International Series in Software Engineering – serie

Computer users are placing growing demands on the software industry today. They are looking for more complex products that are - at the same time - easier to use. Software development organizations are expected to produce higher quality products and deliver them to the public faster. In so doing, however, globally distributed development teams have to cope with understaffing and changing technologies. The challenges for the software industry are apparently mounting.

Multimedia has two fundamental characteristics that can be expressed by the following formula: multimedia = multiple media + hypermedia. How can software engineering take advantage of these two characteristics? Will these two characteristics pose problems in multimedia systems design? These are some of the issues to be explored in this book. The first two chapters should be of interest to managers, software engineers, programmers, and people interested in gaining an overall understanding of multimedia software engineering. The next six chapters present multimedia software engineering according to the conceptual framework introduced in Chapter One. This is of particular use to practitioners, system developers, multimedia application designers, programmers, and people interested in prototyping multimedia applications. The next three chapters are more research-oriented and are mainly intended for researchers working on the specification, modelling, and analysis of distributed multimedia systems, but will also be relevant to scientists, researchers, and software engineers interested in the systems and theoretical aspects of multimedia software engineering.The text can be used as a textbook in a graduate course on multimedia software engineering or in an undergraduate course on software design where the emphasis is on multimedia applications. It is especially suitable for a project-oriented course.

The great challenge of reverse engineering is recovering design information from legacy code: the concept-recovery problem. This monograph describes recent research which addresses this problem. It discusses a theory of how a constraint-based approach to program-plan recognition can efficiently extract design concepts from source code, and it details experiments in concept recovery that support the authors' claims of scalability. Models and experiments are presented in sufficient detail for easy replication. The book is intended for researchers and software developers concerned with reverse engineering or re-engineering legacy systems. It may also interest researchers who are interested in using plan-recognition techniques or constraint-based reasoning. The reader is assumed to be familiar with the basics of programming and algorithm analysis, but does not need to have a familiarity with the fields of reverse engineering or artificial intelligence.Designed as a reference for advanced undergraduate or graduate seminar courses in software engineering, reverse engineering, or reengineering, the book can also serve as a supplementary textbook for software-engineering-related courses, such as those on program understanding or design recovery, for AI-related courses, such as those on plan recognition or constraint satisfaction, and for courses that cover both topics, such as those on AI applications to software engineering.

This text presents a systematic discussion of three important questions in software reliability engineering: how to estimate the number of software defects; how to model software operational profiles; and how to estimate software failure rate and quantify software correctness when testing reveals no failures. Researchers will find that this book presents a reasonable summary of related topics and contains a modest amount of original and new research results. Although, due to the space limitation, methods discussed in the main text are selected, a separate section, "Remarks and Problems", is created for each chapter to address ideas and references.

Systems must exhibit software quality attributes, such as accuracy, performance, security and modifiability. However, such non-functional requirements (NFRs) are difficult to address in many projects, even though there are many techniques to meet functional requirements in order to provide desired functionality. This is particularly true since the NFRs for each system typically interact with each other, have a broad impact on the system and may be subjective. To enable developers to deal systematically with a system's diverse NFRs, this framework offers structured graphical facilities for stating NFRs and managing them by refining and inter-relating NFRs, justifying decisions, and determining their impact. Since NFRs might not be absolutely achieved, they may simply be satisfied sufficiently ("satisficed"). To reflect this, NFRs are represented as "softgoals", whose interdependencies, such as tradeoffs and synergy, are captured in graphs. The impact of decisions is qualitatively propagated through the graph to determine how well a chosen target system satisfices its NFRs.Throughout development, developers direct the process, using their expertise while being aided by catalogues of knowledge about NFRs, development techniques and tradeoffs, which can all be explored, reused and customized. This work demonstrates the applicability of the NFR Framework to a variety of NFRs, domains, system characteristics and application areas. This will help readers apply the Framework to NFRs and domains of particular interest to them. Detailed treatments of particular NFRs - accuracy, security and performance requirements -- along with treatments of NFRs for information systems are presented as specializations of the NFR Framework. Case studies of NFRs for a variety of information systems include credit card and administrative systems. The use of the Framework for particular application areas is illustrated for software architecture as well as enterprise modelling.

