An approach to characterize a software process

Abstract

Process improvement is a cyclic activity consisting of several phases. According to the Quality Improvement Paradigm, the first phase is characterization. This paper presents a developed methodology for characterizing a software process. The methods include software process assessment and modeling. Using an assessment driven process modeling methodology we can create a descriptive model that characterizes the current process, and a prescriptive model containing improvement suggestions. The selected processes are reviewed and the process components are gathered according to a software engineering process meta-model. The SPICE assessment model is utilized in process reviews. In a case study the methodology is applied to characterize the software process of a small enterprise. The current process is defined and its process capability and product quality are determined. The enterprise's process guide, the produced work products and the projects workload are analyzed. This paper reports the experiences of using the methodology and presents a way to analyze the implications caused by the differences between the existing process guidance and the actually implemented process.