Forum for Advancing Software engineering EducationForum for Advancing Software engineering Education
Volume 6 Number 9 April 26, 1996
Contents:
Opening - SREC Newsletter Editor
Validation of CMM
Global Issues in IS Educ (Web site; e-mail list)
Professional/Educational Thoughts from Innovation
US versus Eastern European engineering education
Book Offer: An Integrated Approach to Software Engineering
IWSEE Workshop and PSP
RE: IWSEE Workshop and PSP
SIGCSE Award Nominations Sought
CFP: 8th Conf. on Tools with AI
Subject: Opening - SREC Newsletter Editor
The Software Reliability Engineering Committee (SREC) of the IEEE-CS
Technical Council on Software Engineering (TCSE) has an opening for
NEWSLETTER EDITOR. The SREC Newsletter Editor will work with the
Chair of SREC in soliciting articles from other SREC members and
workers in the field of SRE and directly writing material for the
SRE Newsletter (eg. letters from the chair, conference/meeting/workshop
announcements). The SRE Newsletter is distributed 3 times a year as
part of the TCSE Newsletter. Circulation of the TCSE Newsletter is
25,000. Each edition of the SRE Newsletter is 4 pages. The SRE
Newsletter Editor must also coordinate with the TCSE Newsletter editor
in submitting materials. The SRE Newsletter Editor will coordinate
submission of time-sensitive material (eg. Call-for-papers,
workshop/symposia announcements) on the SRE electronic mail bulletin
board.
This is an opportunity to get into the "mainstream" of work in the
field of Software Reliability Engineering (SRE).
If you are interested in this position, please submit your name and a
few words on relevant experience. Please email to
w.w.everett@computer.org by May 1st.
- -- Bill Everett
Chair, SRE Committee of IEEE TCSE
Subject: Validation of CMM
At the Conference on Software Engineering Education last week, the issue of
validation of process effectiveness was brought up. Here's a reference I
ran across; I am sure there are more:
A correlational study of the CMM and software development
performance / Lawlis, Patricia K. ; Flowe, Robert M. ;
Thordahl, James B. -- In: SOFTWARE PROCESS, QUALITY & ISO
9000, 5(1) Jan. 1996 p. 4-12
Subject: Global Issues in IS Educ (Web site; e-mail list)
I invite you to visit the Web site on Global Issues in IS Education
that Betty Boyd and I have established. Its purpose is to promote
collaborative research into IS education, to share information about
conferences and findings, and to promote the stature of research
into IS education and training within the IS academic community.
The page address is http://www.acm.org/~eli_cohen/globalis.htm.
Currently it is updated weekly.
A listserv complements the web site. The purpose of this list is to
help advance IS education globally by creating a virtual community
of IS educators. The listserv is moderated so you will not be
inundated with messages. The list moderators, Betty Boyd and Eli
Cohen, understand that your time is valuable and will endeavor to
send you digests of conference announcements and discussions related
to IS education. To subscribe, send an e-mail message to
majordomo@uow.edu.au with the following message:
subscribe iseducation your_e-mail_address <-- not your real name
If you are interested in taking a more pro-active role in this
project, please contact me directly at eli_cohen@acm.org.
Subject: Professional/Educational Thoughts from Innovation
WHAT IS THE SYSTEM FOR AND WHAT ARE THE PEOPLE FOR? The director of
the information management program at the University of Texas at
Austin advocates the creation of specialists he calls "social
systems analysts," to be communicators and change-agents who can
both talk to the technologists and understand corporate strategy.
