PATTERN LANGUAGE

Modeling, Managing, Making it Right.

February 2007

In August 2004, the Software Engineering Institute's International Process Research Consortium, a forum for leaders in software and systems process to jointly explore emerging opportunities, began developing a process research roadmap. The result was a frameworks whose topics provide research direction in response to emerging trends, focus on real-world impact, and have international relevance.

That framework has been published a book entitled A Process Research Framework, available via the SEI. The framework describes the gaps in today's process capabilities that need to be overcome in order to enable the software, systems, and organizations envisioned for the next decade. The framework also lays out several strategies for closing those gaps.

Posted by Jon Erickson at 09:35 AM  Permalink |

The folks at Microsoft's Solution Architecture Center have released the Enterprise Library Test Guide 1.0.

The Enterprise Library consists of a set of tools that let you integrate various Application Blocks into.NET applications. The Blocks are designed to handle common tasks in enterprise-scale applications, such as logging, data access, exception management, and many others. Enterprise Library is provided as source code.

This recently-released guide provides detailed description for performing functional tests -- design reviews, code reviews, and automated testing -- on Enterprise Library components. The guide also describes how to test the components to determine whether they follow globalization and security best practices in addition to meeting performance and scalability requirements.

Posted by Jon Erickson at 05:23 PM  Permalink |

Carnegie Mellon West has launched a Master of Science (MS) program in Software Management.

Offered as a part-time program, the inter-disciplinary curriculum gives students a hands-on, team-oriented education. In its technical components, the program builds upon Carnegie Mellon’s software engineering curriculum. In its business and organizational components, however, Carnegie Mellon West breaks with tradition by giving students a broader perspective needed to collaborate with and lead global, distributed teams that are defining next-generation software organizations.

"Globalization and outsourcing are facts of life," said Martin Griss, associate dean of education at Carnegie Mellon West. "They're not good or bad. Our educational system simply has to recognize these facts and fold them into the curriculum."

While software engineering degree prepares graduates for positions as senior software engineers, architects, technical project leads, and software development managers, a software management degree is for students pursuing careers as program managers, product managers, directors of software development, and software executives. Over a six-semester (two-year) period, students in the software management program learn strategies for developing and delivering software products and services.

According to Carnegie Mellon West, among the features of its MS in Software Management degree are:

• Project- and simulation-based curriculum. The Carnegie Mellon West software management program simulates how students learn and work in an industry environment with learn-by-doing projects, case analyses, and industrial practica.
• Team orientation. Teamwork is fundamental to the program because the scope of all real software projects requires teamwork, and sharing work enables students and their teams to produce more authentic work products
• Contextual skills. Carnegie Mellon West's master's degree teaches technical expertise within the broader context of the software business itself. Consequently, marketing, finance, strategy, management and other business skills are highly stressed as are organizational skills, including negotiating, writing, presenting, and managing team dynamics.

Posted by Jon Erickson at 06:17 PM  Permalink |

Microsoft has made available SaaS architectural guidance through a sample application, available at the SaaS Architecture Center on MSDN.

The goal of the SaaS sample application is to illustrate the key architectural principles behind SaaS. The application is an implementation of the guidance that the Microsoft Architecture Team has been publishing over the past year into a reference application and accompanying source code.

Additionally, to view the source code and/or participate in the next release of the SaaS Sample Application, visit CodePlex.

Posted by Jon Erickson at 12:10 PM  Permalink |

Software Engineering Institute (SEI) Fellow Watts Humphrey, often called the "father of software quality" and recipient of the 2003 National Medal of Technology, will be teaching the SEI's February 28, 2007, Team Software Process (TSP) Executive Strategy Seminar. Humphrey will co-teach this class with Dan Wall, Vice President of Production Methods at Vicarious Visions, a developer of computer and video games.

The TSP Executive Strategy Seminar introduces software executives and middle managers to the key concepts and principles of the TSP from a management perspective. Its companion course, Managing TSP Teams, provides managers and team leaders with the knowledge and skills that they need to effectively lead and coach TSP development teams.

The TSP was designed to provide both a strategy and a set of operational procedures using disciplined software process methods at the individual engineer and project team levels. The TSP builds accurate, achievable plans for software project teams, provides a formal team-building process, and provides the mechanism for tracking progress against project plans.

Posted by Jon Erickson at 07:05 PM  Permalink |