Tua%20Rahikkala

1
Software Configuration Management Process
Improvement within a Distributed Environment
BLANKO 98October 22-23, 1998

• Tua Rahikkala
• VTT Electronics
• tua.rahikkala_at_vtt.fi

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BackgroundVISCOUNT

• EU/Esprit project 25754
• 1.9.1997-31.12.1999
• The objective of the VISCOUNT project is to
  develop a SCM tool and SCM methods for use in a
  geographically distributed environment
• More VISCOUNT information
• http//www.baesema.co.uk/stg/viscount/index.htm
• http//www.ele.vtt.fi/projects/viscount/vischome.h
  tml

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Background SCM Questionnaire

• Made during 09-10/98
• Objective was to investigate software development
  distribution and SCM improvement areas of
  industrial organisations
• 38 answers (13.10.1998)
• Questions
• industrial sector, company size, number of SW
  professionals
• software development and distribution
• SCM tools
• SCM development areas (28 areas, score 1-5)

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SCM Questionnaire Industrial sectors
5
SCM Questionnaire Number of personnel
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SCM Questionnaire SW distribution

• Distribution including company offices, daughter
  companies and sub-contractors

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SCM Questionnaire Software task distribution

• If software development has been distributed,
  what sub-tasks are most distributed?
• Prestudy/Idea Phase
• Requirements specification
• Technical design
• Implementation
• Module/unit testing
• Integration testing
• System testing
• Documentation
• Project Management
• Quality Assurance

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SCM Questionnaire Use of SCM tools
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SCM Questionnaire Main development areas
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SCM Questionnaire Main development areas/SCM
tool

• ClearCase, Continuus
• quality assurance and audits
• communication
• SCM process improvement
• product conformity management
• PCMS/PVCS, Visual SourceSafe, others
• SCM process improvement
• communication
• quality assurance and audits
• release/version building
• No SCM tool
• SCM process improvement
• product conformity management
• module version management
• documentation version management

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Improvement Framework

• Pr2imer (Practical Process Improvement for
  Embedded Real-Time Software) is an approach to
  process improvement and measurement developed at
  VTT Electronics. (http//www.ele.vtt.fi/projects/p
  rimer/primer.htm)
• In this work, the focus of the Pr2imer approach
  is on SCM. Therefore, we call our approach SCM-
  Pr2imer
• GQM (Goal/Question/Metric) used as a part of
  SCM-Pr2imer
• MetriFlame

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SCM-Pr2imer
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SCM-Pr2imer Phase 1Analysis of the current SCM
practices
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SCM Process
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SCM Current State Analysis at VAT

• VAT Valmet Automation Oy
• Pilot projects in the SCM-Pri2mer program
• 1 Maintenance project
• 1 Development project
• Logistics department
• Analysis steps
• Analysis planning
• Interviews
• Feedback session I
• Quantitative assessment (SCM-Pr2imer question
  list, BOOTSTRAP)
• Feedback session II and planning of further work

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Main Results from Current State Analysis/VAT

• Version manufacturing process is not effective
• When working in distributed environment, VATs
  information sharing between project participants
  is not effective in all cases, and the practices
  vary depending on projects and individuals
• Changes are not always documented, and the
  documentation practices are not clear
• The special requirements and properties of SCM
  within VATs distributed environment are not
  really known or identified.

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SCM-Pr2imer Phase 2Definition of Goals for New
SCM Practices
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SCM-Pr2imer Phase 2Tasks

• Identify improvement objectives and goals for the
  SCM process
• Evaluate and select methods and tools for the
  improved SCM process
• Identify and model the target state of the SCM
  process (Use case approach)
• Definition of new methods and practices (SCM
  requirements)

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Goal-oriented SCM process improvement
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Examples of SCM goals

• Goal 1 Analyse the version building process for
  the purpose of improving it with respect to
  effectiveness from the project team point of view
  in the context of distributed environment
• Goal 2 Analyse the change control process for
  the purpose of improving it with respect to
  traceability of changes from the project team
  point of view in the context of distributed
  environment
• Goal 3 Analyse the SCM training and support
  material for the purpose of improving and
  developing it with respect to learning from the
  project team point of view in the context of
  distributed environment

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Example of GQM template
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Use Case Description
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GQM-planning

• Goals and use cases were refined to measurable
  questions and metrics by interviewing all
  involved persons for retrieving the required
  information
• Examples
• What is the number of building errors?
• M_1.1 Number of times a release has to be built
  again/customer release
• M_1.2 Number of new source files/release
• Why a release has to be built again?
• M_2.1 Number of changed source files/release
• M_2.2 Number of revisions of code rows/labelled
  file version
• etc.
• Feedback sessions!

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Next stepsSCM-Pr2imer Phases 3-4

• Plan for Data Collection
• Manually collected metrics
• Automatically collected metrics (e.g. ClearCase -
  MetriFlame interface)
• Templates for data collection
• Tool Support for Metrics Collection
• MetriFlame (http//www.ele.vtt.fi) for SCM data
  collection and measurement process
• Calculation templates (rules for metrics
  calculation)
• Result analysis and feedback sessions

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Tool Support for Metrics Collection
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Measurement process

• Data collection was planned to be done by using a
  specialised conversion tool and Clear Case
  scripts
• Generic format for data import both the scripts
  and the converter could be reused in the future
  improvement cycles

Convert the SCM measurement data with
converter

• MetriFlame
• Result
• presentation

Calculate the metrics with MetriFlame (based on
the measurement data)
Metrics analysis during the feedback sessions
(based on the analysis material)
Graphs/ analysis material ( based on the
calculated metrics)

• MetriFlame
• Data Importing
• Metrics definition

• ClearCase
• SCM Data

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Example of a MetriFlame graph
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Conclusions 1/3

• SCM process improvement within a distributed
  environment is an important development area
• 1. SCM Process improvement
• 2. Communication
• 3. Quality assurance and audits
• 4. Release/version building
• Systematic SCM process improvement methods are
  needed

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Conclusions 2/3

• Process improvement should be based on the goals
  of the organisation and projects (commitment,
  resources, real-world problems)
• Experiences from use cases are encouraging
• Increase understanding of specific process area
  (SCM)
• tool for communication
• test and education material
• requirements analysis via use cases
• Feedback sessions and commenting rounds are
  essential

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Conclusions 3/3

• Tool support for metrics collection is important
• Measurements increase visibility of the process
  and thus make process improvement more achievable
  and justified.
• The awareness of SCM and its influence on process
  and product quality increases inside the
  organisation due to the improvement activities.

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Questions?
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SCM Concepts

• Used in this presentation
• Software Configuration Management (SCM) is a
  discipline for establishing and maintaining the
  integrity of the products of the software
  projects throughout the projects lifecycle
• The basic concept of SCM is a Software
  Configuration Item (SCI), which can be a unit or
  a collection of lower-level items (source code,
  documentation, test data, executable code,
  specifications, etc.)
• During software development and maintenance SCIs
  undergo changes i.e. series of versions.
• A release is a particular version of a SCI that
  is made available for a specific purpose such as
  a customer delivery.