GLOBALLY DISTRIBUTED SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT IN SMALL AND MEDIUM-SIZED ENTERPRISES IN GERMANY: REASONS, LOCATIONS, AND OBSTACLES

Many large enterprises develop their software nowadays in globally distributed settings. By using the option to outsource, the respective enterprises can realize decisive competitive advantages. In order to remain competitive, small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are also forced to follow this trend and to outsource parts of their software development. However, most of the existing studies analyze the outsourcing situation in large enterprises, whereas the position of SMEs is being neglected and remains unclear. Main drivers for software development outsourcing decisions, suitable vendor locations, and problems occurring while realizing such projects may differ between large enterprises and SMEs. Therefore, in this explorative research paper we examine the outsourcing activities of eight SMEs in the German state of Baden-Württemberg. Besides the question why SMEs are choosing the outsourcing option we seek to find out, which countries are best suited for outsourcing activities of SMEs as well as which obstacles in particular hinder these enterprises in successfully conducting software development outsourcing

STraS: A Framework for Semantic Traceability in Enterprise-wide SOA Life-cycle Management

Abstract—In recent years, service-oriented architecture (SOA) has been widely adopted for enterprise application integration. A SOA not only promotes interoperable, loosely coupled enterprise applications; it also reduces the conceptual gap between business and IT. For SOA life-cycle management it is desirable that business processes can be traced to services and vice versa. However, this is usually not the case because many stakeholders and often more than one organization are involved in the SOA ecosystem. In addition, the various stakeholders employ their own vocabularies and formats. In this paper, we therefore recognize semantic traceability as the missing link between the two worlds and promote an integrated view on the various entities in the SOA life-cycle. First, we describe a SOA life-cycle model. Second, we propose the STraS traceability framework for end-to-end semantic traceability. Finally, we show how our approach contributes to the management of a SOA in business networks

Trustworthiness in networks: A simulation approach for approximating local trust and distrust values

International audienceTrust is essential for most social and business networks in the web, and determining local trust values between two unfamiliar users is an important issue. However, many existing approaches to calculating these values have limitations in various constellations or network characteristics. We therefore propose an approach that interprets trust as probability and is able to estimate local trust values on large networks using a Monte Carlo simulation method. The estimation is based on existing indirect trust statements between two unfamiliar users. This approach is then extended to the SimTrust algorithm that incorporates both trust and distrust values. It is implemented and discussed in detail with examples. Our main contribution is a new approach which incorporates all available trust and distrust information in such a way that basic trust properties are satisfied