The purpose of Experimentation in Software Engineering: An Introduction is to introduce students, teachers, researchers, and practitioners to experimentation and experimental evaluation with a focus on software engineering. The objective is, in particular, to provide guidelines for performing experiments evaluating methods, techniques and tools in software engineering. The introduction is provided through a process perspective. The focus is on the steps that we go through to perform experiments and quasi-experiments. The process also includes other types of empirical studies. The motivation for the book emerged from the need for support we experienced when turning our software engineering research more experimental. Several books are available which either treat the subject in very general terms or focus on some specific part of experimentation; most focus on the statistical methods in experimentation. These are important, but there were few books elaborating on experimentation from a process perspective, none addressing experimentation in software engineering in particular.The scope of Experimentation in Software Engineering: An Introduction is primarily experiments in software engineering as a means for evaluating methods, techniques and tools. The book provides some information regarding empirical studies in general, including both case studies and surveys. The intention is to provide a brief understanding of these strategies and in particular to relate them to experimentation. Experimentation in Software Engineering: An Introduction is suitable for use as a textbook or a secondary text for graduate courses, and for researchers and practitioners interested in an empirical approach to software engineering.

Software is difficult to develop, maintain, and reuse. Two factors that contribute to this difficulty are the lack of modular design and good program documentation. The first makes software changes more difficult to implement. The second makes programs more difficult to understand and to maintain. This work describes an approach to promoting program modularity. It presents a formal specification language that promotes software modularity through the use of abstract data types, even though the underlying programming language may not have such support. This language is structured to allow useful information to be extracted from a specification, which is then used to perform consistency checks between the specification and its implementation. The book also describes a specification-driven, software re-engineering process model for improving existing programs. The aim of this process is to make existing programs easier to maintain and reuse while keeping their essential functionalities unchanged. This book should be suitable as a secondary text for graduate-level courses in software engineering, and as a reference for researchers and practitioners in industry.

Developing correct and efficient software is far more complex for parallel and distributed systems than it is for sequential processors. Some of the reasons for this added complexity are: the lack of a universally acceptable parallel and distributed programming paradigm, the criticality of achieving high performance, and the difficulty of writing correct parallel and distributed programs. These factors collectively influence the current status of parallel and distributed software development tools efforts. This work addresses the above issues by describing working tools and environments, and gives a solid overview of some of the fundamental research being done worldwide. Topics covered in this collection are: mainstream program development tools, performance prediction tools and studies; debugging tools and research; and nontraditional tools.

The importance of properly selecting testing techniques is widely accepted in the software engineering community. However, there are chiefly two reasons why the selections now made by software developers are difficult to evaluate as correct. First, there are several techniques with which the average developer is unfamiliar, often leaving testers with limited knowledge of all the techniques currently available. Second, the available information regarding the different testing techniques is primarily procedure (focused on how to use the technique), rather than pragmatic (focused on the effect and appropriateness of using the technique). The problem addressed in this book is that of improving software testing technique selection.

Faster, better and cheaper are challenges that IT-companies face every day. The customer's expectations shall be met in a world where constant change in environment, organization and technology are the rule rather that the exception. A solution for meeting these challenges is to share knowledge and experience - use the company's own experience, and the experience of other companies. Process Improvement in Practice - A Handbook for IT Companies tackles the problems involved in launching these solutions. Process Improvement in Practice - A Handbook for IT Companies is designed for small IT companies who wish to start with systematic improvement. The methods and techniques in this handbook are tried in practice, and have proven to be easy to use and scalable for local needs. Managers and developers will discover useful tips to initiate improvement work efficiently. This practical handbook is based on the authors' improvement work in a range of companies since the mid-nineties. Process Improvement in Practice - A Handbook for IT Companies is designed for a professional audience, composed of researchers and practitioners in industry.This book is also suitable for graduate-level students in software process improvement and software engineering.

Software Process Modeling brings together experts to discuss relevant results in software process modeling, and expresses their personal view of this field. This book focuses on new aspects of software process modeling. Specifically, it deals with socio-technological aspects, process modeling for new development types (open source software, dependability applications, etc.) and organization change management.The computer audience is placing growing demands on the software industry today. Consumers are looking for more complex products that are, at the same time, easier to use. Software developer organizations are expected to produce higher quality products and deliver them to the public faster. In so doing, however, globally distributed development teams have to cope with understaffing and changing technologies. The challenges for the software industry are apparently mounting. Over the years, a variety of software process models have been designed to structure, describe and prescribe the software systems construction process. Most recently, software process modeling is increasingly dealing with new challenges raised by the tests that the software industry has to stand. Software Process Modeling is designed for a professional audience of researchers and practitioners in industry. The book is also suitable for graduate-level students in computer science.

