Though much talked about, there appears to be no clear definition or agreement of what constitutes software architecture.http://www.ratio.co.uk/software_architecture.pdf. By way of background information, here are some of the definitions and associated discussions of software architecture that can be found on the CMU software engineering institute website. Booch, Rumbaugh, and Jacobson, 1999 An architecture is the set of significant decisions about the organisation of a software system, the selection of the structural elements and their interfaces by which the system is composed, together with their behaviour as specified in the collaborations among those elements, the David Garlan and Dewayne Perry have adopted the following definition for their guest editorial to the April 1995 IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering devoted to software architecture: The structure of the components of a program/system, their interrelationships, and principles and guidelines governing their design and evolution over time. These views do not preclude each other, nor do they really represent a fundamental conflict about what software architecture is. Instead, they represent a spectrum in the software architecture research community about the emphasis that should be placed on architecture -- its constituent parts, the whole entity, the way it behaves once built, or the building of it. envisaged (e.g. what granularity the software is placed under configuration management, amount of CPU required to support timely compilation of the application) Designing for scalability and performance Scalability and performance are important to correctness of the solution. Dr. Wills has worked ...




Continuous data availability meets the needs of software development environments.http://www.netapp.com/ftp/software-dev-brief-lr.pdf. Manage increasing storage needs and growing development teams with ease, enabling software developers to focus on their core competencies—designing and developing next-generation software solutions. Software development is a continuous cycle of improvements. You constantly push the limits of your software offerings by updating, extending, and integrating existing programs, building new applica-tions, and deploying new packaged app-lications. Companies like Oracle, IBM, and SAP understand this process well, because software development is at the core of their business. Whether yours is a large software development company or an enterprise automating its business processes, you recognize the software development lifecycle requirements which include designing, architecting, developing, and testing; each requires its own set of data management services. Each iteration of the software development lifecycle brings with it enormous amounts of data and ever-increasing demands for storage and storage management. Understanding and addressing your storage challenges related to the software devel-opment process enable your development teams to speed up delivery of your software products and at the same time drive down your costs. Leading software development innovators rely on Network Appliance™ storage solutions to help them build products faster and reduce their overall development costs. Data management issues can delay software development projects by days, weeks, months, or even years, greatly hindering your company’s ability to deliver innovative ...


Computer software engineers apply the principles and techniques of computer science, engineering, and mathematical analysis to the design, development, testing, and evaluation of the software and systems that enable computers to perform their many applications.http://www.careercornerstone.org/pdf/software/software.pdf. Software engineers working in applications or systems development analyze users' needs and design, construct, test, and maintain computer applications software or systems. Software engineers can be involved in the design and development of many types of software, including software for operating systems and network distribution, and compilers, which convert programs for execution on a computer. Computer applications software engineers analyze users' needs and design, construct, and maintain general computer applications software or specialized utility programs. Some software engineers develop both packaged systems and systems software or create customized applications. Academic programs in software engineering emphasize software and may be offered as a degree option or in conjunction with computer science degrees. Increasing emphasis on computer security suggests that software engineers with advanced degrees that include mathematics and systems design will be sought after by software developers, government agencies, and consulting firms specializing in information assurance and security. Working as a computer engineer requires expertise in both computer hardware and software, and requires the engineer to be able to recommend tradeoffs between hardware and software to create a system or product design that is cost effective and useful. As they strive ...


Many clients invest considerable sums of money in having computer software developed for them.. Developing software is a high-risk undertaking. The risks, and the ways of minimising and sharing them, need to be clearly understood before embarking on any significant software development project. In 1995 the Standish Group, which is a respected group of US researchers, undertook the largest ever survey of software development projects. The remaining 52.7% of projects were completed late, over budget, or delivered software that did not work as required. 66% of projects were completed late, over budget, or delivered software that did not function as required. These surveys contain some guidance for clients who wish to develop computer software. They clearly show that there were four key contributors to software development projects failing. a lack of involvement in the development process by the ultimate user of the software; the requirements that the software needed to meet were not complete; the requirements that the software needed to meet kept changing; a lack of management support. The client needs to be fully aware that software development is inherently risky and will remain so until software development matures as an engineering discipline. What costs will the software reduce? This will not only make the software requirements easier to specify but will often simplify the software design. It will also mean that the software requirements are easier to specify and that the software will be easier to change. One particular aspect of this, whilst not entirely unique to the software development industry, is important ...


