Adopting test automation at Effizency to Improve Agility and Software Quality

Digital solutions have long been used as a means to solve everyday problems. Over time these solutions have been improved and refined. These solutions have emerged to help humans, primarily with tasks that can be cumbersome or repetitive. The demand for repetitive tasks and process optimization through digital means is peaked. For this reason, many companies in the software development area have adopted the use of automated tests capable of doing autonomously and quickly the tasks that previously required a lot of resources to perform, thus jumping on the "Automation Bandwagon”. By applying this approach, companies have the goal to improve the quality standards of the software offered by reducing the number of bugs and identifying them as early as possible in the development process. To observe the applicability, optimization, and efficiency of the automation of autonomous testing in a specific system, the concepts and technologies proposed here were applied in a professional scenario of a young company, Effizency. This company aims to facilitate the sale of energy services and electrical optimization. Effizency currently works using an agile approach and is constantly looking for ways to improve its development process. The company is currently facing the challenge of increasing the quality of its software and at the same time reducing the repetitiveness of its validation processes. Through this dissertation, it is expected that an improvement will be identified in terms of both a reduction of process repetition, time consumption and an increase in the test coverage performed. The main objective of this dissertation is to improve the quality of a company's software and the agility of its development process. This objective will be achieved using automated testing.As soluções digitais são usadas para resolver problemas do dia a dia há muito tempo. Ao longo do tempo, estas têm sido melhoradas e aperfeiçoadas. Estas soluções surgiram com o objetivo de ajudar o ser humano nas suas tarefas, maioritariamente tarefas que podem ser pesadas ou repetitivas. A procura pela automatização de tarefas repetitivas e de otimização de processos através de meios digitais está no seu auge. Por essa razão, muitas empresas na área de desenvolvimento de software adotaram o uso de testes automáticos capazes de fazer de forma autónoma e rápida as tarefas que anteriormente necessitariam de muitos recursos para realizar, entrando assim no “Vagão da Automatização”. Ao aplicar esta abordagem, as empresas têm o objetivo de melhorar os padrões de qualidade do software oferecidos reduzindo o número de bugs e identificando-os o mais cedo possível no processo de desenvolvimento. Com o intuito de observar a aplicabilidade, otimização e eficiência da automação de testes autónomos num sistema em concreto foi realizada a aplicação dos conceitos e tecnologias aqui propostos num cenário profissional de uma empresa jovem, Effizency. A Effizency trabalha atualmente utilizando uma abordagem ágil e está constantemente à procura de formas de melhorar o seu processo de desenvolvimento. Atualmente a empresa, enfrenta o desafio de aumentar a qualidade do seu software e, ao mesmo tempo reduzir o a repetitividade dos seus processos de validação. Através desta dissertação, espera-se que seja identificada uma melhoria tanto em termos de uma redução da repetição do processo, do consumo de tempo e de um aumento da cobertura dos testes realizados. O principal objetivo desta dissertação é melhorar a qualidade do software de uma empresa e a agilidade do seu processo de desenvolvimento. Este objetivo será alcançado através de testes automatizados

Jälkimarkkinatuotteiden hinnoittelun hallinta globaalissa B2B-yrityksessä

The main objective of this thesis is to improve the pricing process of the case company by assessing its current level compared to literature and propose improvement points. The research problem is divided further into sub-problems: How prices can be maintained and how they can be realized to greatest extent and finally how these two should be applied to the case company considering industry’s and company’s unique characteristics. Theory simplifies that 1 % increase in average realized price improves company profitability by 10 %. Price setting is analyzed briefly to explore pricing possibilities and understand the current practices although price setting is out of scope of this thesis. Price realization is analyzed more deeply on the theory side especially focusing on tools which can be used to identify where the money is lost. This part of theory uses a lot of six sigma terminology and tools more commonly seen in operations management. The results show that biggest gains in controlling prices are gained by training sales representatives and their assistants who place the sales orders into ERP. Globally standardized practices in placing and processing sales orders in ERP make following them easier and is less prone to confusion. Finer segments should be measured independently and later treated differently from one another to set multiple price points to gain more market and more profit. When such segmentation and fact-based intelligence gathering is in place, educated price adjustments can be made