Some of the tasks for the social systems analyst: learn what
managers and workers really need from systems and what they will
really do with them; work with systems designers to make sure that
the design truly fits the organizational structure, culture and
behavior; work with the users to make sure they are part of the
system; and take a hard look at the new system and make any changes
that are necessary so that it actually performs as promised. (Tom
Davenport, "Software As Socialware," CIO 1 Mar 96 p24)
WHAT REQUIREMENTS ENGINEERS SHOULD BE REQUIRED TO KNOW: Requirements
engineering -- which is the attempt to incorporate an engineering
orientation into systems analysis -- needs to be revised to account
for organizational context, incompleteness of information, and the
evolutionary nature of the process of understanding requirements in
the real world. Instead of thinking of requirements engineering as
the development of a "contract" representing a precise, unambiguous
statement of what a development will build, you should think of it
as something that will realistically support the organization's
overall market /product strategies; clarify the relative importance
of different "requirements" (i.e., necessary or "nice"); and
tolerate the inevitable "incompleteness" of requirements definitions
in real-life environments. (Jawed Siddiqui & M. Chandra Shekarian,
"Requirements Engineering: The Emerging Wisdom," IEEE Software
Mar 96 p15)
Innovation offers a weekly summary of trends, strategies, and
innovations in business and technology. This is an abbreviated list of
news items of interest to the IS community from the March 4, 11, and 18,
1996 issues. Subscriptions are available at $15 a year. For a trial copy
of Innovation, type the word "subscribe" in the body (not subject) of a
message to innovation- request@newsscan.com.
Date: 8 Apr 1996 07:22:17 -0600
Subject: US versus Eastern European engineering education
[From EduPage, 4/7/96]
THE WHOLE ENGINEER A new book, "The Whole Engineer" by Samuel C.
Florman, says Eastern European universities are doing a better job of
integrating the humanities and social sciences into the engineering
curriculum than universities in the U.S. "Programs at U.S. universities
concentrate on blending engineering disciplines such as electrical
engineering and computer science, or at most on combining engineering
with other allied fields such as chemistry and manufacturing... The new
European thrust, by contrast, is broader and more ambitious, reaching
beyond the technical to emphasize the auspicious effect of humanistic
studies on the engineer-citizen." (Technology Review Apr 96 p67)
Date: 9 Apr 1996 12:07:02 -0600
Subject: Book Offer: An Integrated Approach to Software Engineering
OFFER FOR COMPLIMENTARY COPY OF A TEXT BOOK
I am in the process of finishing the 2nd edition of my Software
Engineering Text (An Integrated Approach to Software Engineering,
Pub: Springer Verlag New York). The publisher has agreed to give
out complimentary copies, or an offer for it, to the list of faculty
members that I provide. I am now trying to compile this list.
If you are interested in getting a complimentary copy when the
book comes out, please send me an email with your name and
postal address. A very brief description about the text is
given below. If you want more information, kindly contact me.
Please feel free to pass this message to collegues who also might
be interested in this offer. Many apologies if you get more
than one copies of this.
This book is intended primarily as a text for the first course in
Software Engineering. The book has nine chapters - Introduction,
Software Processes, Requirements analysis and specification,
Project Planning, Function oriented design, Object Oriented Design,
Detailed Design, Coding, and Testing. Metrics and validation
methods for each phase are discussed in the chapter for that phase.
A running case study is employed, which is used through out the book,
illustrating the different activities of software development. All the
the major documents that are produced for the case study are given
in the book - SRS, project plan, function oriented design specification,
object oriented design specification, test plan, testcase specification, etc.
The C implementation of the structured design, the C++ implementation of
the OO design, some design documents of the case study, and some tools
developed for metrics based analysis of code and design will also be
available (on web) for the readers.
The first version got good reviews in American Scientist (Sept, 92),
ACM Computing Reviews (June 92), and IEEE Computer (Dec 92).
Pankaj Jalote
(jalote@iitk.ernet.in)
Subject: IWSEE Workshop and PSP
I would like to thank the organizers of the recent workshop for their
efforts. I enjoyed the workshop and got quite a lot out of it.
To continue/generate some discussion, I would like to ask people if they
incorporate the personal software process (PSP) by Watts Humphries in
their courses in any formal manner? If so, how do you do it and how
well does it work?
When I returned to Adelaide after the workshop in Berlin, we continued
curriculum development and decided to vertically integrate the PSP into
our undergraduate degree. In annutshell, this means introducing the
students to the process in one course, developing it further in another
etc, until the final levels of the process are revealed at the end of
their degrees. The hope is that self improvement and self assessment
will become a habit for the students over that period of time.
