Organization of Process

• Review Class 15

• Processes– Configuration Management– Introduction and Education

CEN 4021 Class 16 – 03/07

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Processes

• In addition to hiring new employees, other new resources necessary for the s/w project must be considered, acquired, established, and installed during the organizing phase.

• The process used to develop the s/w must be clearly defined. That is, the process must be tailored depending on some of the following:

– The size and complexity of the project based on the deliverables

– The maturity of the organization

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Processes cont

– The history of the working relationships of the people

– The size of the organization

– The goals of the s/w project

• Many spmrs refer to the definitions and guidelines from ISO 9000, S/w Process Improvement and Capability dEtermination (SPICE), or the Software Engineering Institute’s (SEI) Capability Maturity Model (CMM)

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Processes contProcess Map

• There is a need to map the overall process to clearly list the activities carried out with in each step, and to explain any relationships among the steps. See next slide: Fig. 7.1 P. 146.

• Diagram:– For waterfall-like process

– Arrows show the flow of activities.

– Dotted arrows indicate the potential for backward flow.

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Initial Reqs.and

Businesscase

Reqs.Gathering

andSpecs.

ProductDesign

Coding and UnitTesting

Test Scenario and

Test ScriptDevelopment

Information andPublications

MaterialDevelopment

Functionaland

ComponentTests

Systemand

ReleaseTests

SystemPackaging

andRelease

InformationPrinting orLoading

AndRelease

Project Management

Configuration Management

Fig. 7.1 Overall Project Process Map

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Processes cont

Configuration Management

• Defn: A set of procedures that define, track, and control artifacts produced during the development, support, and maintenance of software.

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Processes contConfiguration Management cont

• Configuration management is made up of a complex set of activities including the following key activities:

• Part 1: Definition and Setup

- Defining and listing the artifacts that need to be managed

- Defining the granularity of managing the artifacts and designing the directory scheme to accommodate that level if granularity

- Defining the rules for accessing the artifacts

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Processes contConfiguration Management cont

• Part 2: Control and track- Defining the security and controls needed to manage

the artifacts

- Defining the security and controls needed to manage the artifacts

- Storing retrieving, locking, and unlocking artifacts based on the predefined rules

- Maintaining all of the tools employed to help in configuration management.

Note configuration management spans the entire project.

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Processes cont

Process Introduction and Education

• Members of a project team may come from a variety of backgrounds, all of which use some form of a process. Even if this process is some form of chaotic organization i.e., the process is formulated as the project progresses.

• Education and communication of project progress should come in stages.

• There are many approaches, one such approach is as follows:

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Processes cont

Process Introduction and Education cont

• Stage 1: Process Introduction– Provide the intro and education, if necessary, to the

general process chosen for the project.

– Provide the rationale behind the specific process.

– Point out both the positive and the negative as well as any portion of the process that is still untested.

– Point out any past history, if available.

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Processes contProcess Introduction and Education cont

• Stage 2: Feedback and Modification cont– Allow team members to debate and study the process

on their own.

– Ask for written feedback.

– Collect and analyze the responses

– Make appropriate modifications and prepare for responses to these changes.

– Bring the team together, providing the team members with feedback on which suggested modifications were accepted and explaining what was done with both the accepted and the rejected suggestions.

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Processes cont

Process Introduction and Education cont

• Stage 3: Acceptance– Ask whether any further education is needed and

provide it as appropriate.

– Ask for concurrence and acceptance of the process.

• Stage 4: Reinforcement– Quickly review the process and ask for any further

input to its implementation.

– Make any adjustments and update the process as needed.

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Processes cont

Process Introduction and Education cont

• The effort required to organize, communicate, educate, and gain acceptance of the process may be longer than many people would like.

• Stage 4 (reinforcement) may be performed repeatedly as needed, but not excessively.

• As new employees come on board, they must also be introduced to the project process.

• Spmr needs to ensure that the team is clear about, and ready to follow the process map.

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Methodologies• Recall a methodology is a prescribed set of

steps to accomplish a task.

• The process provides the macro steps the methodology provide the micro steps, i.e., the difference between a methodology and a process is a matter of degree.

• Spmrs have traditionally been highly involved in discussion on methodologies for the following reasons:

1. Need to keep up with the new methodologies

2. Promotion was linked to performance using a methodology

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Methodologies cont• Spmrs must be familiar with the most appropriate

methodology.

• Spmrs need to monitor how the methodology is used on the project.

• The spmr needs to ensure that the team is prepared to use the methodology. Usually describe at two levels:

1. Higher-level is a more process oriented way i.e., major substeps to be employed are listed and their relationships shown.

2. Deeper level describes the specific methods in each substep.

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Methodologies cont

Methodology Definition:

• Functional testing activity:– Review the reqs. spec for the description of the

desired functionality

– Review the design document for the design of the soln to provide the functionality

– Review the code, if necessary

– Develop the usage scenario and break down the usage scenario into test cases for the functionality

– Execute the test cases and record the results

– Report any problems found

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Methodologies contMethodology Definition cont:

• Functional testing activity cont:– Incorporate the fixes and retest to ensure that the

fixes are correct

– Promote all of the correctly test functional code to a library

• Within this general methodology, very different, specific methods may be employed to accomplish any of the particular substeps.

• For example the generation of test cases may be done using white-box, black-box, and/or grey-box testing approaches.

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Methodologies contMethodology Preparation:

• If the planned methodology crosses several steps, such as OO programming and Ken Beck’s eXtreme programming methodology (from the family of Agile methodologies) , then the preparation for it may be quite difficult for project management.

• It is extremely difficult for spmrs to stay out of the detailed technical discussions of a methodology, especially if it is and up-and-coming one such as aspect-oriented programming (AOP), which is viewed as post-OO programming (??)

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Methodologies contMethodology Preparation cont:

• Aspect-oriented programming (AOP) – A new s/w development methodology that emphasizes cross-functional features or concerns that may arise in the requirements, design, or implementation steps. Example of aspects include design constraints, systems properties, and system behaviors.

• Spmrs need to facilitate the debate over a new or complex methodology, so that all fears and apprehensions about it may be exposed and resolved before the next stage of preparation.

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Methodologies contMethodology Preparation cont:

• During the debate the new methodology should be judged by the following criteria:

– Whether it will accomplish the task

– Whether it will accomplish the task in some advantageous way that improves productivity, reduces complexity, and enhances quality

– Whether the actual project cost will be reduced and the schedule improved.

• The spmrs must be prepared to address the above criteria as part of the organization and preparation of the methodologies.

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Methodologies contMethodology Preparation cont:

• A new methodology will have a front-end cost in terms of the potentially steep learning curve and extra time required to master the methodology.

• After the debate is over and the team embraces the new methodology the education process begins.

• Some teams may include a few experts in the new methodology, the spmr should use these team members effectively in the education process.