A Weakly Constrained Approach to Software Change Coordination

  • Authors:
  • Ciaran O'Reilly

  • Affiliations:
  • University of Ulster

  • Venue:
  • Proceedings of the 26th International Conference on Software Engineering
  • Year:
  • 2004

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Abstract

The development of a software system 驴 of any reasonablesize 驴 from initial conception through ongoing maintenanceand evolution accrues significant coordination overheads.Often the mechanisms used to manage change andcoordination detract from the time developers have to pursuethe principal goal of constructing the desired system.This is one of the motivators behind the emerging ýagileýmethodologies. By permitting people to work as independentlyas possible and yet be aware of each otherýs dependenciesand constraints, it is believed that these secondarycosts can be minimised. The position taken in theresearch summarised here is that better support can beprovided for this type of weakly constrained coordinationby enhancing the awareness, automated traceability, andconstraint checking capabilities of software configurationmanagement systems. Current progress in the research andplans for future work are described.