The IT community has always struggled with questions concerning the value of an organization’s investment in software and hardware. It is the goal of value-based software engineering (VBSE) to develop models and measures of value which are of use for managers, developers and users as they make tradeoff decisions between, for example, quality and cost or functionality and schedule – such decisions must be economically feasible and comprehensible to the stakeholders with differing value perspectives. VBSE has its roots in work on software engineering economics, pioneered by Barry Boehm in the early 1980s. However, the emergence of a wider scope that defines VBSE is more recent. VBSE extends the merely technical ISO software engineering definition with elements not only from economics, but also from cognitive science, finance, management science, behavioural sciences, and decision sciences, giving rise to a truly multi-disciplinary framework. Biffl and his co-editors invited leading researchers and structured their contributions into three parts, following an introduction into the area by Boehm himself. They first detail the foundations of VBSE, followed by a presentation of state-of-the-art methods and techniques. The third part demonstrates the benefits of VBSE through concrete examples and case studies. This book deviates from the more anecdotal style of many management-oriented software engineering books and so appeals particularly to all readers who are interested in solid foundations for high-level aspects of software engineering decision making, i.e. to product or project managers driven by economics and to software engineering researchers and students.
Author(s): Stefan Biffl, Aybuke Aurum, Barry Boehm, Hakan Erdogmus, Paul Grünbacher
Edition: 1
Publisher: Springer
Year: 2005
Language: English
Pages: 411
Table of Contents......Page 16
Foreword......Page 6
Preface......Page 10
List of Contributors......Page 20
Part 1 Foundations and Frameworks......Page 24
1.1 Overview and Rationale......Page 26
1.2 Background and Agenda......Page 30
1.3 A Global Road Map for Realizing VBSE Benefits......Page 33
1.4 Summary and Conclusions......Page 34
2.1 Introduction......Page 38
2.2 A "4+1" Theory of Value-Based Software Engineering......Page 41
2.3 Using and Testing the VBSE Theory: Process Framework and Example......Page 46
2.4 VBSE Theory Evaluation......Page 54
2.5 Conclusions and Areas for Further Research......Page 56
3.1 Introduction......Page 62
3.2 Issues in Valuation......Page 63
3.3 Valuation of Uncertain Projects with Decision Trees......Page 68
3.4 Real Options Theory......Page 75
3.5 Summary and Discussion......Page 83
4.1 Introduction......Page 90
4.2 Decisions with Multiple Criteria and Software Engineering......Page 92
4.3 Multicriteria Decision Methods......Page 94
4.4 Incomplete Information and Sensitivity Analysis......Page 105
4.5 Summary and Conclusions......Page 107
5.1 Introduction......Page 114
5.3 The Time Value of Money......Page 115
5.4 Financial Risk......Page 117
5.5 Prediction and the Value of the Firm......Page 118
5.7 The Economic Cost of Extended Time-to-Market......Page 119
5.8 Financial Risk and Software Projects......Page 120
5.9 Predictability and Process Improvement......Page 122
5.10 Arriving at a Risk Premium for Software Projects......Page 123
5.11 Computing the Financial Value of Improved Predictability......Page 124
5.12 An Illustrative Example......Page 125
5.13 Conclusions......Page 126
Part 2 Practices......Page 130
6.1 Benefits Realization Analysis......Page 132
6.2 Stakeholder Value Proposition Elicitation and Reconciliation......Page 134
6.3 Business Case Analysis......Page 136
6.4 Continuous Risk and Opportunity Management......Page 137
6.5 Concurrent System and Software Engineering......Page 140
6.6 Value-Based Monitoring and Control......Page 142
6.7 Change as Opportunity......Page 145
6.8 Integrating Ethical Considerations into Software Engineering Practice......Page 147
6.9 Getting Started Toward VBSE......Page 151
7.1 Introduction......Page 156
7.2 Negotiation Challenges......Page 157
7.3 The EasyWinWin Requirements Negotiation Support......Page 161
7.4 Possible Extensions to the EasyWinWin Approach......Page 170
7.5 Conclusions......Page 174
8.1 Introduction......Page 178
8.2 Models of Measurement and Decision Making......Page 179
8.3 Decision Making Behavior......Page 185
8.4 Decision Making Behavior in Groups......Page 189
8.5 Measurement and Analysis for Decision Making......Page 190
8.6 Decision Support in a VBSE Framework......Page 193
8.7 Conclusion......Page 196
9.1 Introduction......Page 202
9.2 Background......Page 204
9.3 Research Approach......Page 208
9.4 Survey Results and Analysis......Page 212
9.5 Conclusions and Further Work......Page 219
10.1 Introduction......Page 224
10.2 Usability Testing......Page 226
10.3 Collaboration Tools and Techniques for Usability Testing......Page 228
10.4 Research Approach......Page 231
10.5 The e-CUP process......Page 233
10.6 Application of e-CUP......Page 236
10.7 Conclusion......Page 240
11.1 Introduction......Page 248
11.2 Taking a Value-Based Perspective on Testing......Page 249
11.3 Practices Supporting Value-Based Testing......Page 256
11.4 A Framework for Value-Based Test Management......Page 259
11.5 Conclusion and Outlook......Page 264
Part 3 Applications......Page 268
12.1 Introduction......Page 270
12.2 Background......Page 271
12.3 Value-Based Release Planning......Page 274
12.4 Example......Page 278
12.5 Conclusions and Future Work......Page 281
13.1 Introduction......Page 286
13.2 Software Process Simulation......Page 289
13.3 SPS-Based Risk Analysis Procedure......Page 292
13.4 Case Example......Page 294
13.5 Discussion and Future Work......Page 301
14.1 Introduction......Page 310
14.2 Video-on-Demand Case Study......Page 313
14.3 Testing-Based Trace Analysis......Page 316
14.4 Trace Analysis through Commonality......Page 322
14.5 The Tailorable Factors......Page 325
14.6 Conclusions......Page 329
15.1 Introduction......Page 332
15.2 Managing Knowledge......Page 333
15.3 Example: Postmortem Review and Process Workshop......Page 336
15.4 Discussion......Page 341
15.5 Conclusion and Further Work......Page 345
16.1 Introduction......Page 350
16.2 Background......Page 352
16.3 Applications......Page 353
16.4 Impact Assessment Methodology......Page 358
16.5 Results......Page 361
16.7 Discussion......Page 364
17.1 Introduction......Page 368
17.2 Software Intellectual Property Protection Mechanisms......Page 369
17.3 Licensing......Page 372
17.4 Valuation Process......Page 373
17.5 Valuation Framework for Intellectual Property......Page 379
17.7 Future Shock......Page 386
17.8 Summary and Conclusions......Page 387
B......Page 390
C......Page 391
D......Page 392
F......Page 394
I......Page 395
N......Page 396
P......Page 397
R......Page 398
S......Page 399
T......Page 400
V......Page 401
List of Figures......Page 404
List of Tables......Page 406
D......Page 408
R......Page 409
V......Page 410
W......Page 411
