Process Tailoring for Software
Project Plans
Addendums
DOD-STD-2167A Defense System Software Development, 29 February 1988
GINS95 Ginsberg, Mark, "Tailoring and the CMM," Presentation to
SEI Symposium, September 1995
LAKE93 Lake, Jerry, "The Work Breakdown Structure - It's Much
More Than a Cost-Reporting Structure," pp. 3-9, Program
Manager, July-August 1993
MAIB94 Defense System Software Development DOD-STD-2167A &
DOD-STD-2168 Tailoring Tips & Software Development Cycle
Chart, (c) David Maibor Associates, Inc., 1994
MIL-STD-498 Software Development and Documentation, 5 December 1994
MIL-STD-881A Work Breakdown Structures for Defense Materiel Items
MIL-STD-882C System Safety Program Requirements, 19 January 1993
MIL-STD-1521B, Technical Reviews and Audits for Systems, Equipment, and
Change 1 Computer Programs, 19 December 1985
PAUL93 Paulk, Mark C., Bill Curtis, Mary Beth Chrissis, and
Charles V. Weber, Capability Maturity Model for Software,
Version 1.1, CMU/SEI-93-TR-24, Software Engineering
Institute, February 1993
4GL Fourth Generation Language ANSI American National Standards Institute ATE Automatic Test Equipment CDR Critical Design Review CDU Control Display Unit CFD Control Flow Diagram CMM Capability Maturity Model COTS Commercial Off-The-Shelf CPM Critical Path Method CSCI Computer Software Configuration Item CSSR Cost and Schedule Status Report DFD Data Flow Diagram DID Data Item Description FP Function Points GPS Global Positioning System GUI Graphical User Interface HUD Head-Up Display HWCI Hardware Configuration Item IDD Interface Design Description IPT Integrated Product Team IRS Interface Requirements Specification ISM Integrated Software Management KPA Key Process Area MIS Management Information System OCD Operational Concept Document PDR Preliminary Design Review PDSS Post-Development Software Support PERT Project Evaluation and Review Technique SCM Software Configuration Management SDD Software Design Description SEE Software Engineering Environment SEI Software Engineering Institute SEPG Software Engineering Process Group SLOC Source Lines of Code SPD Software Process Definition SPI Software Process Improvement SQA Software Quality Assurance SRS Software Requirements Specification SSDD System/Subsystem Design Description SSS System/Subsystem Specification STD Software Test Description STP Software Test Plan STR Software Test Report STrP Software Transition Plan SVD Software Version Description SW Software WBS Work Breakdown Structure
This glossary provides a brief definition of the important terms used in this report. It is arranged in alphabetical order.
TERM DEFINITION
Building Block A generic method, practice, tool, or process definition in the
inventory of software process assets owned and maintained by an
organization.
Current best A process and associated implementation procedures that an
practice organization keeps current through continuous process
improvement.
Lessons Learned The organization's current best practice for recording a
project's best practices, experiences with tools, problems, and
other lessons learned in a postmortem report.
Metrics The organization's current best practice for measuring software
projects, products, and processes.
Organization A documented set of generic software building blocks which
Standard Software define how a software organization does business.
Process
Product The organization's current best practice for inspecting (peer
Inspections reviewing) software documents and code to remove defects.
Programming The set of programming languages, and organizational standards
Language for using them, in which the organization is proficient.
Project Defined The compilation of tailored building blocks, in a software
Software Process development plan, for a specific project.
Project Estimation The organization's current best practice for estimating the
cost, schedule, resource requirements, and size of a development
effort.
Project Management The organization's current best practice for managing software
projects (includes planning, and tracking and oversight).
Project Reviews The organization's current best practice for conducting
technical and management reviews.
Requirements The organization's current best practice for eliciting and
Management managing a project's requirements.
Risk Management The organization's current best practice for assessing and
managing software project risk.
Software The organization's current best practice for SCM.
Configuration
Management (SCM)
Software Quality The organization's current best practice for SQA.
Assurance (SQA)
Subcontract The organization's current best practice for managing
Management subcontractors in the performance of all or part of a software
project.
Support Tools The set of management and development tools that support the
organization's standard process and practices in which the
organization is proficient.
Software Design The organization's current best practice for performing software
design.
Software The organization's current best set of development methods in
Development current use (e.g., object oriented, structured, etc.) in which
Methods the organization is proficient.
Software Life The set of software life cycles (e.g., waterfall, evolutionary,
Cycles spiral, rapid-prototyping, etc.) for which the organization is
proficient at executing a software project.
Software System The organization's current best practice for performing software
Test system test.
Tailoring rules Documented rules that provide guidance for adapting the
organization's standard software process to specific project
requirements.
Technical The organization's current best practice for managing and
Documentation producing technical documents.
Training The organization's current best practice for training personnel
in the use of software development methods, tools, and practices.
Unit Test The organization's current best practice for performing unit
test activities.
The tools examined for this report were defined to allow users to maintain their organization's standard software process using the tool, tailor that process to the needs of a specific project, develop the project WBS and schedule with the same tool, and track progress during project execution.
