Experiences in Learning XP Practices: A Qualitative Study

Abstract. Extreme programming (XP) is one of the new agile methodologies for software engineering that has earned a lot of interest the last few years. Through a field study where a group of researchers and students aimed to learn XP through practice, we gathered qualitative data about the different practices of XP and programmers ’ impression of them in order to do get knowledge on how the different practices work. Findings regarding the most well-known prac-tices are presented in this paper and to a great extent seem to verify claims from the literature. However, some difficulties in the practices are reported.

Usage Control in Inter-organisational Collaborative Environments – A Case Study from an Industry Perspective

Part 1: ConferenceInternational audienceSharing information between collaborators without relinquishing control of that information has for many years been a tantalizing goal in the research community, but despite application support, the concept of usage control has failed to take hold in the business community. In this paper we present the results of a case study in the Norwegian oil & gas domain. The purpose of the study is to better understand the reasons for the slow adoption rate of usage control technology to control shared information. To this end we investigate risk perception, existing control measures and the attitude towards usage control technology. The study shows that although participants in the case study do not think their information is properly protected, there are several practical challenges that prevent them from adopting usage control technology as a means to improve protection

COTS-Based Software Development: Processes and Open Issues

The work described in this paper is an investigation of COTS-based software development within a particular NASA environment, with an emphasis on the processes used. Fifteen projects using a COTS-based approach were studied and their actual process was documented. This process is evaluated to identify essential differences in comparison to traditional software development. The main differences, and the activities for which projects require more guidance, are requirements definition and COTS selection, high level design, integration and testing. Starting from these empirical observations, a new process and set of guidelines for COTS-based development are developed and briefly presented. Keywords Commercial off-the-shelf, COTS, component-based, empirical study, software development process.

Exploring communities of practice for product family engineering

Product Family Engineering (PFE) is an approach to software engineering that seeks to reduce the global effort in producing multiple software products by actively promoting and governing the reuse of assets between the family members. However, PFE is highly demanding, putting stringent demands on careful planning and management in the organization. To leverage the full opportunities offered by PFE, its introduction and use requires effective coordination of people and organizational units. This paper presents a solution to support this coordination by exploring concepts from the area of communities of practices for PFE. The expected benefit is that communities offer a more adaptive approach supporting the transition towards PFE compared to formal organizational restructuring. In this paper, we will describe our considerations about the building principles for organizations using a shared platform for the family members and a study proposal that will examine the effects of knowledge brokering among Communities of Practice as a means to assist PFE