Engineering tasks are supposed to achieve defined goals under certain project constraints. Example goals of software engineering tasks include achieving a certain functionality together with some level of reliability or performance. Example constraints of software engineering tasks include budget and time limitations or experience limitations of the developers at hand. Planning of an engineering project requires the selection of techniques, methods and tools suited to achieve stated goals under given project constraints. This assumes sufficient knowledge regarding the process-product relationships (or effects) of candidate techniques, methods and tools. Planning of software projects suffers greatly from lack of knowledge regarding the process-product relationships of candidate techniques, methods and tools. Especially in the area of testing a project planner is confronted with an abundance of testing techniques, but very little knowledge regarding their effects under varying project conditions. This book offers a novel approach to addressing this problem: First, based on a comprehensive initial characterization scheme (see chapter 7) an overview of existing testing techniques and their effects under varying conditions is provided to guide the selection of testing approaches. Second, the optimisation of this knowledge base is suggested based on experience from experts, real projects and scientific experiments (chapters 8, 9, and 10). This book is of equal interest to practitioners, researchers and students. Practitioners interested in identifying ways to organize their company-specific knowledge about testing could start with the schema provided in this book, and optimise it further by applying similar strategies as offered in chapters 8 and 9.

Developing correct and efficient software is far more complex for parallel and distributed systems than it is for sequential processors. Some of the reasons for this added complexity are: the lack of a universally acceptable parallel and distributed programming paradigm, the criticality of achieving high performance, and the difficulty of writing correct parallel and distributed programs. These factors collectively influence the current status of parallel and distributed software development tools efforts. Tools and Environments for Parallel and Distributed Systems addresses the above issues by describing working tools and environments, and gives a solid overview of some of the fundamental research being done worldwide. Topics covered in this collection are: mainstream program development tools, performance prediction tools and studies; debugging tools and research; and nontraditional tools. Audience: Suitable as a secondary text for graduate level courses in software engineering and parallel and distributed systems, and as a reference for researchers and practitioners in industry.

Software is difficult to develop, maintain, and reuse. Two factors that contribute to this difficulty are the lack of modular design and good program documentation. The first makes software changes more difficult to implement. The second makes programs more difficult to understand and to maintain. Formal Specification Techniques for Engineering Modular C Programs describes a novel approach to promoting program modularity. The book presents a formal specification language that promotes software modularity through the use of abstract data types, even though the underlying programming language may not have such support. This language is structured to allow useful information to be extracted from a specification, which is then used to perform consistency checks between the specification and its implementation. Formal Specification Techniques for Engineering Modular C Programs also describes a specification-driven, software re-engineering process model for improving existing programs. The aim of this process is to make existing programs easier to maintain and reuse while keeping their essential functionalities unchanged. Audience: Suitable as a secondary text for graduate level courses in software engineering, and as a reference for researchers and practitioners in industry.

Multimedia has two fundamental characteristics that can be expressed by the following formula: Multimedia = Multiple Media + Hypermedia. How can software engineering take advantage of these two characteristics? Will these two characteristics pose problems in multimedia systems design? These are some of the issues to be explored in this book. The first two chapters will be of interest to managers, software engineers, programmers, and people interested in gaining an overall understanding of multimedia software engineering. The next six chapters present multimedia software engineering according to the conceptual framework introduced in Chapter One. This is of particular use to practitioners, system developers, multimedia application designers, programmers, and people interested in prototyping multimedia applications. The next three chapters are more research-oriented and are mainly intended for researchers working on the specification, modeling, and analysis of distributed multimedia systems, but will also be relevant to scientists, researchers, and software engineers interested in the systems and theoretical aspects of multimedia software engineering.Multimedia Software Engineering can be used as a textbook in a graduate course on multimedia software engineering or in an undergraduate course on software design where the emphasis is on multimedia applications. It is especially suitable for a project-oriented course.

