Process capability assessments in small development firms

[Abstract}: Assessment-based Software Process Improvement (SPI) programs such as the Capability Maturity Model (CMM), Bootstrap, and SPICE (ISO/IEC 15504) are based on formal frameworks and promote the use of systematic processes and management practices for software development. These approaches identify best practices for the management of software development and when applied, enable organizations to understand, control and improve development processes. The purpose of a SPI assessment is to compare the current processes used in an organization with a list of recommended or ‘best’ practices. This research investigates the adoption of SPI initiatives by four small software development firms. These four firms participated in a process improvement program which was sponsored by Software Engineering Australia (SEA) (Queensland). The assessment method was based on SPICE (ISO/IEC 15504) and included an initial assessment, recommendations, and a follow-up meeting. For each firm, before and after snapshots are provided of the capability as assessed on eight processes. The discussion which follows summarizes the improvements realized and considers the critical success factors relating to SPI adoption for small firms

A process based approach software certification model for agile and secure environment

In today’s business environment, Agile and secure software processes are essential since they bring high quality and secured software to market faster and more cost effectively. Unfortunately, some software practitioners are not following the proper practices of both processes when developing software. There exist various studies which assess the quality of software process; nevertheless, their focus is on the conventional software process. Furthermore, they do not consider weight values in the assessment although each evaluation criterion might have different importance. Consequently, software certification is needed to give conformance on the quality of Agile and secure software processes. Therefore, the objective of this thesis is to propose Extended Software Process Assessment and Certification Model (ESPAC) which addresses both software processes and considers the weight values during the assessment. The study is conducted in four phases: 1) theoretical study to examine the factors and practices that influence the quality of Agile and secure software processes and weight value allocation techniques, 2) an exploratory study which was participated by 114 software practitioners to investigate their current practices, 3) development of an enhanced software process certification model which considers process, people, technology, project constraint and environment, provides certification guideline and utilizes the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) for weight values allocation and 4) verification of Agile and secure software processes and AHP through expert reviews followed by validation on satisfaction and practicality of the proposed model through focus group discussion. The validation result shows that ESPAC Model gained software practitioners’ satisfaction and practical to be executed in the real environment. The contributions of this study straddle research perspectives of Software Process Assessment and Certification and Multiple Criteria Decision Making, and practical perspectives by providing software practitioners and assessors a mechanism to reveal the quality of software process and helps investors and customers in making investment decisions

ESPAC model: Extended software process assessment and certification model for agile and secure software processes

In today’s business environment, agile and secure software processes are essential since they bring high quality and secured software to market faster and more cost-effectively.Unfortunately, some software practitioners are not following the proper practices of both processes when developing software.There exist various studies which assess the quality of software process; nevertheless, their focus is on the conventional software process. Furthermore, they do not consider weight values in the assessment although each evaluation criterion might have different importance on the project.Consequently, software certification is needed to give conformance on the quality of agile and secure software processes.Therefore, the objective of this paper is to propose ESPAC (Extended Software Process Assessment and Certification) Model which addresses both software processes and considers the weight values during the assessment.The model has been constructed by using deductive approach, whereby the theoretical and exploratory studies were conducted in order to determine the components of the proposed model. The ESPAC Model consists of six components, which are the target, evaluation criteria, reference standard, data gathering technique, assessment phases and synthesis technique.The proposed model has been validated by seven software practitioners from the practical perspectives through focus group discussion. The validation result shows that the ESPAC Model gained their satisfaction and able to be practically executed in the real environment

Modelos de Evaluación y Mejora de Procesos: Análisis Comparativo

Desde los albores de la disciplina de la ingeniería del software, queda patente la dificultad para que los artefactos generados alcancen un nivel de calidad óptimo dentro de unos límites de tiempo y coste. Dada la naturaleza lógica del producto, se asume que la calidad de un sistema software depende sobremanera de la calidad del proceso usado para desarrollarlo. Los modelos de evaluación y mejora de procesos y su estandarización, han tomado un papel determinante en la identificación, integración, medición y optimización de las buenas prácticas existentes en la organización y desarrollo software. El presente trabajo pretende repasar aquellos modelos de mayor difusión (ISO 9001, CMMI y SPICE), centrándose en su evolución y estructura, aspectos clave, aplicando comparativas y comentando el estado actual de cada estándar. Por último intentaremos destacar las aportaciones del modelado y simulación del proceso software con sistemas dinámicos como herramienta de mejora de los procesos de una organización dentro de los anteriores estándares.Ministerio de Ciencia y Tecnología TIN2004-06689-C03-0