Design a market hub platform for utilities

Dissertação de mestrado em Computer ScienceSoftware Engineering has been contributing, over the years, to a better and more efficient production of software. Through its methodologies and processes, it has been used to increase the assurance that the software produced is robust, of quality, easy to update, and above all that, conforms to the requirements identified by the stakeholders. With the growth of data sharing, collection and storage in the utilities sector, there is also an urgent need to maintain and use the available information in a useful way. This requires the adoption of strategies and infrastructures that can help leveraging this form of treatment to make it possible to improve the quality of certain utility sectors (gas, electricity, water, internet, communications). However, much of this process is still nowadays controlled solely by the production and distribution companies, preventing the all other users to participate in the process. To try to undo the supremacy of the production and distribution companies have on the utilities panorama, and in support of the European Commission vision, the energy sector is trying to move towards a liberalized market and, with this, it aims to enable all entities such as consumers, retailers, producers, distributors, to contribute to the management of the network and for new business models to emerge. To sustain this ecosystem, where these entities can communicate and share data, it would be advantageous to have a platform that would allow the communication of such data between all users. In this project, and through the application of SE techniques, we will develop, step by step, a model for a modular, scalable and integrated environment to enable demand response, data exploration, storage and fulfill all the European Union-wide Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).A Engenharia de Software tem contribuído, ao longo dos anos, para uma melhor e eficiente produção de software. Através de metodologias e processos, é possível produzir software produzido robusto, com qualidade, confiável, que possa ser atualizado e, acima de tudo, que respeite os requisitos identificados pelas partes interessadas. Com o crescimento da partilha, coleta e armazenamento de dados no setor de serviços públicos, existe uma necessidade urgente de manter e usar as informações disponíveis de maneira útil, com que se consiga extrair conhecimento. Isso requer a adoção de estratégias e infraestruturas que possam apoiar essa forma de tratamento para que, a partir da coleta de informações, seja possível melhorar a qualidade de certos setores de serviços públicos (gás, eletricidade, água, internet, comunicações). No entanto, e nos tempos que correm, grande parte desses processos é controlada exclusivamente pelas empresas de produção e distribuição, impedindo que os demais utilizadores participem do processo. De forma desfazer a supremacia que as empresas de produção e distribuição têm, e com apoio e motivação da Comissão Europeia, o setor energético tem vindo a tentar implementar um mercado de energia liberalizado e, com isso, permitir que todas as entidades como, consumidores, retalhistas, produtores, distribuidores, possam contribuir para a gestão da rede e na criação de novos modelos de negócio. Para sustentar este ecossistema, onde todas as entidades podem comunicar e compartilhar dados, seria útil e vantajoso ter uma plataforma que permitisse a comunicação de tais dados entre todos os utilizadores. Neste projeto, e através da aplicação de técnicas de SE, pretenderemos mostrar passo a passo um método para construir um ambiente modular, escalável e integrado para permitir resposta a procura, exploração dos dados, armazenamento e que cumpra a nova lei da União Europeia respeitante à Proteção de Dados (GDPR).This work is financed by the ERDF – European Regional Development Fund through the Operational Programme for Competitiveness and Internationalisation - COMPETE 2020 Programme within project «POCI-01-0145-FEDER-006961», and by National Funds through the Portuguese funding agency, FCT - Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia as part of Project «UID/EEA/50014/2013»

