Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
Table 5. Product Drivers
straints or lead to conflicting interests. Examples
of non-functional requirements are software reli-
ability, database size, security issues, performance
standards, usability issues and transaction rates.
Other drivers that directly affect platform costs
are incremented memory needs, increased storage
facilities and maintenance of back up files. All
the above parameters capture platform complex-
ity of the software under development.
Process attributes refer to all project supple-
ments that may be used and enable the development
and delivery of quality software within cost and
time limitations. Among these characteristics the
use of CASE (Computer Aided Software Engineer-
ing), the utilization of methods, techniques and
standards are the main aspects that define the level
of support and observation of the development
procedure. Productive development teams usually
follow a well-defined and guided process. Proven
best practices, methodologies and the selection of
the appropriate lifecycle processes are aspects that
a development team should rely on to complete
a project. The success of a project, the time and
cost required for its completion depends on the
existence of a well-managed process.
Software costs are also dependant on person-
nel team attributes. Typical examples of this group
Drivers
Product Drivers
Metric
ERP, Telecommunica-
tions, Logistics, etc.
Type of project
Application Type
Medical, Public Sector,
Transports, Media, etc.
Business Type
New Development, Re-
development, Enhance-
ment
Development Type
Amateur, Professional,
Casual
User type
Level of usage
1-50, 50-200, 200-1000,
>1000
Number of Users
Size
Source Code Lines Lines of Code (LOC)
Number of Function
Points
Function Points
sual. In order to estimate size attributes an initial
assessment of functional requirements is neces-
sary. From functional requirements we can provide
a size estimate measured in function points (Al-
brecht, 1979) or in Lines of Code (Boehm, 1981).
Accurate size estimation is a very important task
as it is considered to directly affect the amount
of effort required to complete a software project.
Non-functional requirements affect the values
of platform drivers and can oppose certain con-
Table 6. Platform Drivers
Drivers
Table Head
Platform Drivers
Metric
Technical attributes
Distributed Databases
1-5 Scale that depicts the necessity of the attribute.
On-line Processing
1-5 Scale
Data communications
1-5 Scale
Back-ups
1-5 Scale
Memory constraints
1-5 Scale
Use of new or immature technologies
1-5 Scale
Non-functional requirements
Reliability
1-5 Scale
Performance
1-5 Scale
Installation Ease
1-5 Scale
Usability
1-5 Scale
Security
1-5 Scale
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