Software product lines represent perhaps the most exciting paradigm shift in software development since the advent of high-level programming languages. Nowhere else in software engineering have we seen such breathtaking improvements in cost, quality, time to market, and developer productivity, often registering in the order-of-magnitude range. While the underlying concepts are straightforward enough – building a family of related products or systems by planned and careful reuse of a base of generalized software development assets – the devil can be in the details, as successful product line practice can involve organizational change, business process change, and technology change.

The authors ideally combine academic research results with industrial real-world experiences, thus presenting a broad view on product line engineering so that both managers and technical specialists will benefit from reading it. After presenting a common framework for the description of the industrial case studies, they capture the wealth of knowledge that eight companies have gathered during the introduction of the software product line engineering approach in their daily practice. After reading this book, you will understand all the relevant aspects, regarding business, architecture, process, and organizational issues, of applying software product line engineering. If you consider using a product line approach in your organization, or if you want to improve your current practices you will find a rich set of useful information at your fingertips – from practitioners to practitioners.

The dependence on quality software in all areas of life is what makes software engineering a key discipline for today’s society. Thus, over the last few decades it has been increasingly recognized that it is particularly important to demonstrate the value of software engineering methods in real-world environments, a task which is the focus of empirical software engineering. One of the leading protagonists of this discipline worldwide is Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Dieter Rombach, who dedicated his entire career to empirical software engineering. For his many important contributions to the field he has received numerous awards and recognitions, including the U.S. National Science Foundation’s Presidential Young Investigator Award and the Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany. He is a Fellow of both the ACM and the IEEE Computer Society. This book, published in honor of his 60th birthday, is dedicated to Dieter Rombach and his contributions to software engineering in general, as well as to empirical software engineering in particular.

This book presents invited contributions from a number of the most internationally renowned software engineering researchers like Victor Basili, Barry Boehm, Manfred Broy, Carlo Ghezzi, Michael Jackson, Leon Osterweil, and, of course, by Dieter Rombach himself. Several key experts from the Fraunhofer IESE, the institute founded and led by Dieter Rombach, also contributed to the book. The contributions summarize some of the most important trends in software engineering today and outline a vision for the future of the field. The book is structured into three main parts. The first part focuses on the classical foundations of software engineering, such as notations, architecture, and processes, while the second addresses empirical software engineeringin particular as the core field of Dieter Rombach’s contributions. Finally, the third part discusses a broad vision for the future of software engineering.

Software product lines represent perhaps the most exciting paradigm shift in software development since the advent of high-level programming languages. Nowhere else in software engineering have we seen such breathtaking improvements in cost, quality, time to market, and developer productivity, often registering in the order-of-magnitude range. While the underlying concepts are straightforward enough – building a family of related products or systems by planned and careful reuse of a base of generalized software development assets – the devil can be in the details, as successful product line practice can involve organizational change, business process change, and technology change.

The authors ideally combine academic research results with industrial real-world experiences, thus presenting a broad view on product line engineering so that both managers and technical specialists will benefit from reading it. After presenting a common framework for the description of the industrial case studies, they capture the wealth of knowledge that eight companies have gathered during the introduction of the software product line engineering approach in their daily practice. After reading this book, you will understand all the relevant aspects, regarding business, architecture, process, and organizational issues, of applying software product line engineering. If you consider using a product line approach in your organization, or if you want to improve your current practices you will find a rich set of useful information at your fingertips – from practitioners to practitioners.

The dependence on quality software in all areas of life is what makes software engineering a key discipline for today’s society. Thus, over the last few decades it has been increasingly recognized that it is particularly important to demonstrate the value of software engineering methods in real-world environments, a task which is the focus of empirical software engineering. One of the leading protagonists of this discipline worldwide is Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Dieter Rombach, who dedicated his entire career to empirical software engineering. For his many important contributions to the field he has received numerous awards and recognitions, including the U.S. National Science Foundation’s Presidential Young Investigator Award and the Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany. He is a Fellow of both the ACM and the IEEE Computer Society. This book, published in honor of his 60th birthday, is dedicated to Dieter Rombach and his contributions to software engineering in general, as well as to empirical software engineering in particular.

This book presents invited contributions from a number of the most internationally renowned software engineering researchers like Victor Basili, Barry Boehm, Manfred Broy, Carlo Ghezzi, Michael Jackson, Leon Osterweil, and, of course, by Dieter Rombach himself. Several key experts from the Fraunhofer IESE, the institute founded and led by Dieter Rombach, also contributed to the book. The contributions summarize some of the most important trends in software engineering today and outline a vision for the future of the field. The book is structured into three main parts. The first part focuses on the classical foundations of software engineering, such as notations, architecture, and processes, while the second addresses empirical software engineeringin particular as the core field of Dieter Rombach’s contributions. Finally, the third part discusses a broad vision for the future of software engineering.