It was assumed that these requirements would be implemented in a number of tools. Initially, both custom and commercially available tools were examined. In time, the list of tools was limited to those that were released (or had target dates for release) as Commercial Off-The-Shelf (COTS) products.
A breakdown of the functionality requested for these tools is as follows:
a. Share data with other tools (e.g., spreadsheets and/or scheduling tools).
b. Allow the organization to develop and maintain the organization's standard software process within the tool. The process should be able to be custom designed for the needs of the organization.
c. Provide a combined process definition and project management capability. (Project management here is assumed to include building and modifying WBSs, activity networks, and schedules and tracking progress against the schedules.)
d. Allow a number of user roles to have access to the data in the tool set in different ways.
e. Have a Graphical User Interface (GUI) to support ease of use.
f. Support software process definition and software process modeling.
g. Tie its project management capabilities to software process enactment.
h. Provide both Gantt and activity network (e.g., Program Evaluation and Review Technique (PERT) or Critical Path Method (CPM)) outputs.
i. Provide a relationship between the WBS and the project's defined software process.
Five tools were found that claimed to provide a majority of the requested capabilities. These tools and their advertised capabilities are listed in Table A-1 along with vendor, point of contact, and minimum system configuration information. None of the tools were examined in detail since the vendors contacted were not able to provide demonstration versions (or limited time examination copies) on request.
At the time of this research, it appeared that tools with the requested capabilities were just beginning to reach the market. This initial set of tools was unable to provide the full set of requested capabilities, and in dealing with vendors, it appeared that this type of tool set is still quite immature and not ready for use in a production environment.
It will be interesting to see the next generation of these tools and how they mature to support process driven project planning and project management.
Table A-1. Integrated software process and project management tools.
| Tool | firstCASE | PEAKS |
| Vendor | AGS Management Systems 1012 West Ninth Ave. King of Prussia, PA 19406 |
Cedar Creek Process Engineering P.O Box 308 Cedar Creek, TX 78612 |
| Point of Contact | Valerie Palamountain 610-265-1550 |
Terrel 800-303-8468 terrelj@source.asset.com |
| Data Import/Export | Import Text Files Export Text Files, Report Writer to Excel/Lotus files. Can copy and paste between applications. |
ASCII text files. Import/Export Plans API Data Access |
| Flexible Process | Can be customized by your organization to incorporate your standards and procedures | Yes |
| Combination of Process Definition and PM | Yes, suite of tools | Combined |
| Role Driving? | Can define roles and responsibilities | Process Driven |
| Ease of Use | Windows based | GUI, point and click |
| Process Definition and Modeling | through fcprocess | Yes |
| PM tied to Process Enactment | Yes | Supports low level enactment in conjunction with other tools |
| Gantt & PERT or CPM | Gantt, PERT, CPM includes resources | Gantt |
| WBS tied to Process Structure | Yes | Yes |
| Platforms | PC/Windows, Windows NT, OS2 | IBM RISC System 6000 w/ AIX 3.2.5 porting to Windows NT and Mac 7.x |
Table A-1. Integrated software process and project management
tools. (Cont.)
| Tool | Process Engineer | Tool Project Management (TPM) [12] |
| Vendor | LBMS 1800 West Loop South, Sixth Floor Houston, TX 77027 |
Applied Business Technology 361 Broadway New York, NY 10013 |
| Point of Contact | 800-345-LBMS | Kristine Kiltz 212-219-8945 |
| Data Import/Export | Bi-directional data transfers for various schedulers including Microsoft Project 3.0, Project Workbench 3.0 for Windows and Timeline 5.0 for DOS | Export to Text files |
| Flexible Process | Yes, with PE/Process Manager | Yes |
| Combination of Process Definition and PM | Yes, suite of tools | Yes, suite of tools |
| Role Driving? | Yes | No |
| Ease of Use | Reportedly easy to use | GUI, reportedly highly intuitive |
| Process Definition and Modeling | Yes, with PE/Process Manager | Yes via Methods Architect |
| PM tied to Process Enactment | Yes | |
| Gantt & PERT or CPM | Gantt, PERT, Resource Charts | Gantt, CPM |
| WBS tied to Process Structure | Yes | |
| Platforms | At least 386/33, MS-DOS 3.1 or greater, MS-Windows 3.1, 4 MB RAM, 15 MB available on hard drive, mouse and any network operating system | PC/Windows |
Table A-1. Integrated software process and project management
tools. (Cont.)
| Tool | WBS Chart for Project | |
| Vendor | Jim Spiller and Associate (JSA) 3256 Seminole Circle Fairfield, CA 94533 |
|
| Point of Contact | 707-425-2484 | |
| Data Import/Export | Import/export to Mircosoft Project files. (.MPX) |
|
| Flexible Process | ||
| Combination of Process Definition and PM | No | |
| Role Driving? | ||
| Ease of Use | GUI, Windows | |
| Process Definition and Modeling | ||
| PM tied to Process Enactment | None | |
| Gantt & PERT or CPM | None | |
| WBS tied to Process Structure | ||
| Platforms | PC/Windows |