Reference Library Practice: A Generic View
	This page provides access to a variety of downloadable papers that address generic practice issues. The following topics are considered: General Practice Roadmaps General Agent-Oriented Software Engineering [PDF] Nicholas R. Jennings and Michael Wooldridge Agent-oriented techniques represent an exciting new means of analyzing, designing and building complex software systems. Yet, to date, there have been few serious attempts to cast agent systems as a software engineering paradigm. This paper seeks to rectify this omission. Specifically, it will be argued that: (i) the conceptual apparatus of agent-oriented systems is well-suited to building software solutions or complex systems and (ii) agent-oriented approaches represent a genuine advance over the current state of the art for engineering complex systems. Following on from this view, the major issues raised by adopting an agent-oriented approach to software engineering are highlighted and discussed. A Mature Profession of Software Engineering [PDF] Gary Ford and Norman E. Gibbs This report contains three chapters with examples of characteristics of common professions to predict how the comparable characteristics of the software engineering profession might evolve. First the report defines a profession and models a profession. Then the report will explore the model by examining it in context of the common professions. Finally the report uses the model to characterize the software engineering profession. An Integrated Processes/Product Component Model for Software Engineering [PDF] Scott Hawker The topics for this slide presentation include: components and software engineering today, integrate three architectures (product, process and organization), focus on product, focus on process, component package = product + process, reuse business, and component package = product + process + history + metrics. Architecture - Based Development [PDF] Len Bass and Rick Kazman This report describes an architecture-centric system development. Architectural requirements, design of the architecture, documenting the architecture, analyzing the architecture, realizing the architecture and maintaining the architecture are discussed. Architecture - Based Software Engineering [PDF] Judith A. Stafford and Alexander L. Wolf This paper discusses the formalization of architectural specification and reviews several languages developed for architectural specification. This paper then discusses architectural analysis techniques and also new concepts in software architecture. e-Science Experiences: Software Engineering Practices and the EU DataGrid [PDF] Lee Momtahan and Andrew Martin The conduct of collaborative scientific study mediated by the internet - e-Science - is giving rise to a new type of large distributed software project. This paper reports initial experiences of one such project: the European DataGrid. The authors record some observations about the intended lifecycle and process, compared with actual practice. The paper explores the applicability of current software development practices from the academic, commercial, and open source sectors in the context of such Grid projects. High - Pressure Steam Engines and Computer Software [HTML] Nancy G. Leveson The introduction of computers into the control of potentially dangerous devices has led to a growing awareness of the possible contribution of software to serious accidents. The number of computer-related accidents so far has been small due to the restraint that has been shown in introducing them into safety- critical control loops. However, as the economic and technological benefits of using computers become more widely accepted, their use is increasing dramatically. We need to ensure that computers are introduced into safety-critical systems in the most responsible way possible and at a speed that does not expose people to undue risk. Improving Software Engineering Practice with HCI Aspects [PDF] Xavier Ferre and Ana M. Moreno Techniques from HCI have been used for the development of usable software products for a long time, but their use is often not integrated with software engineering practices. This paper describes an approach for bridging the gap between software engineering and HCI, by offering orientation to software practitioners on the application of HCI techniques and activities. For this purpose, the authors have carried out a survey in HCI literature to define the activities in a user-centered development process, and to select the HCI techniques that are more appropriate for integration into software engineering practice. Back to the top Practice Roadmaps Developing a Roadmap for Software Internationalization [PDF] Ernie Huang, Richard Haft and Jacob Hsu The focus of this white paper will be on internationalization and developing a roadmap towards preparing your product for international markets. The purpose of this paper is not to provide the actual roadmap, but rather to raise issues to consider as you develop your own roadmap. A product that has been properly internationalized, that is reengineered to support multiple locales, will be more easily localized. Empirical Studies of Software Engineering: A Roadmap [PDF] Dewayne E. Perry, Adam A. Porter and Lawrence G. Votta This article summarizes the strengths and weaknesses of empirical research in software engineering. The authors argue that in order to improve the current situation we must create better studies and draw more credible interpretations from them. The article finally presents a roadmap for this improvement, which includes a general structure for software empirical studies and concrete steps for achieving these goals: designing better studies, collecting data more effectively, and involving others in empirical enterprises. Requirements Engineering: A Roadmap [PDF] Bashar Nuseibeh and Steve Easterbrook This paper presents an overview of the field of software systems requirements engineering (RE). It describes the main areas of RE practice, and highlights some key open research issues for the future. Reverse Engineering: A Roadmap [PDF] Hausi A. Müller, Jens H. Jahnke, Dennis B. Smith, Margaret-Anne Storey, Scott R. Tilley and Kenny Wong This paper presents a roadmap for reverse engineering research for the first decade of the new millennium, building on the program comprehension theories of the 1980s and the reverse engineering technology of the 1990s. Software Analysis: A Roadmap [PDF] Daniel Jackson and Martin Rinard This paper describes the challenges of software analysis by presenting a series of dichotomies. Each gives a spectrum on which any particular analysis can be placed; together, they give some