Software Development in Developing Countries

2002 ◽  
pp. 309-318
Author(s):  
Syed Zahoor Hassan
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
Software Development ◽  
Process Improvement ◽  
Software Quality ◽  
Quality Indicator ◽  
Developed Countries ◽  
Quality Enhancement ◽  
Market Quality ◽  
Quality Initiatives ◽  
Software Companies

A number of software quality enhancement approaches have been suggested and implemented. Over the last decade, software (SW) companies in developed countries have reported significant enhancements in productivity and quality by using various quality approaches. Software companies operating in developing countries have also undertaken quality initiatives in the recent years. This chapter presents a framework for analysis of quality initiatives. The need for considering customer and market aspects in assessing an organization’s quality initiatives has been established. The notion of a market quality indicator (MQI) has been introduced for this purpose. Information on the quality and process improvement initiatives at some of the leading software companies of Pakistan has been collected. The proposed framework is applied to analyze the quality initiatives of these companies. Based on the insights obtained from this analysis, some recommendations for companies interested in launching quality and process improvement initiatives are also presented.

An Evaluation of Software Development Practices among Small Firms in Developing Countries

2016 ◽  
Vol 24 (3) ◽  
pp. 45-70 ◽  
Author(s):  
Delroy Chevers ◽  
Annette M. Mills ◽  
Evan Duggan ◽  
Stanford Moore
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
Software Development ◽  
Process Improvement ◽  
Small Firms ◽  
Software Process ◽  
Software Process Improvement ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Capability Maturity ◽  
Software Product ◽  
Software Development Practices

For software development firms to be competitive they must assure the quality of the software product. This has led many firms to adopt software process improvement (SPI) programs such as the capability maturity model integration (CMMI). However, for small software firms, especially those in developing countries with limited resources, these programs are often too cumbersome and costly to implement. To address this issue, this paper proposes a simplified SPI model for small firms (SPM-S) comprised of 10 key software development practices; with fewer practices, the proposed model should be more accessible and less costly to implement. Using data collected in four developing countries in the English-speaking Caribbean from 112 developer/user dyads, the model is evaluated with respect to its impact on software quality. The findings show that the software development process coupled with supporting technology (e.g. project management tools) significantly impact software product quality. Implications for software process improvement in small firms and future research are discussed.

Impact Assessment of Policies and Practices for Agile Software Process Improvement

2018 ◽  
pp. 685-710
Author(s):  
George Leal Jamil ◽  
Rodrigo Almeida de Oliveira
Keyword(s):  
Software Development ◽  
Dynamic Simulation ◽  
Process Improvement ◽  
Software Quality ◽  
Software Process Improvement ◽  
Decision Makers ◽  
Sigma Level ◽  
Six Sigma Methodology ◽  
Belo Horizonte ◽  
Policies And Practices

This chapter proposes the application of computer simulation models for the evaluation of software quality improvement through the implementation of policies and practices of software development processes and performing the measurement of the evolution of the quality through the Six Sigma methodology. In order to provide decision makers of process improvement, a model of dynamic simulation of systems was proposed. Model validation was performed using data collected from various projects developed in an information technology company headquartered in Belo Horizonte-MG. The models mentioned in this chapter are able to provide the decision makers a tooling of process improvement able to perform predictions, predictions, analysis of “what if” scenarios in the model. As a result of this work, a dynamic simulation model of systems capable of performing the evaluation of software quality in Sigma level is found. Also, there are comparisons and analyses of actual data of software development projects with the simulation data of the models presented. The earnings with the new version of the case exceed by more than 50% the Sigma level, the quality of software developed, and reduction of more than 55% of the time of development of the project.

scholarly journals Integrating User eXperience practices into software development processes: implications of the UX characteristics

2017 ◽  
Vol 3 ◽  
pp. e130 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pariya Kashfi ◽  
Agneta Nilsson ◽  
Robert Feldt
Keyword(s):  
Software Development ◽  
User Experience ◽  
Software Quality ◽  
Quality Characteristics ◽  
Mitigation Strategies ◽  
Software Systems ◽  
Software Companies ◽  
Research Areas ◽  
Key Factor ◽  
Past Experiences

