Improving the Requirements Engineering Process Through Automated Support: An Industrial Case Study

Although Distributed Software Development (DSD) has been a growing trend in the software industry, performing requirements management in such conditions implies overcoming new limitations resulting from geographic separation. SIDIA is a Research and Development (R&D) Institute, located in Brazil, responsible for producing improvements on the Android Platform for Samsung Products in all Latin America. As we work in collaboration stakeholders provided by Mobile Network Operators (MNO) from Latin countries, it is common that software requirements be provided by external stakeholders. As such, it is difficult to manage these requirements due to the coordination of many different stakeholders in a distributed setting. In order to minimize the risks, we developed a tool to assist our requirements management and development process. This experience paper explores the experience in designing and deploying a software approach that facilitates (I) Distributed Software Development, (II) minimizes requirements error rate, (III) teams and task allocations and (IV) requirements managements. We also report three lessons learned from adopting automated support in the DDS environment.

A Decentralized Framework for Managing Task Allocation in Distributed Software Engineering

In distributed software development, planning and managing fair and transparent task allocation is both critical and challenging. The objective of this paper is to propose a decentralized blockchain-oriented, transparent task allocation framework to improve the quality of the task allocation process. It addresses the concerns of (i) enhancing collaboration, (ii) inhibiting knowledge vaporization, and (iii) reducing documentation problems. The proposed method is a novel two-fold process: First, it identifies and categorizes tasks exhibiting different dependencies and complexities to create equal task clusters based on their dependency type, difficulty, cost, and time. Second, it uses a blockchain-oriented framework to broadcast, check bid validity, allow developers to bid on tasks matching their roles and expertise, evaluate, and announce the winner for task allocation using smart contracts. Results of experimentation, surveys, and interviews with software practitioners conclude that the proposed solution is transparent and effective in allocating tasks (with Cranach’s alpha of 0.894) at a low cost of contract execution in a distributed software development environment. Overall, the proposed approach will have a positive and significant impact in industrial settings.

Experiência em Gerenciamento de Projetos de Desenvolvimento Distribuído de Software – DDS

O processo de desenvolvimento de software das empresas está cada vez mais distribuído, de diversas maneiras possíveis em diferentes localidades, em busca de menores riscos, maiores lucros, e vantagens competitivas, entre outros. Este trabalho relata experiência de Gerenciamento de Projeto de Desenvolvimento Distribuído de Software - DDS, com o estudo de caso de um projeto Y da empresa X, organização de tecnologia da informação, outsourcing, vencendo os desafios de comunicação, coordenação, colaboração da equipe, e outros fatores que são agravados em um ambiente de DDS, relatando os resultados obtidos as lições aprendidas. The process of software development companies are increasingly distributed in several possible ways in different locations in search of lower risk, higher profits, and competitive advantages, among others. This paper reports the experience of Project Managing Distributed Software Development - DDS, with the case study of a Y-design company X, organizing information technology, outsourcing, overcoming the challenges of communication, coordination, team collaboration, and other factors which are compounded in a DDS environment, reporting the results lessons learned.

Effective Communication among Globally Distributed Software Development Teams

Global software development, an emerging software development methodology within a technology-enabled environment has recently received increased attention from scholars and practitioners. Despite the fact that the lack of effective communication is a major challenge of globally distributed teams, communication research related to the scale development is still very limited in existing literature. Considering the communication challenges and increasing need to measure the effectiveness of communication, this research is focused to develop a scale for “Effective Communication” for globally distributed software development teams. Systematic literature review is performed to identify the best practices of effective communication for the development of “Effective Communication” scale. A questionnaire survey consisting of 29 items is administered in globally distributed software development teams. Confirmatory factor analysis and statistical results depicted that the four-factor model (e.g. stakeholders' involvement, acculturation, usage of appropriate tools and technology, and information availability) is more parsimonious and an optimal model fit.