structure to the space of possible analyses. The authors argue that in the future analyses will be model-driven, namely centered on abstract models of behavior; modular and incremental, to enable analysis of components, and of systems before completion; and focused and partial, rather than uniform, paying closer attention to properties that matter most and to the parts of the software that affect those properties. Software Architecture: A Roadmap [PDF] David Garlan Over the past decade software architecture has received increasing attention as an important subfield of software engineering. During that time there has been considerable progress in developing the technological and methodological base for treating architectural design as an engineering discipline. This paper examines some of the important trends of software architecture in research and practice, and speculates on the important emerging trends, challenges, and aspirations. Software Configuration Management: A Roadmap [PDF] Jacky Estublier This paper, in the first chapter summarizes the state of the art in SCM, showing the evolution along the last 25 years. Chapter 2 shows the current issues and current research work under way in the area. In chapter 3, the challenges SCM has to take up, as well as SCM future research are discussed. Software Economics: A Roadmap [PDF] Barry W. Boehm and Kevin J. Sullivan Software economics is the field that seeks to enable significant improvements in software design and engineering through economic reasoning about product, process, program, and portfolio and policy issues. This paper summarizes the state of the art and identifies shortfalls in existing knowledge. The authors present a roadmap for research emphasizing the need for a strategic investment approach to software engineering. The paper then discusses how software economics can lead to fundamental improvements in software design and engineering, in theory and practice Software Engineering: A Roadmap [PDF] Anthony Finkelstein and Jeff Kramer This paper provides a roadmap for software engineering. It identifies the principal research challenges being faced by the discipline and brings together the threads derived from the key research specializations within software engineering. The paper draws heavily on the roadmaps covering specific areas of software engineering research collected in this volume. Software Engineering and the Internet: A Roadmap [PDF] Luca Bompani, Paolo Ciancarini and Fabio Vitali This paper argues that a roadmap for software engineering and the Internet currently should be based on standards for complex data and document structures, like the Extensible Markup Language (XML). This paper describes shortly the state of the art of these new standards, and how we are using the concept of declaratively active document for software engineering purposes. Software Engineering Education: A Roadmap [PDF] Mary Shaw Software's increasingly critical role in systems of widespread significance presents new challenges for the education of software engineers. Not only is our dependence on software increasing, but the character of software production is itself changing - and with it the demands on the software developers. Four challenges for educators of software developers help identify aspirations for software engineering education. Software Engineering for Mobility: A Roadmap [PDF] Gruia-Catalin Roman, Gian Pietro Picco and Amy L. Murphy The network structure is no longer fixed, nodes may come and go, processes may move among nodes, and even programs (the code executed by processes) may evolve and change structure. The challenges and opportunities associated with this computational melee form the main subject of this paper. The authors seek to sort out this chaotic form of computing by focusing their attention on the formulation of a simple framework for viewing mobility, on precise definition of terms, and on research issues mobility poses for the software engineering community. Software Engineering for Real-Time: A Roadmap [PDF] Hermann Kopetz The next ten years will see distributed real-time computer systems replacing many mechanical and hydraulic control systems in high-dependability applications. In these applications a failure in the temporal domain can be as critical as a failure in the value domain. This paper discusses some of the technology trends that explain why distributed embedded real-time systems for high dependability applications will move into the mainstream. It then investigates the new requirements that must be addressed by the software engineering process. Software Engineering for Security: a Roadmap [PDF] Premkumar T. Devanbu and Stuart Stubblebine Almost every software controlled system faces threats from potential adversaries, from Internet-aware client applications running on PCs, to complex telecommunications and power systems accessible over the Internet, to commodity software with copy protection mechanisms. Software engineers must be cognizant of these threats and engineer systems with credible defenses, while still delivering value to customers. This paper presents perspectives on the research issues that arise in the interactions between software engineering and security. Software Metrics: Roadmap [PDF] Norman E. Fenton and Martin Neil Good support for decision-making implies support for risk assessment and reduction. Yet traditional metrics approaches, often driven by regression- based models for cost estimation and defects prediction, provide little support for managers wishing to use measurement to analyze and minimize risk. The authors recommended approach is to handle the key factors largely missing from the usual metrics approaches, namely: causality, uncertainty, and combining different (often subjective) evidence. Software Reliability and Dependability: a Roadmap [PDF] Bev Littlewood and Lorenzo Strigini This paper outlines the specific difficulties in applying a sound engineering approach to software reliability engineering, some of the current trends and problems and a set of issues that we therefore see as important in an agenda for research in software dependability. Testing: A Roadmap [PDF] Mary Jean Harrold Studies indicate that more than fifty percent of the cost of software development is devoted to testing, with the percentage for testing critical software being even higher. Unless we can find efficient ways to perform effective testing, the percentage of development costs devoted to testing will increase significantly. This report briefly assesses the state of the art in software testing, outlines some future directions in software testing, and gives some pointers to software testing resources. Back to the top