Assessing process-centered software engineering environments

Abstract

Second revision, Version 2.0 26/12/96Abstract Process-centered Software Engineering Environments (PSEEs) are the most recent generation of environments supporting software development activities. They exploit an explicit representation of the process (called the process model) that specifies how to carry out software development activities, the roles and tasks of software developers, and how to use and control software development tools. A process model is therefore a vehicle to better understand and communicate the process. If it is expressed in a formal notation, it can be used to support a variety of activities such as process analysis, process simulation, and process enactment.PSEEs provide automatic support for these activities. They exploit languages based on different paradigms, such as Petri nets and rule-based systems. They include facilities to edit and analyse process models. By enacting the process model, a PSEE provides a variety of services such as software developers assistance, automation of routine tasks, invocation and control of software development tools, and enforcement of mandatory rules and practices.Several PSEEs have been developed, both as research projects and also as commercial products. The initial deployment and exploitation of this technology has made it possible to produce a significant amount of experiences, comments, evaluations, and feedback. We still miss, however, consistent and comprehensive assessment methods that can be used to collect and organize these information. This paper aims at contributing to the definition of such method, by providing a systematic comparison grid and by accomplishing an initial evaluation of the state of the art in the field. This evaluation takes into account the systems that have been developed by the authors in the past 5 years, and also the main characteristics of other wellknown environments.

Collaboration and coordination in process-centered software development environments: a review of the literature

“…Modeling languages are in general low-level, and biased towards the implementation phase and may not be appropriate for all phases of development, particularly the more creative design phases [4].…”

“…Provence [30], that separates process enactment from process execution, in order to enhance the degree of non-intrusiveness [4,31]. The assumption is that users know what to do without being explicitly told and that therefore the system can remain most of the time invisible.…”

“…An enhanced level of human collaboration support is provided by integrating PCSDE with external tools that are able to handle a closer mode of collabo-ration [4]. Usually, the tool that is integrated adds some form of synchronous communication support, such as support for electronic meetings.…”

“…Further reviews of these and other systems can be found e.g. in Ambriola et al's excellent survey [4] and in [5,7,6].…”

“…A survey and taxonomy of PCSDE can be found in [4]; in depth descriptions of systems' features can be found in [5][6][7] and in the many papers mentioned throughout this paper.…”