Software quality from behavioural and human perspectives

Software quality is evolving beyond static assessment to include behavioural attributes and human aspects.These two groups of attributes are vital and necessary to balance between technical and non-technical (human) aspects in software assessment. PQM or Pragmatic Quality Model is a proposed model of quality, which composes of behavioural and human perspectives in assessment. This model provides opportunity to give priority or contribution of quality attributes to reflect the business requirement. Therefore, it is more practical that can suit different users and purposes. As for our research, PQM is used for assessment of software for certification process. This paper explains in detail this model of PQM

Architecture value mapping: using fuzzy cognitive maps as a reasoning mechanism for multi-criteria conceptual design evaluation

The conceptual design phase is the most critical phase in the systems engineering life cycle. The design concept chosen during this phase determines the structure and behavior of the system, and consequently, its ability to fulfill its intended function. A good conceptual design is the first step in the development of a successful artifact. However, decision-making during conceptual design is inherently challenging and often unreliable. The conceptual design phase is marked by an ambiguous and imprecise set of requirements, and ill-defined system boundaries. A lack of usable data for design evaluation makes the problem worse. In order to assess a system accurately, it is necessary to capture the relationships between its physical attributes and the stakeholders\u27 value objectives. This research presents a novel conceptual architecture evaluation approach that utilizes attribute-value networks, designated as \u27Architecture Value Maps\u27, to replicate the decision makers\u27 cogitative processes. Ambiguity in the system\u27s overall objectives is reduced hierarchically to reveal a network of criteria that range from the abstract value measures to the design-specific performance measures. A symbolic representation scheme, the 2-Tuple Linguistic Representation is used to integrate different types of information into a common computational format, and Fuzzy Cognitive Maps are utilized as the reasoning engine to quantitatively evaluate potential design concepts. A Linguistic Ordered Weighted Average aggregation operator is used to rank the final alternatives based on the decision makers\u27 risk preferences. The proposed methodology provides systems architects with the capability to exploit the interrelationships between a system\u27s design attributes and the value that stakeholders associate with these attributes, in order to design robust, flexible, and affordable systems --Abstract, page iii

0028/2009 - Problemas na Elicitação de Requisitos: Uma visão de pesquisa/literatura

A primeira fase na engenharia de requisitos é a elicitação de requisitos, na qual as informações sobre as necessidades do cliente são adquiridas, sendo crucial e crítica e podendo comprometer todas as etapas subseqüentes do desenvolvimento. O presente relatório apresenta um levantamento dos problemas que ocorrem durante a elicitação de requisitos citados na literatura da área

Investigating Cultural Dimensions via Developers Artefacts: The Utility of Repository Mining

A growing body of research is using artefacts from online development communities to explore the impact of developers’ behaviours on the software development process. Although this research has produced many insights, researchers have yet to fully explore the impact of developers’ cultural backgrounds on their behaviours in an online community, although such understandings could be useful for helping the community to understand and plan for team dynamics. This study utilised a pragmatic case study to explore the relationship between culture and online behaviour among developers from the United States (U.S.), China, and Russia—three countries that differ in their orientations as individualistic or collectivist cultures. The data for the study comprised artefacts supplied over an 11-year period by users of Stack Overflow1, a popular online programming community that addresses questions from members by providing them with rapid access to the knowledge and expertise of their peers. Artefacts consisted of developers’ questions and answers, personal profiles, Up and Down voting records, online reputations, and earned badges. Data mining techniques, as well as statistical, linguistic, and content analysis were used to compare artefacts from the three groups of developers based on their cultural orientation as individualistic or collectivistic, attitudes, and interaction and knowledge sharing patterns. The findings revealed differences among the three groups that were consistent with their cultural backgrounds. U.S. developers, who are from an individualistic culture, asked and responded to more questions, had higher average reputations, used the pronoun “I” more frequently, and were more task- focused. Conversely, Chinese developers, who are from a collectivistic culture, provided more extensive commenting and editing of posts, used the pronouns “we” and “you” more frequently, and were more likely to engage in information exchange. Russian developers had been using Stack Overflow the longest and were the most reflective. The cultural patterns identified in this study have numerous implications for enhancing in- group interactions and behaviour management among software development communities

Analyse der softwarebasierten Einflussnahme auf eine verkürzte Nutzungsdauer von Produkten

ANALYSE DER SOFTWAREBASIERTEN EINFLUSSNAHME AUF EINE VERKÜRZTE NUTZUNGSDAUER VON PRODUKTEN Analyse der softwarebasierten Einflussnahme auf eine verkürzte Nutzungsdauer von Produkten / Jaeger-Erben, Melanie (Rights reserved) ( -