Agile software development methodologies provide many benefits including reduced time to market, lower defect rates, and more accurate requirements tracking.http://www.sds-consulting.com/AgileSoftwareDevelopment.pdf. This paper describes Strategic Data Systems’ experience with agile software development, and demonstrates the advantages an organization may gain through implementing a similar development process. Ideas about the process of developing software have been around almost as long as software itself. This method has been around since the earliest days of software development and is the method generally encouraged in undergraduate schools across the country. Management often encourages ad hoc software development in an attempt to get products finished quickly. A typical programmer will introduce 100 defects per thousand lines of code written using the ad hoc development process.1 An undisciplined approach to software development has three primary problems. As will be shown later, an advantage of agile software development is that it is a “lightweight” approach. The traditional waterfall software development methodology was introduced to curb the problems of the code-and-fix method. The waterfall approach has become the basis of most software development models adopted in the industry. Studies have shown that a good software development process can greatly increase the quality of the software produced. Agile processes allow for changing requirements throughout the development cycle and stress collaboration between software developers and customers. In developing an agile software development process, one must consider two important ramifications of managing an ever-changing ...


The science concerned with putting scientific knowledge to practical use.http://www.panl10n.net/Presentations/Software_Engineering.pdf. The science concerned with putting computer science knowledge to practical use. The application of a systematic, disciplined, quantifiable approach to the development, operation, and maintenance of software; that is, the application of engineering to software. The study of approaches as in 1. Project – the task at hand People – by whom it is done Process – the manner it is done Product – the artifacts produced 10 Challenge is to balance these requirements. Do not turn into product Rapid prototyping may replace specification phase—never the design phase Comparison: – Waterfall model—try to get it right first time Smaller capital outlay, rapid return on investment Need open architecture—maintenance implications Variations used in object-oriented life cycle 21 More risky version—pieces may not fit Somewhat controversial new approach Stories (features client wants) Estimate duration and cost of each story Select stories for next build Each build is divided into tasks Test cases for task are drawn up first Pair programming Continuous integration of tasks 25 Microsoft’s life-cycle model Requirements analysis—interview potential customers Draw up specifications Divide project into 3 or 4 builds Each build is carried out by small teams working in parallel 30 Synchronize-and Stabilize Model (contd) At the end of the day—synchronize (test and debug) At the end of the build—stabilize (freeze build) Components always work together – Get early insights into operation of product 31


USM has elected to follow the recommendations outlined in NACUBO Advisory 99-7 and adopt the provisions of SOP 98-1 “Accounting for the Costs of Computer Software Developed or Obtained for Internal Use”.http://www.fincsvc.umaryland.edu/images/Accounting-for-computer-Software.pdf. NACUBO has reviewed certain accountability issues pertaining to the recognition and measurement of costs associated with developing or acquiring computer software intended for internal use. SOP 98-1 provides guidance on accounting by all nongovernmental entities, including not-for-profit organizations, for the costs of computer software developed or obtained for internal use and provides guidance for determining whether computer software is for internal use. The adoption of SOP 98-1 will provide industry wide comparability in the area of account for the costs of computer software developed or obtained for internal use. The adoption will also provide interim guidance to public not-for-profit higher education institutions that desire to capitalize the costs of computer software developed or obtained for internal use and want to be consistent and comparable within the industry. Internally Developed Computer Software for Internal Use must have the following characteristics: The software is developed internally or modified solely to meet the entity’s internal needs. During the software’s development or modification, no substantive plan exists or is being developed to market it externally.


In December 2001, the Software Protection Initiative (SPI) was established to prevent the unauthorized distribution and exploitation of national security application software by our adversaries.http://www.preemptive.com/documentation/SPI_software_Protection_Initative.pdf. To achieve this, the SPI has several goals, which are to institutionalize software protection within the software development life-cycle, educate and train the community, develop user-friendly protection techniques, and ensure that protection technology and policy are appropriately applied, balancing mission requirements with security. The focus of the SPI is to improve protections for critical scientific, engineering, and modeling and simulation software running on desktops through supercomputers. Software application security (Software Protection) will become another tool in the Information Assurance toolbox that can be used to protect and defend our information resources on multiple fronts. The wide spread availability of powerful computing technology, in conjunction with the realization that DoD software has tremendous intellectual property value, mandates stronger protection of application software. Another motivation for protecting software springs from the significant investment in software that has been made over the past three decades. Some examples of critical application software that are credited for helping to achieve this technological advantage include electromagnetic modeling software for radar signature predictions such as those within the EMCC, signal and image processing software for sonar and radar, fluid dynamics software for SPI is not simply another approach to improve network security, operating ...