It is my belief that software engineers not only need to know software engineering methods and processes, but that they also should know how to assess them. Conse­ quently, I have taught principles of experimentation and empirical studies as part of the software engineering curriculum. Until now, this meant selecting a text from another discipline, usually psychology, and augmenting it with journal or confer­ ence papers that provide students with software engineering examples of experi­ ments and empirical studies. This book fills an important gap in the software engineering literature: it pro­ vides a concise, comprehensive look at an important aspect of software engineer­ ing: experimental analysis of how well software engineering methods, methodologies, and processes work. Since all of these change so rapidly in our field, it is important to know how to evaluate new ones. This book teaches how to go about doing this and thus is valuable not only for the software engineering stu­ dent, but also for the practicing software engineering professional who will be able to • Evaluate software engineering techniques. • Determine the value (or lack thereof) of claims made about a software engineer­ ing method or process in published studies. Finally, this book serves as a valuable resource for the software engineering researcher.

Non-Functional Requirements in Software Engineering presents a systematic and pragmatic approach to `building quality into' software systems. Systems must exhibit software quality attributes, such as accuracy, performance, security and modifiability. However, such non-functional requirements (NFRs) are difficult to address in many projects, even though there are many techniques to meet functional requirements in order to provide desired functionality. This is particularly true since the NFRs for each system typically interact with each other, have a broad impact on the system and may be subjective. To enable developers to systematically deal with a system's diverse NFRs, this book presents the NFR Framework. Structured graphical facilities are offered for stating NFRs and managing them by refining and inter-relating NFRs, justifying decisions, and determining their impact. Since NFRs might not be absolutely achieved, they may simply be satisfied sufficiently (`satisficed'). To reflect this, NFRs are represented as `softgoals', whose interdependencies, such as tradeoffs and synergy, are captured in graphs. The impact of decisions is qualitatively propagated through the graph to determine how well a chosen target system satisfices its NFRs. Throughout development, developers direct the process, using their expertise while being aided by catalogues of knowledge about NFRs, development techniques and tradeoffs, which can all be explored, reused and customized. Non-Functional Requirements in Software Engineering demonstrates the applicability of the NFR Framework to a variety of NFRs, domains, system characteristics and application areas. This will help readers apply the Framework to NFRs and domains of particular interest to them. Detailed treatments of particular NFRs - accuracy, security and performance requirements - along with treatments of NFRs for information systems are presented as specializations of the NFRFramework. Case studies of NFRs for a variety of information systems include credit card and administrative systems. The use of the Framework for particular application areas is illustrated for software architecture as well as enterprise modelling. Feedback from domain experts in industry and government provides an initial evaluation of the Framework and some case studies. Drawing on research results from several theses and refereed papers, this book's presentation, terminology and graphical notation have been integrated and illustrated with many figures. Non-Functional Requirements in Software Engineering is an excellent resource for software engineering practitioners, researchers and students.

The great challenge of reverse engineering is recovering design information from legacy code: the concept recovery problem. This monograph describes our research effort in attacking this problem. It discusses our theory of how a constraint-based approach to program plan recognition can efficiently extract design concepts from source code, and it details experiments in concept recovery that support our claims of scalability. Importantly, we present our models and experiments in sufficient detail so that they can be easily replicated. This book is intended for researchers or software developers concerned with reverse engineering or reengineering legacy systems. However, it may also interest those researchers who are interested using plan recognition techniques or constraint-based reasoning. We expect the reader to have a reasonable computer science background (i.e., familiarity with the basics of programming and algorithm analysis), but we do not require familiarity with the fields of reverse engineering or artificial intelligence (AI). To this end, we carefully explain all the AI techniques we use. This book is designed as a reference for advanced undergraduate or graduate seminar courses in software engineering, reverse engineering, or reengineering. It can also serve as a supplementary textbook for software engineering-related courses, such as those on program understanding or design recovery, for AI-related courses, such as those on plan recognition or constraint satisfaction, and for courses that cover both topics, such as those on AI applications to software engineering. ORGANIZATION The book comprises eight chapters.

also in: THE KLUWER INTERNATIONAL SERIES ON ASIAN STUDIES IN COMPUTER AND INFORMATION SCIENCE, Volume 1