An Architecture Maturity Model of Software Product Line

Software architecture has been a key research area in the software engineering community due to its significant role in creating high-quality software. The trend of developing product lines rather than single products has made the software product line a viable option in the industry. Software product line architecture (SPLA) is regarded as one of the crucial components in the product lines, since all of the resulting products share this common architecture. The increased popularity of software product lines demands a process maturity evaluation methodology. Consequently,this paper presents an architecture process maturity model for software product line engineering to evaluate the current maturity of the product line architecture development process in an organization. Assessment questionnaires and a rating methodology comprise the framework of this model. The objective of the questionnaires is to collect information about the SPLA development process. Thus, in general this work contributes towards the establishment of a comprehensive and unified strategy for the process maturity evaluation of software product line engineering. Furthermore, we conducted two case studies and reported the assessment results, which show the maturity of the architecture development process in two organizations

Software Product Line Engineering: Future Research Directions

The recent trend of switching from single software product development tolines of software products in the software industry has made the software product line concept viable and widely accepted methodology in the future. Some of the potential benefits of this approach include cost reduction, improvement in quality and a decrease in product development time. Many organizations that deal in wide areas of operation, from consumer electronics, telecommunications, and avionics to information technology, are using software product lines practice because it deals with effective utilization ofsoftware assets and provides numerous benefits. Software product line engineering is an inter-disciplinary concept. It spans over the dimensions of business, architecture, process and organization. The business dimension of software product lines deals with managing a strong coordination between product line engineering and the business aspects of product line. Software product line architecture is regarded as one of the crucial piece of entity in software product lines. All the resulting products share thiscommon architecture. The organizational theories, behavior and management play critical role in the process of institutionalization of software product line engineering in an organization. The objective of this chapter is to discuss the state of the art of software product line engineering from the perspectives of business, architecture, organizational management and software engineering process. This work also highlights and discusses the future research directions in this area thus providing an opportunity to researchers and practitioners to better understand the future trends and requirements

ECONOMIC TRADEOFF ANALYSIS OF A PRODUCT LINE ARCHITECTURE APPROACH THROUGH MODEL-BASED SYSTEMS ENGINEERING: A CASE STUDY OF FUTURE MINE COUNTERMEASURES UNMANNED UNDERWATER VEHICLES

The defense sector often develops systems to operate for at least 15 years, which can reach 40 or even 50 years. Those systems tend to be cheaper, more rapidly developed, and reliable when developed on product lines (PL). Product line architecture surges with potential to improve the acquisition process, resulting in a more rapid insertion of cost-effective warfighting capabilities. This thesis investigates the impact of the PL approach by analyzing the future generation of mine countermeasure (MCM) unmanned underwater vehicle (UUV) architecture alternatives, employing a detailed reuse model based on the COPLIMO framework. The research integrates parametric cost modeling with model-based systems engineering (MBSE), feeding the existing baseline knowledge regarding PL architecture. Furthermore, this can improve systems acquisition processes, deliver more agile capability, and reduce total life cycle costs (LCC). The integration of models highlights significant differences among the architectural variations considered early in the acquisition process before substantial financial commitments. Early decisions determine most of the total LCC and establish a baseline for long-term system performance. Hence, the choice of favorable design alternatives is crucial to program success. The results demonstrate that up-front investments in product lines generate a significant return on investment (ROI).Capitao-Tenente, Brazilian NavyApproved for public release. Distribution is unlimited

Software Architectures and Multiple Variability

International audienceDuring the construction of software product lines, variability management is a crucial activity. A large number of software variants must be produced, in most cases, by using extensible architectures. In this chapter, we present the various applications of a set of modular management variability tools (FAMILIAR) for different forms of architecture (component-, service- and plug-in-based), and at different stages of the software life cycle. We discuss the lessons learnt from these studies and present guidelines for resolving recurring problems linked to multiple variability and to software architecture

Building the Core Architecture of a NASA Multiagent System Product Line

The field of Software Product Lines (SPL) emphasizes build- ing a family of software products from which concrete products can be derived rapidly. This helps to reduce time-to-market, costs, etc., and can result in improved software quality and safety. Current Agent-Oriented Software Engineering (AOSE) methodologies are concerned with devel- oping a single Multiagent System. The main contribution of this paper is a proposal to developing the core architecture of a Multiagent Systems Product Line (MAS-PL), exemplifying our approach with reference to a concept NASA mission based on multiagent technology

Design of an ultra-high precision machine for form measurement

International audienceIn today's business environment, the trend towards more product variety and customization is unbroken. Due to this development, the need of agile and reconfigurable production systems emerged to cope with various products and product families. To design and optimize production systems as well as to choose the optimal product matches, product analysis methods are needed. Indeed, most of the known methods aim to analyze a product or one product family on the physical level. Different product families, however, may differ largely in terms of the number and nature of components. This fact impedes an efficient comparison and choice of appropriate product family combinations for the production system. A new methodology is proposed to analyze existing products in view of their functional and physical architecture. The aim is to cluster these products in new assembly oriented product families for the optimization of existing assembly lines and the creation of future reconfigurable assembly systems. Based on Datum Flow Chain, the physical structure of the products is analyzed. Functional subassemblies are identified, and a functional analysis is performed. Moreover, a hybrid functional and physical architecture graph (HyFPAG) is the output which depicts the similarity between product families by providing design support to both, production system planners and product designers. An illustrative example of a nail-clipper is used to explain the proposed methodology. An industrial case study on two product families of steering columns of thyssenkrupp Presta France is then carried out to give a first industrial evaluation of the proposed approach