Paolo Tell

Hybrid software and system development in practice: waterfall, scrum, and beyond

Software and system development faces numerous challenges of rapidly changing markets. To address such challenges, companies and projects design and adopt specific development approaches by combining well-structured comprehensive methods and flexible agile practices. Yet, the number of methods and practices is large, and available studies argue that the actual process composition is carried out in a fairly ad-hoc manner. The present paper reports on a survey on hybrid software development approaches. We study which approaches are used in practice, how different approaches are combined, and what contextual factors influence the use and combination of hybrid software development approaches. Our results from 69 study participants show a variety of development approaches used and combined in practice. We show that most combinations follow a pattern in which a traditional process model serves as framework in which several fine-grained (agile) practices are plugged in. We further show that hybrid software development approaches are independent from the company size and external triggers. We conclude that such approaches are the results of a natural process evolution, which is mainly driven by experience, learning, and pragmatism.

ActivitySpace: Managing Device Ecologies in an Activity-Centric Configuration Space

Mobile devices have become an intrinsic part of peoples everyday life. They are multifunctional devices providing ubiquitous access to many different sources of information. Together with traditional personal computers, these devices form a device ecology that provides access to an overlapping information space. Previous studies have shown that users encounter a number of fundamental problems when interacting with these device ecologies, such as lack of transparency, control, intelligibility and context. To mitigate these problems, we introduce ActivitySpace: an activity-centric configuration space that enables the user to integrate and work across several devices by utilizing the space between the devices. This paper presents the conceptual background and design of ActivitySpace and reports on a study with nine participants. Our study shows that ActivitySpace helps users to easily manage devices and their allocated resources while also exposing a number of usage patterns. \

Activity Theory Applied to Global Software Engineering: Theoretical Foundations and Implications for Tool Builders

Although a plethora of tools are available for Global Software Engineering (GSE) teams, it is being realized increasingly that the most prevalent desktop metaphor underpinning the majority of tools have several inherent limitations. We have proposed that Activity-Based Computing (ABC) can be a promising alternative to build tools for GSE. However, significant effort is required to introduce a new paradigm; there is a need of sound theoretical foundation based on activity theory to address challenges faced by tools in GSE. This paper reports our effort aimed at building theoretical foundations for applying activity theory to GSE. We analyze and explain the fundamental concepts of activity theory, and how they can be applied by using examples of software architecture design and evaluation processes. We describe the kind of data model and architectural support required for applying activity theory in building supporting infrastructure for GSE, and describe a proof of concept prototype.

Hybrid Software Development Approaches in Practice: A European Perspective

The surveyed companies applied hybrid development approaches to specific projects even when company-wide policies for process usage existed. These approaches emerged from the evolution of different work practices and were consistently used regardless of company size or industry sector.

Requirements for an Infrastructure to Support Activity-Based Computing in Global Software Development

Global Software Development (GSD) has become an established paradigm of developing software. One of the most important prerequisites of successfully supporting GSD projects is the provision of appropriate tooling support. Researchers and practitioners have developed several dozens of tools to support the GSD paradigm. However, there has been an increased realization that the most commonly used desktop metaphor underpinning existing tools has several limitations in terms of supporting communication, coordination, collaboration and awareness among distributed team members. We propose to leverage the Activity-Based Computing (ABC) paradigm that has been successfully applied to support collaboration and mobility in healthcare environments. We are exploring the viability of leveraging the ABC paradigm for addressing many of the limitations of the existing GSD tools. This paper identifies the requirements that an ABC based infrastructure needs to fulfill to support GSD practitioners. We have extensively reviewed the literature reporting requirements for designing GSD tools and have categorized them in two distinct groups: system quality requirements and system requirements for computer-mediated teamwork. We have analyzed the identified requirements with respect to the ABC principles using a scenario to demonstrate how the requirements reported in the literature and the ABC principles can provide a synergistic foundation for guiding the development of an infrastructure enabling GSD tools to take advantage of the ABC paradigm. We expect these requirements to be used not only by us to develop an infrastructure but also by others to develop or modify GSD tools.

