Distributed software development in an offshore outsourcing project: A case study of source code evolution and quality

Abstract

Context: Offshore outsourcing collaborations can result in distributed development, which has been linked to quality-related concerns. However, there are few studies that focus on the implication of distributed development on quality, and they report inconsistent findings using different proxies for quality. Thus, there is a need for more studies, as well as to identify useful proxies for certain distributed contexts. The presented empirical study was performed in a context that involved offshore outsourcing vendors in a multisite distributed development setting.Objective: The aim of the study is to investigate how quality changes during evolution in a distributed development environment that incurs organizational changes in terms of number of companies involved.Method: A case study approach is followed in the investigation. Only post-release defects are used as a proxy for external quality due to unreliable defect data found pre-release such as those reported during integration. Focus group meetings were also held with practitioners.Results: The results suggest that practices that can be grouped into product, people, and process categories can help ensure post-release quality. However, postrelease defects are insufficient for showing a conclusive impact on quality of the development setting. This is because the development teams worked independently as isolated distributed teams, and integration defects would help to better reflect on the impact on quality of the development setting.Conclusions: The mitigation practices identified can be useful information to practitioners that are planning to engage in similar globally distributed development projects. Finally, it is important to take into consideration the arrangement of distributed development teams in global projects, and to use the context to iden- tify appropriate proxies for quality in order to draw correct conclusions about the implications of the context. This would help with providing practitioners with wellfounded findings about the impact on quality of globally distributed development settings.

Explorando a gestão de contratos com fornecedores no contexto de CMMI-DEV e metodologias ágeis: a identificação de um gap

“…Mesmo sem encontrar estudos empíricos que tratam especificamente sobre SAM e metodologias ágeis, é fácil perceber que as metodologias ágeis podem agregar valor [31,32,33,34,35] nesta gestão de fornecedores pelos próprios valores e princípios [17,18] que neste cenário pode agregar para solucionar inúmeros problemas encontrados e relatados na literatura como: negligência em tratar os problemas; falta de código de conduta para fornecedores; falta de auditorias como parte de uma política de governança; falta de um canal aberto para que colaboradores, funcionários e parceiros "denunciem" possíveis riscos; falta de uma clareza na comunicação sobre quem são os fornecedores e quais as atividades eles realizam; escopo fechado; tempo fixo de desenvolvimento [4,5,6,7,10,13,14,15]. Assim, uma pesquisa que investigue como metodologias ágeis podem se inserir no contexto de gestão do acordo de fornecedor é relevante para resolver esses e outros problemas na relação existente entre cliente-fornecedor.…”

A method for investigating the quality of evolving object‐oriented software using defects in global software development projects

“…Further refinements were then performed based on insights and lessons learned from the application of the method in that study. This resulted in the latest version of the method that is presented in this paper, which was also applied in another empirical case study, i.e., [19]. Table I shows the information about the studies and the GSD contexts in which the method was applied.…”

“…The method was then applied in a study that was conducted at a company that develops online gaming systems ( [19]). The company requested to remain anonymous.…”

“…The method is based on lessons from empirical studies presented in [3,16,18] and [19], and the data collection methods for each study are presented in detail in each study. Included in the present paper, apart from the complete method, are details of how the method was developed and how it was refined, as well as how the lessons learned from each individual empirical study helped in the development of the method.…”

“…We, therefore, gained insights through the individual studies, and this enabled us to construct a systematic and coherent method by following a method engineering approach. Therefore, the current version of the method presented in this paper is a synthesis and aggregation of lessons learned from GSD empirical studies presented in [3,16,18] and [19]. Although we do not invent the method fragments and the fundamental properties of the method (e.g., the importance of understanding context and the goal-oriented approach), the novelty of the method is in how it combines them into a coherent structure and the insights that are obtained in following the method.…”