Un Estudio Crítico Comparativo de ISO 9001, CMMI e ISO 15504

Desde los albores de la disciplina de la ingeniería del software, queda patente la dificultad para que los artefactos generados alcancen un nivel de calidad óptimo dentro de unos límites de tiempo y coste. Dada la naturaleza lógica del producto, se asume que la calidad de un sistema software depende sobremanera de la calidad del proceso usado para desarrollarlo. Los modelos de evaluación y mejora de procesos y su estandarización, han tomado un papel determinante en la identificación, integración, medición y optimización de las buenas prácticas existentes en la organización y desarrollo software. El presente trabajo pretende repasar aquellos modelos de mayor difusión (ISO 9001, CMMI y SPICE), centrándose en su evolución y estructura, aspectos clave, aplicando comparativas y comentando el estado actual de cada estándar. Por último intentaremos destacar las aportaciones del modelado y simulación del proceso software con sistemas dinámicos como herramienta de mejora de los procesos de una organización dentro de los anteriores estándares.Ministerio de Ciencia y Tecnología TIN2004-06689-C03-0

Methods to evaluate lightweight software process assessment methods based on evaluation theory and engineering design principles

Achieving a mature software development process has become essential for many software organizations. A mature development process permits software organizations to provide their customers with a high quality software product delivered on time and within budget. Software organizations have been struggling for decades to improve the quality of their products by improving their software development processes. Designing an improvement program for a software development process is a demanding and complex task. This task consists of two main processes: the assessment process and the improvement process. A successful improvement process requires first a successful assessment; failing to assess the organization's software development process could create unsatisfactory results. Software processes assessment (SPA) can be used either to determine the capability of another organization, for subcontracting purposes, or to determine and understand the status of the organization's current processes to initiate an improvement process. The increasing number of assessment approaches available; the ISO 15504 standard that sets out the requirements for process assessment; and the popularity of the CMMI model, illustrate the relevance of software process assessment for the software development industry. Currently, several methods are available to assess the maturity and capability of a software development process based on well-known software process assessment and improvement frameworks such as CMMI and ISO-15504. The success of these assessment methods and improvement frameworks is supported by post-development studies on the validity, reliability and effectiveness of these methods. Unfortunately, many researchers consider that such methods are too large to implement in SME organizations. As a result, many researchers have studied process assessment and improvement in SME organizations and proposed assessment methods, usually called lightweight SPA methods, suitable to the organizations' needs. The current research in the SPA field focuses on proposing convenient and easy-to-use assessment methods, without investigating to what extent the design of these methods is related to the engineering design perspective. This unclear alignment with the engineering discipline raises questions about the relevance and representativeness of the results produced by these methods from an engineering viewpoint. Moreover, although numerous SPA methods are currently available which offer help and guidance, unfortunately they only partially address evidences found essential for achieving an SPA success. This thesis presents and discusses the evaluation of lightweight SPA methods. The evaluation is two-fold: evaluating the SPA methods design using a top-down approach and based on engineering viewpoints and evaluating the success of SPA methods using a bottom-up approach. The evaluation theory concepts are used as a framework to formally develop both evaluation methods. To develop the first evaluation method using the top-down approach, an exploratory analytical study of SPA methods from an engineering design viewpoint has been conducted. Vincenti's classification has been used as a tool for this analysis. The aim of this exploratory study is to put the developed SPA methods into an engineering design framework, and use this framework as a guideline to put the new SPA methods to be designed into the same engineering design framework. To develop the second evaluation method using the bottom-up approach, a systematic literature review was conducted to extract the set of evidences for the success of the SPA method based on requirements, observations, lessons learned and recommendations which have been formulated within the industry and published in books, conferences and journals. The development process of the two evaluation methods has then been verified using a set of verification criteria and the proposed evaluation methods were tested by conducting three case studies. The first evaluation method would be useful mainly for the designers of new SPA methods during the design phase, while the second evaluation method would be useful for both designers and practitioners of SPA methods to verify the success of the assessment method in question. This research project forms an entry point to study the alignment of SPA methods design with engineering design principles and sheds light on achieving successful assessment results by studying the successful evidences that should be supported by assessment methods separated from the improvement process. The proposed evaluation methods in this thesis have great benefits for SPA methods designed mainly for SME organizations, because these assessments methods, contrary to well-known methods, lack comprehensive studies on their reliability and effectiveness