Report (M.S.)--Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University. M.S. 1992. / Vita. Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 60-62). Also available via the Internet.

Thesis (M.S.)--Ohio University, August, 1994. / Title from PDF t.p.

Thesis (M.S.)--Oregon Graduate Institute of Science and Technology, 1990.

International Telemetering Conference Proceedings / October 17-20, 1994 / Town & Country Hotel and Conference Center, San Diego, California / The advantages of using visual programming to create, modify, test and display a telemetry stream are presented. The failure to fully deploy the high-gain antenna of the Galileo spacecraft has resulted in a software redesign of the computer systems onboard the spacecraft to support the low-gain antenna mission. Visual programming software is being used to test new algorithms as part of the ground support for the spacecraft Test Bed. It is very important that any new software algorithms be thoroughly tested on the ground before any modifications are made to the spacecraft. The advantage of using a visual programming language (LabVIEW, National Instruments) is that it provides easy visibility into the decommutation process that is being modified by the Galileo programming support team. In addition, utilities were written using visual programming to allow real-time data display and error detection. A data acquisition board is used to clock in the actual synchronous telemetry signal from the Test Bed at rates below 10 kHz. The time to write and modify the code using visual programming is significantly less (by a factor of 4 to 10) than using text-based code. The gains in productivity are attributed to the communication among the customer, developer, and computer that are facilitated by the visual syntax of the language.

Thesis (M. Eng.)--Carleton University, 2004. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 68-75). Also available in electronic format on the Internet.

In the 1990s, software projects became larger in size and more complicated in structure. The traditional development processes were not able to answer the needs of these growing projects. Comprehensive documentation in traditional methodologies made processes slow and discouraged the developers. Testing, after all code is written, was time consuming, too costly and made error correction and debugging much harder. Fixing the code at the end of the project also affects the internal quality of the software. Agile software development processes evolved to bring quick solutions to these existing problems of the projects. Test Driven Development (TDD) is a technique, used in many agile methodologies, that suggests minimizing documentation, writing automated tests before implementing the code and frequently run tests to get immediate feedback. The aim is to increase software productivity by shortening error correction duration and increase software quality by providing rapid feedback to the developer. In this thesis work, a software project is developed with TDD and compared with a control project developed using traditional development techniques in terms of software productivity and software quality. In addition, TDD project is compared with an early work in terms of product quality. The benefits and the challenges of TDD are also investigated during the whole process.

Thesis (MTech (Quality))--Cape Peninsula University of Technology, 2010 / The aim of this study is to examine the level of utilisation of productivity software by staff of the Engineering Faculty of a South African University, and the impact it has on productivity. One of the primary effects of staff underutilisation is time wasted by staff who are doing tasks manually, instead of learning faster methods of doing tasks. It was thought that the use of computers would free staff up from the tedium of everyday manual tasks, effectively giving staff a shorter work day, however the actual impact has been to increase workload, as one can now simply do much more work. Staff have become so accustomed to using technology in every aspect of the daily work life, that they are not able to perform even the most basic function if that particular technology, such as e-mail or the internet, is not working. This study investigates the current skills level of staff in their use of productivity software, as well as what effect their current knowledge has on their ability to do their job effectively. Also to be investigated is how their level of training relates to their current level of knowledge, what tasks are staff not capable of doing, what additional skills do they need to improve their productivity, what type of training would they like to receive. A questionnaire will be used to gather required information about both the general skill level, as well as specific functions in Microsoft Excel and Word, as well as Novell GroupWise.

Este trabalho tem como objetivo propor um modelo para a criação e organização de um processo fabril de produção de software. Para atingir este objetivo foram mapeadas 11 empresas de produção de software com características fabris, 6 brasileiras (o autor deste trabalho não possui uma autorização forma para divulgar o nome das empresas) e 5 estrangeiras (as japonesas Hitachi, Toshiba, NEC, Fujtsu e a americana SDC). Salienta-se que os dados utilizados neste trabalho sobre as empresas estrangeiras foram extraídos de CUSUMANO (1991). É importante salientar que todas as fábricas brasileiras que se propuseram a participar do estudo de caso possuem certificação de qualidade em processos comprovada (CMMI e/ou ISO). Após a apresentação dos casos é realizada uma comparação entre os processos fabris brasileiros e estrangeiros. Uma aderência do processo de produção de software mapeados nas empresas ao modelo proposto, também, é desenvolvida no trabalho. Por fim, 01 caso real apresentando o comportamento do modelo proposto na criação de um processo fabril, também, se caracteriza como um dos pontos a ser destacado. / This work has as objective to propose a model to create and to organize a production process with factory software characteristic. To reach this objective 11 software production companies were mapped, 6 Brazilian (the author of this work doesn\'t possess an authorization to publish the name of the companies) and 5 foreigners (Hitachi, Toshiba, NEC, Fujtsu and SDC). The data used in this work, on the foreign companies were extracted of CUSUMANO (1991). All the Brazilian factories that participate of this case study possess quality certification in processes (CMMI and/or ISO). After the presentation of the cases a comparison between the Brazilian factories and the foreigners\' factories is developed. An adherence of the software production process mapped in the companies to the proposed model, also, is showed in the work. A real case presenting the behavior of the model proposed in the creation software production process, also, is characterized in the text (12 cases in the total).