Agile Processes in Software Engineering and Extreme Programming – Workshops

This open access book constitutes papers from the 5 research workshops, the poster presentations, as well as two panel discussions which were presented at XP 2021, the 22nd International Conference on Agile Software Development, which was held online during June 14-18, 2021. XP is the premier agile software development conference combining research and practice. It is a unique forum where agile researchers, practitioners, thought leaders, coaches, and trainers get together to present and discuss their most recent innovations, research results, experiences, concerns, challenges, and trends. XP conferences provide an informal environment to learn and trigger discussions and welcome both people new to agile and seasoned agile practitioners. The 18 papers included in this volume were carefully reviewed and selected from overall 37 submissions. They stem from the following workshops: 3rd International Workshop on Agile Transformation 9th International Workshop on Large-Scale Agile Development 1st International Workshop on Agile Sustainability 4th International Workshop on Software-Intensive Business 2nd International Workshop on Agility with Microservices Programmin

Analysis of requirements and technologies to migrate software development to the PaaS model

Dissertation presented as the partial requirement for obtaining a Master's degree in Information Management, specialization in Information Systems and Technologies ManagementSoftware development has been evolving during the last years and, more and more, the software architecture to support this development has become more complex to meet the new requirements and new technologies. With the new cloud computing architecture and models, IT departments and ISV are developing new applications and moving the traditional software architecture to the cloud. In this context, Platform as a Service (PaaS) model can provide software development services and components within a new architecture for building a new generation of software with all benefits of cloud, like scalability and elasticity. However, currently, most companies have significant challenges to adapt and change its software development process to use the PaaS architecture and the cloud services. In this dissertation, it will first be identified and analyzed the changes and challenges for develop software with the PaaS architecture. Afterwards, will be analyzed and identified the requirements in a traditional software development and architecture (on premise) to development new software or adapt the existents software with the PaaS.Dissertation submitted as partial requirement for obtaining the Master’s degree in Information Managemen

Overcoming Barriers to Innovation in Food and Agricultural Biotechnology

The food and agricultural biotechnology (FAB) sector is poised to respond to some of society\u27s most pressing challenges, including food security, climate change, population growth, and resource limitation. However, to realize this promise, substantial barriers to innovation must be overcome. Here, we draw upon industry experience and innovation management literature to analyze FAB innovation challenges, as well relevant frameworks for their resolution. In doing so, we identify two major FAB innovation challenges: specialized adoption uncertainty, and complex product-market fit across convergent value chains. We propose that these innovation challenges may be overcome by 1) prioritizing the establishment of organizational and social technology legitimacy, and 2) leveraging technology-market matching methods and open innovation practices

‘Controlling instruments’ for price management: a single case study on a B2B company in the OEM business operating in the German electrical / electronics industry

Price management is a company’s most significant profit lever. Business-to-business (B2B) companies frequently delegate pricing decisions to the sales force, which often results in information asymmetry and goal incongruence due to management and the sales force having different interests. This situation increases the risk that pricing plans created by management will not be executed. Efforts to improve price planning can be rendered meaningless if Price Control 1 is not implemented to ensure the execution of pricing plans. An effective Price Control 1 can ensure that the profit lever of price management can be utilised in a way that benefits the company. The current academic literature does not thoroughly address the topic of Price Control 1 despite its relevance to the profitability of companies and the need to implement it in practice. This research adopts a social constructivist approach using semi-structured interviews with employees of a B2B company in the Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) business operating in the German electrical/electronics industry to develop a Price Control 1 model containing instruments for mitigating the Price Control 1 problem in the price management process for B2B in the OEM business operating in the electrical/electronics industry. Although the researcher focuses on a single case study of a B2B company in the OEM business operating in the electrical/electronics industry, this Price Control 1 model can help practitioners of other similar B2B companies manage Price Control 1 at their companies. It can be used by practitioners to guide the evaluation, design or redesign of Price Control 1 models to better understand the Price Control 1 problem and improve the success of achieving pricing plans. Other researchers can use the created Price Control 1 model to better understand this phenomenon and/or produce Price Control 1 models in other contextual settings