User eXperience (UX) is a key factor in the success of software systems. Many software companies face challenges in their work with UX. Existing research does not analyze UX practices and challenges in relation to other software quality characteristics or, in particular, in relation to usability. A better understanding of these challenges can help researchers and practitioners better address them in the future. In this empirical study, we have interviewed 17 practitioners with different backgrounds and occupations from eight software development companies. Their responses are coded, and analyzed with thematic analysis. We report eight themes of challenges that practitioners face in their work with UX. While some of these challenges partly overlap with those reported in existing literature about usability or other software quality characteristics, the participants of our study either view many of the challenges as unique to UX, or more severe in the case of UX. Although at a superficial level challenges of UX and other quality characteristics overlap, we differentiate these challenges at a deeper level through the five main characteristics of UX:subjective,holistic,dynamic,context-dependentandworthwhile. In particular, we identified that these characteristics have at least 20 implications (i.e. additional difficulties) for day-to-day work of practitioners. We found that 11 of these implications have been previously reported in literature. However, to the best of our knowledge, the remaining nine implications are unique to our study. These implications can explain why practitioners perceive the challenges to be more severe than for other quality characteristics. Most importantly, they can explain the industry’s lopsided focus on the pragmatic aspect of UX. Our findings can be useful for researchers in identifying new and industry-relevant research areas and for practitioners to learn from empirically investigated challenges in UX work, and base their improvement efforts on such knowledge. Identifying and investigating the overlaps underlines the importance of these challenges, and can also help finding research areas not only for enhancing UX work but also software quality in general. It also makes it easier for practitioners to spot, better understand as well as find mitigation strategies for UX, through learning from past experiences and developments in the area of software quality.

Global Software Team and Inexperienced Software Team

2011 ◽  
pp. 1671-1677
Author(s):  
Kim Man Lui ◽  
Keith C.C. Chan
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Developing Countries ◽  
Human Resources ◽  
Software Quality ◽  
The Other ◽  
Global Team ◽  
Software Teams ◽  
Software Companies ◽  
The World ◽  
Software Team

Given that the number of qualified programmers cannot be increased drastically and rapidly, software managers in most parts of the world will likely have to live with a human resources shortage in this area for some time. One way of dealing with this shortage is to form global software teams in which members are recruited from all over the world and software is developed in a distributed manner. Forming such a global software teams can have many advantages. In addition to alleviating the problems caused by scarcity of human resources, programmers on a global team would be free to work without being confined by physical location. Although forming global software teams may increase the size of the pool of programmers that can be recruited, both team quality and software quality are issues of great concern. Some software companies would prefer to establish a global software team with software programmers in developing countries, such as China, Poland, and South Africa (Sanford, 2003). Given the tremendous salary gap between skilled and unskilled developers or between developed and developing countries, it is not difficult to see that maintaining a team with a proportion of less experienced members significantly reduces running expenses (Figure 1). On the other hand, however, it would present the problem of managing inexperienced programmers. This chatper shares our experience of managing inexperienced software teams in China. To simplify our discussion, we deal separately with the two topics of inexperienced software teams and global software teams. However, it should be noted that a global software team can be composed of both inexperienced and experienced software subteams. We categorize the problems in these two types of software teams which will help software managers learn more how to manage the two types of software teams.

Study on CMM-Based Software Quality Assurance Process Improvement - A Case of the Educational Software Quality Assurance Model

2014 ◽  
Vol 1049-1050 ◽  
pp. 2032-2036
Author(s):  
Ai Ming Huang ◽  
Guang Shan Deng ◽  
Jun Hu ◽  
Yong Jun Huang
Keyword(s):  
Quality Assurance ◽  
Software Development ◽  
Process Improvement ◽  
Software Quality ◽  
Educational Software ◽  
Software Process ◽  
Software Process Improvement ◽  
Theoretical Research ◽  
Software Quality Assurance ◽  
Assurance Process

This paper mainly make a theoretical research and exploration on software quality assurance quality assurance improvement based on CMM process, with the educational software quality assurance model as an example. It elucidates the relationship between educational software process improvement and quality assurance, and explicits the importance of educational software development process improvement to the quality of educational software. Additionally, it discussed the establishment of educational software development model on the basis of the waterfall model of traditional software development, and construction of process quality management models and platforms based on CMM educational software process improvement.

