In 2005 Automotive SPICE (based on ISO 15504) has been published (see ) and used in major automotive firms world wide. In parallel the topic ‘Functional Safety’ became important due to changes in liability law and the development of IEC 61508 as an application and branch independent standard for functional safety. As a result, ISO WD 26262 a ISO draft for functional safety has been initiated classifying systems with ASIL (automotive safety integrity levels) levels and requiring additional processes, techniques, and methods to illustrate the competence for managing systems that have an impact on the loss of lives. An Automotive SPICE assessment usually takes (for the processes defined in the scope of the German automotive manufacturing association) 4 days per project. Adding the scope of a safety assessment this dramatically increases the number of hours used in assessments. In a working group of major automotive suppliers and assessment tool suppliers, we developed from 2005 to 2009 an integrated assessment approach. Portals in the above-mentioned automotive suppliers already use this environment. The working group that elaborated the methods and tools described in this paper are part of the SOQRATES initiative () where more than 20 leading German firms collaborate in cross-company task forces. In this paper, we want to explain the results of the analysis done, the assessment model applied, and what kind of reports the integrated assessment environment is producing. The results of all work (except of the proprietary assessment tools) will be made public to all suppliers in 2009. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Researchers in the field of software process seem to have an interesting relationship with managers and the management of software projects. Clearly managers make many of the decisions on the project. These decisions deal directly with the planning, execution, and control of development activities which have a significant impact on the process. Yet, how much research in the process area is focused on management, or management decisions and their impact? In this special journal issue, we have selected three papers which deal with software project management at different levels and from different perspectives. In the first paper titled, “Benefits of Global Software Development: Exploring the Unexplored”, the authors, Conchúir et al. address the increasingly common paradigm of globally distributed software development (GSD) projects. This paper takes a managerial view of the costs and benefits associated with GSD projects and provides insight into less commonly recognized benefits and costs. The paper makes distinctions among these costs and benefits as “referred” or “inferred” and categorizes them into (1) organizational, (2) team and (3) process/task related issues. The insights are based on qualitative case study information. The second paper titled, “Accurate Estimates Without Local Data?” continues the theme of addressing management level issues by dealing with the important topic of project cost estimation. Providing good cost estimates is a key software project management responsibility that is critical not only to support bids made to external customers, but also to justify resource requirements to internal project sponsors. This work by Menzies et al. continues the quest to obtain better quantitative cost estimates faster. The authors use machine learning tools to show that in many cases, tuning COCOMO models using detailed, hard-to-collect “internal tuning data” does not substantially reduce variation in cost estimation results. Project managers are better off using “project tuning data” to reduce estimate variance in most cases. The authors have based their findings on 10 case studies. In the final paper titled, “Quantitative Defects Management in Iterative Development with BiDefect”, authors Gou et al. also address an important management function which is to manage and control project quality and defects. The authors present a quantitative approach for managing defects when an iterative development methodology is used. The authors site three major challenges associated with managing defects quantitatively with the iterative development paradigm. The challenges are (1) identifying appropriate “control points” in each iteration, (2) selecting appropriate measures and corresponding measurement methods, and (3) determining the optimal amount of effort for performing testing and defect fixing activities. The authors show how the BiDefect approach and models correct these problems. The approach has been applied at a leading Chinese telecommunication firm. Results from the case study are reported. The three articles presented in this issue were based on papers that were selected as being among the best papers of the 2008 International Conference on Software Process (ICSP) held in Leipzig, Germany in May of 2008. All of the papers went through an additional reviewing process and were significantly expanded from their original conference versions. The acceptance rate for these papers was under 8%.

