Selecting component sourcing options: A survey of software engineering’s broader make-or-buy decisions

Borg, Markus; Chatzipetrou, Panagiota; Wnuk, Krzysztof; Alégroth, Emil; Gorschek, Tony; Papatheocharous, Efi; Shah, Syed Muhammad Ali; Axelsson, Jakob

doi:10.1016/j.infsof.2019.03.015

Cited by 14 publications

(23 citation statements)

References 68 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…In the survey of Borg et al (Borg et al, 2019), the most important challenges related to CSO selection were identified and fell within the following three types: managerial, functional, and non-functional (quality-related). There have not yet been any attempts to identify the significance of these challenges to the best of our knowledge.…”

Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The CSO decisions can be summarized in the following four alternatives (Petersen et al, 2017;Borg et al, 2019): Practitioners were asked to choose between the above-mentioned four CSOs and indicate which information was the most important input for their decision process. The attributes were chosen after a joint research effort was conducted with several senior researchers within the project research team (the Orion research team).…”

Section: Description Of the Data Setmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The number of the respondents involved was 157. The complete description and design of the survey is available in (Borg et al, 2019).…”

Section: Description Of the Data Setmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The products concern software-intensive systems and thus entail component complexity. Therefore, an industrial cross-domain anonymous survey regarding the practitioners' decision making in relation to choosing between CSOs was conducted (Borg et al, 2019). The questionnaire was web-based and consisted of both open-ended and closedended questions.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The results of the hundred-dollar ($100) test are coded as variables, and they are statistically analyzed in order to find differences or agreements in views and correlations with other inherent characteristics of the practitioners, i.e., the role, amount of working experience, level of education, maturity of product they work with, and size of their organization. This information was collected via the same survey (Borg et al, 2019). The selection of the inherent characteristics was based on the available data.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 4 more Smart Citations

Component attributes and their importance in decisions and component selection

et al. 2019

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Component-based software engineering is a common approach in the development and evolution of contemporary software systems. Different component sourcing options are available, such as: (1) Software developed internally (in-house), (2) Software developed outsourced, (3) Commercial off-the-shelf software, and (4) Open-Source Software. However, there is little available research on what attributes of a component are the most important ones when selecting new components. The objective of this study is to investigate what matters the most to industry practitioners when they decide to select a component. We conducted a cross-domain anonymous survey with industry practitioners involved in component selection. First, the practitioners selected the most important attributes from a list. Next, they prioritized their selection using the Hundred-Dollar ($100) test. We analyzed the results using compositional data analysis. The results of this exploratory analysis showed that cost was clearly considered to be the most important attribute for component selection. Other important attributes for the practitioners were: support of the component, longevity prediction, and level of off-the-shelf fit to product. Moreover, several practitioners still consider in-house software development to be the sole option when adding or replacing a component. On the other hand, there is a trend to complement it with other component sourcing options and, apart from cost, different attributes factor into their decision. Furthermore, in our analysis, nonparametric tests and biplots were used to further investigate the practitioners' inherent characteristics. It seems that smaller and larger organizations have different views on what attributes are the most important, and the most surprising finding is their contrasting views on the cost attribute: larger organizations with mature products are considerably more cost aware.

show abstract

Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Description Of the Data Setmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The number of the respondents involved was 157. The complete description and design of the survey is available in (Borg et al, 2019).…”

Section: Description Of the Data Setmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 3 more Smart Citations

Component attributes and their importance in decisions and component selection

et al. 2019

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

Towards evidence‐based decision‐making for identification and usage of assets in composite software: A research roadmap

Wohlin

Papatheocharous

Carlson

et al. 2021

J Software Evolu Process

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Software engineering is decision intensive. Evidence-based software engineering is suggested for decision-making concerning the use of methods and technologies when developing software. Software development often includes the reuse of software assets, for example, open-source components. Which components to use have implications on the quality of the software (e.g., maintainability). Thus, research is needed to support decision-making for composite software. This paper presents a roadmap for research required to support evidence-based decision-making for choosing and integrating assets in composite software systems. The roadmap is developed as an output from a 5-year project in the area, including researchers from three different organizations. The roadmap is developed in an iterative process and is based on (1) systematic literature reviews of the area; (2) investigations of the state of practice, including a case survey and a survey; and (3) development and evaluation of solutions for asset identification and selection. The research activities resulted in identifying 11 areas in need of research. The areas are grouped into two categories: areas enabling evidence-based decision-making and those related to supporting the decision-making. The roadmap outlines research needs in these 11 areas. The research challenges and research directions presented in this roadmap are key areas for further research to support evidence-based decision-making for composite software.

show abstract

Using composition trees to matching software requirements—An external agency's approach to support software acquisition

et al. 2022

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

To improve their competitiveness, companies should acquire the latest software systems. However, many small or medium-sized companies might not be able to afford a proper software acquisition process without the resource and technical support essential for acquiring the right software system. This article proposes a meta-process, software acquisition with an external agent (SAEA), that includes a new industry role, external agent, to substitute for that support.SAEA will significantly reduce the cost of the software acquisition process. For implementing SAEA, the authors also introduce composition trees as a modelling language to collect, integrate, and compare all software requirements from different stakeholders and to identify issues during the software acquisition process. Finally, a real industry case study, for which this process has been successfully implemented, has been provided to illustrate our approach.

show abstract

Selecting component sourcing options: A survey of software engineering’s broader make-or-buy decisions

Cited by 14 publications

References 68 publications

Component attributes and their importance in decisions and component selection

Component attributes and their importance in decisions and component selection

Towards evidence‐based decision‐making for identification and usage of assets in composite software: A research roadmap

Using composition trees to matching software requirements—An external agency's approach to support software acquisition

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About