Assessment of software process and metrics to support quantitative understanding

The use of process metrics and data for quantitative understanding is not very straightforward. If we have an identification of process components and follow a measurement process, we are likely to use process metrics and data effectively. But if we don't have these practices, we can hardly trust oil process metrics and data for quantitative understanding. In this paper, we summarize eight case studies that we performed in different industrial contexts. The case studies rely on an assessment approach that investigates suitability of a software process and metrics for quantitative analyses. The approach investigates a process's inner attributes and outer factors as well as a number of usability characteristics for process metrics. We validated the results of the studies via SPC tools. This paper brief's the approach, explains contexts and findings of the case studies, and discusses overall case study results

Assessment of Software Process and Metrics to Support Quantitative Understanding: Experience from an Undefined Task Management Process

Software engineering management demands the measurement, evaluation and improvement of the software processes and products. However, the utilization of measurement and analysis in software engineering is not very straightforward. It requires knowledge on the concepts of measurement, process management, and statistics as well as on their practical applications. We developed a systematic approach to evaluate the suitability of a software process and its measures for quantitative analysis, and have applied the approach in several industrial contexts. This paper explains the experience of evaluating a task management process and related measures of a government research agency. The agency had not defined the task management and measurement processes, and the performance data were gathered from a change management tool. We spent six person-days performing the assessment and analyzing data from 92 process executions. We observed that as systematic approaches have become available, software organizations are able to readily apply quantitative techniques