Abstract In this article, we describe the implementation of an assessment method that was developed to assess software processes within small to medium‐sized Irish software organisations that have little or no experience of software process improvement (SPI) programmes. We discuss the actual overheads associated with performing software process assessments based upon our experiences of performing assessments in three small to medium‐sized (SMEs) software development companies. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Abstract Models of software projects input project details and output predictions via their internal tunings. The output predictions, therefore, are affected by variance in the project details P and variance in the internal tunings T. Local data is often used to constrain the internal tunings (reducing T).While constraining internal tunings with local data is always the preferred option, there exist some models for which constraining tuning is optional. We show empirically that, for the USC COCOMO family of models, the effects of P dominate the effects of T i.e. the output variance of these models can be controlled without using local data to constrain the tuning variance (in ten case studies, we show that the estimates generated by only constraining P are very similar to those produced by constraining T with historical data).We conclude that, if possible, models should be designed such that the effects of the project options dominate the effects of the tuning options. Such models can be used for the purposes of decision making without elaborate, tedious, and time‐consuming data collection from the local domain. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Abstract In this article we describe how a lightweight assessment method was developed to educate Irish software small‐ to medium‐sized enterprises (SMEs)1 in relation to becoming automotive software suppliers. The main goal of this assessment method is to provide software SMEs with a software process improvement (SPI) path to becoming automotive software suppliers. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Abstract During the last decades, software process and product improvement (SPI) has been recognized as a usable possibility to increase the quality of software development. Recently, more attention has been focused on the costs of SPI as well as on the cost‐effectiveness and productivity of software development.This study defines the concepts and principles of a value‐based approach, which is an outcome of the economic‐driven discussion related to software engineering. Defined concepts, principles, and processes are based mostly on value engineering (VE) and are justified in earlier discussions. Therefore, this study assumes that this discussion has given a theoretically justified evolutionary plateau for using value assessment in practice.The main purpose of this study is to collect details of experiences on whether the value assessment for products support value‐based approach and whether the value assessment works and is useful in industrial context. This is done by implementing value assessment in a case company step by step to see which phases possibly work and which phases possibly do not work.The practical industrial case and research results show that proposed value assessment for products is useful and supports the meaningfulness of a value‐based approach. It also demonstrates the strengths and weaknesses of using it and what all should be taken into consideration when implementing it. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Most studies of software outsourcing focus on how to manage outsourcing from the perspective of the outsourcer. There are few studies of outsourcing presented from the viewpoint of the supplier. Given that more and more Chinese software companies are getting software outsourcing subcontracts from all over the world, it is important to understand how software outsourcing projects are actually performed in China, and to identify ways in which performance might be improved. Our study first collected data through a questionnaire-based survey from 53 finished projects in 41 Chinese software suppliers. A follow-up study was performed by telephone interviews with 11 participants, to find explanations for phenomena revealed by the preceding survey. The results show that: (a) differences in natural languages are not a real obstacle for Chinese software suppliers; (b) e-mail is most used to discuss issues related to development, while face-to-face meetings are mainly used to discuss issues related to management and requirements; and (c) the two main reasons for overtime work at the Chinese suppliers are changes to the design or requirements that are proposed by the outsourcers and the suppliers' initial underestimation of the effort required. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Abstract We have conducted an empirical study with 23 Vietnamese software practitioners to determine Software Process Improvement (SPI) demotivators. We have compared the demotivators identified by the Vietnamese practitioners with the demotivators identified by UK practitioners. The main objective of this study is to provide SPI managers with insight into the nature of factors that can hinder the success of a SPI program, so that SPI managers can better manage those demotivators to maximize practitioners' support for an SPI program.We used face‐to‐face questionnaire‐based survey sessions for gathering data. We also asked the participants to rank each identified SPI demotivator on a five‐point scale (high, medium, low, zero or do not know) to determine the perceived importance of each demotivator. From this, we proposed the notion of ‘perceived value’ associated with each identified demotivator.Our findings identify the ‘high’ and ‘medium’ perceived value demotivators that can undermine SPI initiatives. The findings also show that there are differences in SPI demotivators across practitioners' groups (i.e., developers and managers) and across organisational sizes (i.e. large and small‐to‐medium). Moreover, our results reveal the similarities and differences between SPI demotivators as perceived by practitioners in Vietnam and the United Kingdom. The findings are expected to provide SPI managers with insight to design and implement suitable strategies to deal with the identified SPI demotivators. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA) is having a major impact on the development of software systems because of its potential for increased business agility, adaptability of applications, interopera...

Abstract The use of Commercial Off‐The‐Shelf (COTS) products in the software development process requires the evaluation of existing COTS products, and then selecting the one that best fits system requirements. In this process, it is inevitable to encounter mismatches between COTS features and system requirements. Mismatches occur as a result of an excess or shortage of COTS capabilities. Many of these mismatches are resolved after selecting a COTS product. Existing COTS‐selection approaches fail to properly consider these mismatches. This article presents MiHOS (Mismatch Handling for COTS Selection), an approach that aims at addressing mismatches while considering limited resources. MiHOS can be integrated with existing COTS‐selection methods at two points: (i)When evaluating COTS candidates in order to estimate the anticipated fitness of the candidates if their mismatches are resolved. This helps to base our COTS‐selection decisions on the fitness that the COTS candidates will eventually have if selected. (ii) After selecting a COTS product in order to plan the resolution of the most appropriate mismatches using suitable actions, such that the most important risk, technical, and resource constraints are met. A case study from the e‐services domain is used to illustrate the method and to discuss its added value. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.