Modern Software Problems - The Technical and Social History of Software Engineering - page 366

2005: Failure to Complete the FBI Trilogy Project
In or about 2000, the FBI started a major effort to improve case files and allow
sharing of information. The project was called Trilogy and involved both hardware
and software components. One of the purposes was to move data from dozens of
fragmented file systems into a unified Oracle database. In 2005, the project was
terminated with losses estimated at perhaps $170 million. The problems with this
FBI system have been widely cited in the literature.
Although not specified, the probable size of the full Trilogy application would
have been in the 100,000 function point size range. Failures and delays at this size
level are endemic and approach 80%.
For big systems such as this, requirements creep runs about 2% per calendar
month during design and coding, and the total development schedules run about
five years. Total scope creep can approximate a 35% increase in required func-
tions.
Defect potentials average close to 6.0 per function point combined with cumu-
lative defect removal efficiency levels less than 85%. Make no mistake: These big
systems are very risky and require state-of-the-art methods to have any chance of
success.
Lessons learned: This system's failure is a textbook example of the problems of
large monolithic software applications. They have rapidly changing requirements
and they need careful architecture and design prior to coding. They also need a full
suite of pre-test quality steps before testing even begins.
Problem avoidance: Big systems such as this need formal architecture and design
phases combined with a full suite of pre-test inspections of requirements, design,
and code. In fact, these systems need most of the methods listed at the start of this
chapter: formal inspections, code and text static analysis, mathematical test-case
design, and certified test personnel. Pair programming would be cumbersome on
applications with 500 or so programmers because of the expense and the training
needs. Inspections are a better choice. Proofs of correctness are probably not pos-
sible due to the need for thousands of proofs.
2005: Secret Sony Copy Protection Software
In 2005, Sony BMG secretly placed copy protection software on 52 music CDs.
Customers who played those CDs on their computers had the protection software
installed on their equipment without their knowledge or consent.