How Does Software Process Improvement Address Global Software Engineering

For decades, Software Process Improvement (SPI) programs have been implemented, inter alia, to improve quality and speed of software development. To set up, guide, and carry out SPI projects, and to measure SPI state, impact, and success, a multitude of different SPI approaches and considerable experience are available. SPI addresses many aspects ranging from individual developer skills to entire organizations. It comprises for instance the optimization of specific activities in the software lifecycle as well as the creation of organization awareness and project culture. In the course of conducting a systematic mapping study on the state-of-the-art in SPI from a general perspective, we observed Global Software Engineering (GSE) becoming a topic of interest in recent years. Therefore, in this paper, we provide a detailed investigation of those papers from the overall systematic mapping study that were classified as addressing SPI in the context of GSE. From the main studys result set, a set of 30 papers dealing with GSE was selected for an in-depth analysis using the systematic review instrument to study the contributions and to develop an initial picture of how GSE is considered from the perspective of SPI. Our findings show the analyzed papers delivering a substantial discussion of cultural models and how such models can be used to better address and align SPI programs with multi-national environments. Furthermore, experience is shared discussing how agile approaches can be implemented in companies working at the global scale. Finally, success factors and barriers are studied to help companies implementing SPI in a GSE context.

Is Scrum fit for global software engineering

Distributed software engineering and agility are strongly pushing on todays software industry. Due to inherent incompatibilities, for years, studying Scrum and its application in distributed setups has been subject to theoretical and applied research, and an increasing body of knowledge reports insights into this combination. Through a systematic literature review, this paper contributes a collection of experiences on the application of Scrum to global software engineering (GSE). In total, we identified 40 challenges in 19 categories practitioners face when using Scrum in GSE. Among the challenges, scaling Scrum to GSE and adopting practices accordingly are the most frequently named. Our findings also show that most solution proposals aim at modifying elements of the Scrum core processes. We thus conclude that, even though Scrum allows for extensive modification, Scrum itself represents a barrier for global software engineering, and development teams have to customize Scrum properly to benefit from agile software development in GSE.

Supporting activity based computing paradigm in global software development

Global software development (GSD) teams have to use multiple tools to perform both complex and even simple tasks involving many context switches that can be frustrating. To lessen these issues, researchers are looking at providing new plug-ins whereas commercial vendors are flooding the market with comprehensive solutions often in the form of platforms. The current file- and application- oriented desktop metaphor can hardly support the collaborative and distributed nature of GSD teams. We assert that the Activity-Based Computing (ABC) paradigm has the potential for addressing the tool support related challenges of GSD. We have been incrementally designing and developing a flexible middleware (ABC4GSD) for supporting ABC in GSD. In this paper we present the theoretical foundations underpinning our approach and the architectural overview of a middleware for supporting ABC in GSD. Moreover, we briefly present a prototype leveraging the features provided by the middleware as a proof of concept.

Summary of the 1st International Workshop on Hybrid Development Approaches in Software Systems Development

The first international HELENA workshop was held co-located with the 2017 International Conference on Software and Systems Process (ICSSP). The goals of this workshop were to bring the HELENA team together, foster general networking, discuss the current state of the project, and develop a roadmap towards future activities. From the 84 researchers and practitioners from 25 active countries, 25 participated in this workshop. The overall status report shows that the HELENA survey is increasingly gaining attention, and more then 300 data points have been collected so far. The team agreed on a number of topics for future activities, e.g., organizational transformation, adaptation and evolution, and development approaches for safety-critical systems.

From Scrum to Agile: a journey to tackle the challenges of distributed development in an Agile team

Background: Agile and distributed software development are two trends that continue to increase rapidly in todays software industry. Even though the benefits achievable by combining them are potentially many, the intrinsic challenges of such marriage often lead to severe complications that can jeopardize the successful completion of software projects. Method: To investigate empirically how these two trends can coexist without compromising on the agile core values and principles, we conducted an exploratory holistic case study. Focusing on the development team of a Danish SME having both distributed offices as well as teleworking arrangements, we showcase (the evolution of) their practices. Results: The case is an example of the effective application of the agile reflective culture that allowed the company to evolve to a level in which the collocation restrictions of agile software development are overcome by a continuously evolving software process geared towards reducing waste to achieve speed and simplicity. Conclusions: Even though results need to be considered carefully due to the single nature of the reported case, we highlight five elements that have been fundamental in such journey: agile servant-leader, agile team, trust, virtual work environment, inspect & adapt, and reduce waste. Extensive information is provided to frame the context and to allow meaningful future comparisons.