Impact Assessment of Policies and Practices for Agile Software Process Improvement

2021 ◽  
pp. 1616-1641
Author(s):  
George Leal Jamil ◽  
Rodrigo Almeida de Oliveira
Keyword(s):  
Software Development ◽  
Dynamic Simulation ◽  
Process Improvement ◽  
Software Quality ◽  
Software Process Improvement ◽  
Decision Makers ◽  
Sigma Level ◽  
Six Sigma Methodology ◽  
Belo Horizonte ◽  
Policies And Practices

This chapter proposes the application of computer simulation models for the evaluation of software quality improvement through the implementation of policies and practices of software development processes and performing the measurement of the evolution of the quality through the Six Sigma methodology. In order to provide decision makers of process improvement, a model of dynamic simulation of systems was proposed. Model validation was performed using data collected from various projects developed in an information technology company headquartered in Belo Horizonte-MG. The models mentioned in this chapter are able to provide the decision makers a tooling of process improvement able to perform predictions, predictions, analysis of “what if” scenarios in the model. As a result of this work, a dynamic simulation model of systems capable of performing the evaluation of software quality in Sigma level is found. Also, there are comparisons and analyses of actual data of software development projects with the simulation data of the models presented. The earnings with the new version of the case exceed by more than 50% the Sigma level, the quality of software developed, and reduction of more than 55% of the time of development of the project.

An Evaluation of Software Development Practices among Small Firms in Developing Countries

2021 ◽  
pp. 955-983
Author(s):  
Delroy Chevers ◽  
Annette M. Mills ◽  
Evan Duggan ◽  
Stanford Moore
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
Software Development ◽  
Process Improvement ◽  
Small Firms ◽  
Software Process ◽  
Software Process Improvement ◽  
Management Tools ◽  
Software Product ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Software Development Practices

For software development firms to be competitive they must assure the quality of the software product. This has led many firms to adopt software process improvement (SPI) programs such as the capability maturity model integration (CMMI). However, for small software firms, especially those in developing countries with limited resources, these programs are often too cumbersome and costly to implement. To address this issue, this paper proposes a simplified SPI model for small firms (SPM-S) comprised of 10 key software development practices; with fewer practices, the proposed model should be more accessible and less costly to implement. Using data collected in four developing countries in the English-speaking Caribbean from 112 developer/user dyads, the model is evaluated with respect to its impact on software quality. The findings show that the software development process coupled with supporting technology (e.g. project management tools) significantly impact software product quality. Implications for software process improvement in small firms and future research are discussed.

A Software Process Improvement Model for Small Firms in Developing Countries

2020 ◽  
pp. 47-80
Author(s):  
Delroy Chevers ◽  
Annette M. Mills ◽  
Evan Duggan ◽  
Stanford Moore
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
Software Development ◽  
Process Improvement ◽  
Small Firms ◽  
Software Process ◽  
Software Process Improvement ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Maturity Model ◽  
Management Tools ◽  
Using Data

Managing software quality is a major challenge for software development firms. This has led many firms to adopt software process improvement programs such as the capability maturity model integration to improve the software development process. However, these models are often too cumbersome and costly, especially for small software firms in developing countries, to implement. This chapter proposes a simplified software process improvement model that prioritises key practices for software development, given the constraints that face small firms. Using data collected in four developing countries in the English-speaking Caribbean from 112 developer/user dyads on their software practices, the results show that software process coupled with supporting technology (e.g., project management tools) significantly impact the quality of the software product. Smaller projects (represented by size of the project team) are also associated with high quality software products than larger projects. Implications for SPI programs in small firms and future research is discussed.

scholarly journals SOFTWARE PROCESS IMPROVEMENT: AWARENESS, USE, AND BENEFITS IN CANADIAN SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT FIRMS

2017 ◽  
Vol 57 (2) ◽  
pp. 170-177 ◽  
Author(s):  
DELROY CHEVERS
Keyword(s):  
Software Development ◽  
Process Improvement ◽  
Software Process ◽  
Software Process Improvement ◽  
Quality Systems ◽  
Software Products ◽  
Software Companies ◽  
Systems Software ◽  
Software Product ◽  
Develop Software

ABSTRACT Since 1982, the software development community has been concerned with the delivery of quality systems. Software process improvement (SPI) is an initiative to avoid the delivery of low quality systems. However, the awareness and adoption of SPI is low. Thus, this study examines the rate of awareness, use, and benefits of SPI initiatives in Canadian software development firms. Using SPSS as the analytical tool, this study found that 59% of Canadian software development firms are aware of SPI programs and 43% of employees use a form of SPI programs to develop software products. Although the sample size is small and the results cannot be generalized, the sample firms that use SPI programs reported an improvement in software product quality as the greatest benefit. These findings confirm the importance of SPI programs as a means of producing higher-quality software products, which can increase the likelihood of software companies winning global contracts.

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