Realizing software process lines: insights and experiences

Software process lines provide a systematic approach to construct and manage software processes. A process line defines a reference process containing general process assets, whereas a well-defined customization approach allows process engineers to create new process variants by, e.g., extending or altering process assets. Variability operations are a powerful instrument to realize a process line. However, little is known about which variability operations are suitable in practice. In this paper, we present a study on the feasibility of variability operations to support process lines in the context of the German V-Modell XT. We analyze which variability operations were defined and used to which extent, and we provide a catalog of variability operations as an improvement proposal for other process models. Our findings show 69 variability operations defined across several metamodel versions of which 25 remain unused. Furthermore, we also find that variability operations can help process engineers to compensate process metamodel evolution.