“Effective software process improvement will not start until management insists that product development work be planned and properly managed (Ref.http://www.qsm.com/distributededit99.pdf. This becomes even more challenging in an increasing number of major system developments made up from distributed sub-system software projects. Normally this involves building on a large existing software base made up of the existing sub-systems that are then modified and extended to engineer the new release. new software but also due to latent defects in the existing code. Substantial regression tests must be run to checkout the existing software base that may amount to millions of lines of code. Agreeing and controlling the software baseline 4. These four phases comprise 1) Feasibility and Architecture, 2) Specification and High Level Design, 3) Main Software Development, 4) Factory Test and Pilot operation. This data (at its most basic for the main software development) comprises the size, time and effort for phase 3 of the completed sub-systems and releases (Ref. MANAGING MAJOR DISTRIBUTED SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT Tracking the sub-system defect behaviour reveals the contribution that factors such as time pressure and software size make to the defects found in each sub-system and later during the release integration and validation tests. 1) software process improvement depends on product development being planned and properly managed. In practice the management techniques outlined here form part of a software control office. He has over 30 years experience in software engineering, with a particular interest in management methods used by development and purchasing organisations ...


In the 21st century software is pervasive, the software industry has become one of the largest industries on the planet, and many of today’s most successful companies are organizations built around the production of software and related services.http://www.softmetaware.com/mdsd-and-isad.pdf. This article investigates the root causes of escalating software development costs, and presents an overview of an emerging paradigm for industrialized software development. Software is a critical part in the "engine room" of all technology-based and many service-based industries today. High software development costs have a huge economic impact, and poorly designed software that restrains user productivity possibly has an even larger impact. It is easy to overlook the fact that software development productivity varies by as much as an order of magnitude between organizations, and that off-shoring consequently is not always the best option for cost reduction in terms of achievable gains and risk exposure. The 90s were dominated by two major paradigms for software development: in the early 90s the concept of Computer Aided Software Engineering (CASE) and 4GLs made their appearance, and in the second half of the decade Object-Orientation made it into the mainstream. In parallel with advances in software development tools, there has been a major shift in software development methodologies. For development of more mundane business application software, any process that involves a high degree of ceremony is incompatible with the push of the markets for lower software development costs. An agile method such as Extreme Programming (XP) alone does not provide sufficient ...


The Certified Software Tester Program (CST) is appropriate for individuals who want to enter the testing field or experienced Quality Assurance/Tester professionals seeking certification.http://www.software-testing.com/CSTFactSheet.pdf. The program focuses on the concepts and application of the essential testing principles that are required to perform industry standard quality assurance practices The purpose of the program is to provide the pertinent knowledge and skills for effective Quality Assurance testing in the client/server and web environments and, to Topics include such areas as test case execution on GUI and Web applications; documenting and controlling testing activities with requirements trace ability matrices, test plans, test procedures and test cases; configuration and management of online defect tracking applications, categorizing, tracking and documenting software errors and, Qualified software managers, consultants, and software engineers teach the classes. Quality Assurance Analysts, Testers, or leads that are updating their testing skills and need to enhance managerial skills Anyone interested in improving the quality and maintainability of their software Basic computer skills, capability to access and navigate the Internet, familiarity with executing software applications, previous exposure to client/server, web, and email concepts and familiarity with the Windows environment. This module describes issues and terminology related to tracking software changes. In addition, it explores why managing software changes is a critical part of the systems development and quality assurance functions. This module provides the history and fundamentals of testing ...