Students will also be asked to record information in a database which
will help them track their own progress and allow them to compare
themselves to the best in class, worset in class and the class average
(anonymously obviously). The statistics gathered will also allow staff
to see how well the class as a whole is going and to get a measurment of
where the students have difficulty etc so that improvements to the
course can be targetted.
The extra time required to teach each layer of the PSP in different
courses is fairly minimal and can be handled within the current course
structure. The PSP is supported by practical work which should, in
theory, make the students more productive and hence should not cost the
students any extra time if it is all done properly.
I was just curious if anyone had any ideas, thoughts or comments on such
a proposal which they might like to air.
Michael Oudshoorn
Subject: RE: IWSEE Workshop and PSP
I'd like to join Michael in his sentiments regarding the IWSEE
workshop and its benefits, and I also thank the organizers for
their very considerable efforts.
The proposed PSP idea sounds good to me. I'm planning to offer a PSP
course at a graduate level in Spring 1997 semester, and I've been
worrying about the 400 hours per student that is reportedly required to
cover the material in one semester (our full time graduate students
take 3 courses). Introducing the material at the undergraduate level
over several courses sounds like an idea that might work well.
I think I'll try discussing it with my colleagues at University of
Alaska Fairbanks. Maybe we'll have to first offer PSP as a standalone
course at least once.
Thanks again to both organizers and attendeed for a memorable workshop.
Pete Knoke
Subject: SIGCSE Award Nominations Sought
Dear SIGCSE Members,
This letter is to remind you of the two major awards given
out by SIGCSE each year and to invite you to submit the names of
candidates worthy of recognition.
The two awards are:
1. The SIGCSE Outstanding Educator Award. This award is given to
an individual who has made significant contributions to computer
science education. These contributions can take many forms, such
as curriculum development, course design, textbooks, software,
teaching tools, or important new approaches to teaching.
2. SIGCSE Award For Lifetime Service. This award is given to
an individual who has contributed a great deal of time and effort
to organizations dedicated to improving computer science education.
Of course this includes SIGCSE and ACM, but can also include other
organizations such as IFIP and IEEE/CS.
Both winners will receive a plaque and a cash award of $1000. In
addition, the winner of the Outstanding Educator Award will be invited
to be the keynote speaker at the opening session of our annual
convention next February. The winner of the Lifetime Service Award will
be presented the plaque and check at the Convention Luncheon.
To nominate an individual for either award, simply write a letter giving
the name of the individual whom you wish to nominate and a description
of why you feel that he or she is worthy of this award. It need not be
an extremely long letter, a page or two is more than enough. Also
include the names of 1 or 2 other individuals who can write a letter in
support of your nominee. Send your nominations, either by email or
surface mail, to me at the following address:
G. Michael Schneider
Vice-Chair, SIGCSE
Dept. of Mathematics and Computer Science
Macalester College
1600 Grand Ave.
St. Paul, Minnesota 55105 USA
Subject: CFP: 8th Conf. on Tools with AI
Call for Papers
that focus on
Artificial Intelligence in Software Engineering
for the
8th IEEE International Conference on Tools with Artificial Intelligence
(ICTAI'96)
November 16-19, 1996
Toulouse, France
The annual ICTAI conference is an international forum for the exchange
of ideas relating to artificial intelligence (AI) among academe,
industry, and government agencies. It fosters the creation and transfer
of such ideas, and promotes their cross-fertilization over all AI
application domains and AI paradigms through a unifying theme: AI
Tools. ICTAI focuses on both theory and development methodologies and
encompasses all aspects of specifying, developing, implementing, and
evaluating theoretical and applied frameworks that may serve as tools
for developing intelligent systems and pursuing AI applications.
The conference always includes several paper sessions related to AI in
Software Engineering.
Submission deadline for papers and panels: May 10, 1996
The detailed Call for Papers and other conference information can
be found at: http://www.tai96.tulane.edu
FASE Volume 6 Number 9
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