Technology insertion
John A. D. Anderson · 1990
Computer Sciences Corporation (CSC) is establishing a comprehensive object-oriented life-cycle methodology for Ada software development.The development and introduction of this methodology include many technical, managerial, and logistical challenges that go beyond creating and/or selecting software analysis and design techniques.Like any other large project, such an endeavor must be planned with a specific set of approaches and deliverables, milestones to measure progress, and evaluation criteria to determine quality.This paper identifies the components of a comprehensive life-cycle methodology and the necessary steps required to introduce it into an existing development environment.Recognizing that such a methodology cannot be created and established instantaneously, this paper suggests criteria formaking trade-offs during the creation, introduction, and refinement of these life-cycle methodology components.Finally, the paper reports CSC's progress in developing and inserting its life-cycle methodology into practice. BACKGROUNDThorough research and experience can establish a set of techniques or tools that could greatly improve the software development process, increasing the quality of the product and the productivity of development staff.Unfortunately, the effective and efficient introduction of innovative technology into the mainstream of software development is as much a challenge as the creation of the innovation itself.For an organization to easily accept and apply new methods, techniques, or tools, they must fit neatly into the current method of operation and be reasonably similar to those they replaced.The Ada language program is an example of the difficulty in introducing new technology.Although the Ada language [DOD83] supports powerful