If software requirements are not right, companies will not end up with the software they need.http://www.westfallteam.com/Papers/The_Why_What_Who_When_and_How_Of_Software_Requirements.pdf. How: Techniques for eliciting, analyzing, specifying, and validating software requirements WHAT Requirements must be determined and agreed to by the customers, users, and suppliers of a software product before the software can be built. The requirements define the “what” of a software product: What the software must do to add value for its stakeholders. What limitations there are on the choices that developers have when implementing the software. Business requirements define the business problems to be solved or the business opportunities to be addressed by the software product. The software product must adhere to these rules in order to function appropriately within the user’s domain. A quality attribute may translate into product-level functional requirements for the software that specify what functionality must exist to meet the nonfunctional attribute. There are many issues that can have a negative impact on software development projects and products if practitioners don’t do a good job of defining their software requirements. Stakeholders are individuals who affect or are affected by the software product and therefore have some level of influence over the requirements for that software product. If the software is part of a larger system, hardware designers and developers may also be interested in the software requirements. The testers use the requirements as a basis for creating test cases that they use to execute the software under specific, known conditions to detect defects and provide confidence that the ...


This document provides an introductory overview of the topic of software configuration management (SCM).http://www.fra.dot.gov/downloads/safety/software_config_06.pdf. An SMCP is a plan designed to ensure that the proper and correct version of software for each specific site and location on the railroad is documented and maintained throughout the life-cycle of the system. This document is intended to introduce the topic of software configuration management to personnel who may have never previously been involved with that subject or process. CHANGE REQUEST (CR) FORM - A vehicle used to report deficiencies or enhancements generated against CIs or technical data; a document that requests a correction or change to the baseline documentation and software. COMPUTER SOFTWARE (or SOFTWARE) - A combination of associated computer instructions and computer data definitions required to enable the computer hardware to perform computational or control functions. DEVELOPMENTAL CONFIGURATION - The software and associated technical documentation that define the evolving configuration of a CSCI during development. It is under the development contractor's or procuring organization's configuration control and describes the software design and implementation. Software units may occur at different levels of a hierarchy and may consist of other software units. Software Configuration Management (SCM) is defined as a process for establishing and maintaining consistency of a software product’s performance, and functional and physical attributes with its requirements, design, and operational information throughout its life. Developers and maintainers need to ensure that the support software is available for ...


Computer Software Engineers, Systems apply the principles and techniques of computer science, engineering, and mathematical analysis to the design, development, testing, and evaluation of the software and systems that enable computers to perform their many applications.http://www.calmis.ca.gov/file/manuf/mfg-computer-software-engineers-system-software.pdf. Systems Software Engineers working in applications or systems development analyze users’ needs and design, create, and modify general computer systems. Engineers can be involved in the design and development of many types of software including software for operating systems, network distribution, and compilers, which convert programs for faster processing. In programming, or coding, Systems Software Engineers instruct a computer, line by line, how to perform a function. Systems Software Engineers coordinate the construction and maintenance of a company’s computer systems, and plan their future growth. In addition, they often work as part of a team that designs new hardware, software, and systems. Consult with engineering staff to evaluate interface between hardware and software, develop specifications and performance requirements and resolve customer problems. Modify existing software to correct errors, to adapt it to new hardware or to upgrade interfaces and improve performance. Design and develop software systems, using scientific analysis and mathematical models to predict and measure outcome and consequences of design. Develop and direct software system testing and validation procedures. Direct software programming and development of documentation. Computer Software Engineers, Systems Software Engineers, Systems Software Consult with customers and/or ...


Do Software is playing an increasingly important role in manufacturing.http://www.axiomaticdesign.com/technology/papers/CIRP_AD_of_Software.pdf. Many manufacturing firms have problems with software development. Industrial firms are under pressure to shorten the lead-time required in introducing new software, increase the reliability of their software, and increase their market share. Keywords: software, axiomatic, design 1 INTRODUCTION Software and computers are playing central roles in manufacturing. At the same time, the development of software can be the bottleneck in development of machines and systems, since current industrial software development is full of uncertainties, especially when new products are designed. Software is designed and implemented by making prototypes based on experience of software engineers. The final design of software is represented by a flow chart that represents the entire system architecture of the software, which can aid software programmers. It overcomes many of the shortcomings of the current software design techniques which result in high maintenance cost, limited reusability, extensive need to debug and test, poor documentation, and limited extensionality of the software. A ‘V model for software’ shown in Fig. 1 will be used here to explain the concept of axiomatic design of object-oriented software systems (ADo-oSS). The first step is to design the software following the top-down approach of axiomatic design, build the software hierarchy, and then generate the full design matrix (i.e., design matrix that shows the entire design hierarchy) to define modules. Software System (The V model) Axiomatic design of software can be implemented using any ...