada en frameworks. Finalmente se valida la solución sobre el lenguaje Java, construyendo un prototipo. En resumen, se aporta un nuevo enfoque a la hora de abordar las refactorizaciones, mejorando algunas de las deficiencias detectadasDepartamento de Informátic

Programmiersprachen und Rechenkonzepte

Seit 1984 veranstaltet die GI-Fachgruppe "Programmiersprachen und Rechenkonzepte", die aus den ehemaligen Fachgruppen 2.1.3 "Implementierung von Programmiersprachen" und 2.1.4 "Alternative Konzepte für Sprachen und Rechner" hervorgegangen ist, regelmäßig im Frühjahr einen Workshop im Physikzentrum Bad Honnef. Das Treffen dient in erster Linie dem gegenseitigen Kennenlernen, dem Erfahrungsaustausch, der Diskussion und der Vertiefung gegenseitiger Kontakte