Context: Ethics have broad applications in different fields of study and different contexts. Like other fields of study, ethics have a significant impact on the decisions made in computing concerning software artifact production and its processes. Hence, in this research, ethics is considered in the context of requirements engineering during the software development process. Objective: The aim of this paper is to discuss the investigation results regarding ethical problems of requirements engineering processes by taking sample software developing companies and exposing existing research gaps. Method: This research uses interviewing, focus group discussions, purposive sampling, and qualitative analysis research methods. Result: This research finds an absence of industry practices, professional responsibility code of conduct standards, and other guidelines within companies when integrating ethical concerns of software during requirements engineering. It also indicates that almost all companies have no identification methods and checking mechanisms for ethical concern considerations. Furthermore, the major identified ethical concerns are classified into six categories as requirements identification problems, quality-related problems, carrying out unpermitted activities, unwillingness to give requirements, knowledge gaps and lack of legal grounds/rules for accountability. Conclusion: From the findings of this research, it can be concluded that, in the case software companies, there is no specific method for identifying ethical concerns. Additionally, there are no standards and guidelines used within the companies. This implies the need to overcome the existing and emerging ethical issues of requirements engineering.

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Abstract-Developing quality software product is a challenging activity and yet necessary asset for most software companies especially small and medium size companies. For a Software process improvement (SPI) activity to be effective in such companies, the day to day product-focused activities needs to align with SPI activity.Different process maturity models have been developed, among them the Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMI) is the most widely used process maturity framework. However, it is considered difficult to implement for small and medium companies due to various reasons related with its difficulty and financial requirement. On the other hand, the recent software development approach is being directed towards application of agile software development methodologies. But some difficulties have also been reported regarding agile methods limitations of long term and continues guide to process improvement.Researches findings and experience reports demonstrated that, combination of agile methods and CMMI has advantages where most of which can be considered as a solution to problems associated with implementing process maturity activities in immature companies.Index Terms-Integrated framework, CMMI and agile methods, institutionalization. I. INTRODUCTIONThe design and development of software is still the most challenging and complex process; where most products suffer from un-attained requirements and fail to maintain the expected quality. Many problems are attributed to failure of software products. Regardless of how it is explained, the set of problems that are encountered in the development of computer software is not limited to software that "doesn't function properly". The affliction encompasses problems associated with how we develop software, how we support a growing volume of existing software, and how we can expect to keep pace with a growing demand for more software [1].The quality of a software product is considered to be the output of the software process used in the production process. Different software organizations follow varieties of process Manuscript received June 29, 2014; revised November 4, 2014. Tatek Engdashet is with Addis Ababa University Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (e-mail: mail4te@gmail.com).Ricardo J. Machado is with the Department of Information Systems University of Minho Guimarã es, Portugal (e-mail: rmac@dsi.uminho.pt).Dida Midekso is with the Department of Computer Science Addis Ababa University Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (e-mail: dida.midekso@aau.edu.et). maturity models to improve the software process to maintain and upgrade the quality of software developed Continuous improvement of the software process is considered as a means to guide software developing companies towards standard practices to have a software process with better capability. A standard capability model is created, as a result significant improvement on the quality of the software products, through the introduction of new techniques and new tools, is achieved [2].A number of software process maturity models ...

Abstract. This paper provides empirical evidence of agile method adoption in smaller companies in Ethiopia. Agile methods are emerging as best practice for software development in the global north. So, is there evidence that agile methods are being used in Ethiopia? A Grounded Theory approach was adopted using face-to-face interviews with 17 software professionals from 7 software companies, which were selected by using a snowball sampling technique. The interviews were semi-structured and open-ended and have been audio-recorded, transcribed and analysed. It was discovered that agile principles, values and practices are important to study participants. Agile practices are used to encourage user participation and clarify requirements. However, it was found that many projects are for government clients that mandate extensive requirements and design documentation which must be approved prior to delivery of working software that complies with predefined delivery schedules.

-The computing power of smartphones is increasing as time goes. However, the proliferation of multiple different types of operating platforms affected interoperable smartphone applications development. Thus, the cross-platform development tools are coined. Literature showed that smartphone applications developed with the native platforms have better user experience than the cross-platform counterparts. However, comparative evaluation of usability of cross-platform applications on the deployment platforms is not studied yet. In this work, we evaluated usability of a crossword puzzle developed with PhoneGap on Android, Windows Phone, and BlackBerry. The evaluation was conducted focusing on the developer's adaptation effort to native platforms and the end users. Thus, we observed that usability of the crossplatform crossword puzzle is unaffected on the respective native platforms and the SDK require only minimal configuration effort. In addition, we observed the prospect of HTML5 and related web technologies to enhance usability in composing Web APIs for smartphone applications.