An Empirical Study with Function Point Analysis for Software Development Phase Method

Abstract

It is important to know the actual size and complexity of the software before predicting the amount of effort required to be implemented. Two most common methods used for software size estimation are: (i) Source Lines of Code (SLOC) and (ii) Function Point Analysis (FPA). Estimating the size of a software with SLOC method is only possible once the process of coding is completed. On the other hand, estimating software size with FPA method is possible in early phases of Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC). However, one main challenge from the viewpoint of software development phase, is the presence of inconsistent states of software artifacts i.e. some of the classes are completely developed, some are partially developed, and some are not developed yet. Therefore, this research is using the new developed model i.e. Function Point Analysis for Software Development Phase (FPA-SDP) in an empirical study to overcome this challenge. The results of FPA-SDP model can help software project managers in: (i) knowing the inconsistent states of software artifacts (ii) estimating the actual size of a change request with its complexity level for software development phase.