Software Development Governance: a Case Study for Tools Integration

Abstract

Software development governance can be defined as the application of "governance" in software engineering in order to increase the probability of success in the level of individual projects as well as in the level of the organization comprising many interrelated projects. The topic deserves an interdisciplinary perspective, as the general subject of governance has been analyzed quite extensively under the field of Transaction Cost Economics. This interdisciplinary approach enabled the identification of three main modes of governance for software engineering, namely: top-down governance, bottom-up governance and reuse governance, each having unique transaction cost characteristics. To be cost effective, (1) the organizations should adapt the right governance structure for their projects based on their characteristics, and (2) the software development tools should support and be in alignment with the underlying governance structure. In this chapter, we briefly overview the first premise and then outline an approach to address the second premise, specifically tackling the issue of tools integration, for software modeling and configuration management tools. We use Dependency Structure Matrix (DSM) to represent the mapping between governance structures and software modules, propose a configuration management approach for each mode of software governance, and demonstrate a successful integration using Lattix LDM, IBM Rational ClearCase and IBM Rational Rhapsody, three broadly available tools in the software industry. © 2011, IGI Global.