Lower cost and shorter time-to-market expectations are the major drivers of software productivity improvements. To manage productivity effectively, it is important to identify the most relevant difficulties and develop strategies to cope with them. Agile methods, including Extreme Programming and Scrum, have evolved as approaches to simplify software development process, potentially leading to better productivity. They aim to shorten development time and handle the inevitable changes resulting from market dynamics. Although the industry has extensively adopted agile methods, little research has empirically examined the software development agility construct regarding its dimensions, determinants, and effects on software development performance. Understanding this construct could help determine where to concentrate management efforts (and related financial resources) from a practical standpoint and where to focus research efforts from an academic perspective. Considerable research has been directed at identifying factors that have a significant impact on software development productivity. In general, the studied productivity factors were related to product, personnel, project, process, or organizational issues. Continuously evaluating productivity factors is important, as factors may change under new software engineering practices. However, little research has investigated the major factors influencing agile team productivity. ]The goal of this thesis was to explore productivity definitions, factors, and monitoring in agile teams and to improve the practice based on the collected evidence and gained knowledge. This thesis presents five novel contributions: C1 - Empirical verification of the importance of productivity for companies adopting agile methods and its perceived benefits; C2 - Rationale for the definition of productivity in the context of agile methods; C3 - Empirical verification of agile team productivity factors; C4 - A conceptual framework for agile team productivity factors and their impact; C5 - A team productivity monitoring process considering adaptability and an evaluation of the usefulness of agile team productivity metrics. / Menor custo e expectativa de menor time-to-market são os principais motivadores para melhorias de produtividade de software. Para gerir eficazmente a produtividade, é importante identificar as dificuldades mais relevantes e desenvolver estratégias para lidar com elas. Os métodos ágeis, incluindo Programação Extrema e Scrum, evoluíram como abordagens para simplificar o processo de desenvolvimento de software, potencialmente levando a uma melhor produtividade. Eles visam reduzir o tempo de desenvolvimento e lidar com as mudanças inevitáveis decorrentes da dinâmica do mercado. Embora a indústria tenha adotado amplamente métodos ágeis, há pouco entendimento científico do construto agilidade em desenvolvimento de software em relação às suas dimensões, determinantes e efeitos sobre o desempenho no desenvolvimento de software. Compreender esse construto poderia ajudar a determinar onde concentrar os esforços de gestão (e recursos financeiros relacionados) de um ponto de vista prático, assim como onde concentrar os esforços de investigação de uma perspectiva científica. Pesquisa considerável tem sido direcionada para identificar os fatores com impacto significativo na produtividade de desenvolvimento de software. Em geral, os fatores de produtividade estudados foram relacionadas ao produto, pessoas, projeto, processo ou questões organizacionais. Avaliar fatores de produtividade continuamente é importante, pois os fatores podem mudar quando novas práticas de engenharia de software são adotadas. No entanto, poucos estudos investigaram fatores influenciando a produtividade de times ágeis. O objetivo desta tese é explorar definições, fatores e monitoramento de produtividade em times ágeis e melhorar a prática baseada em evidência. Esta tese apresenta cinco novas contribuições: C1 - Verificação empírica da importância de produtividade para as empresas que adotam métodos ágeis e seus benefícios percebidos; C2 - Justificativa para a definição da produtividade no contexto de métodos ágeis; C3 - A verificação empírica de fatores de produtividade em times ágeis; C4 - Um arcabouço conceitual de fatores de produtividade em times ágeis e seu impacto; C5 - Um processo de acompanhamento de produtividade de times ágeis, considerando adaptabilidade e uma avaliação da utilidade de métricas de produtividade para esses times.

Downloading software from a server usually takes a noticeable amount of time, that is, noticeable to the user who wants to run the program. However, this issue can be mitigated by the use of streaming software. Software steaming is a means by which software can begin execution even while transmission of the full software program may still be in progress. Therefore, the application load time (i.e., the amount of time from when an application is selected for download to when the application can be executed) observed by the user can be significantly reduced. Moreover, unneeded software components might not be downloaded to the device, lowering memory and bandwidth usages. As a result, resource utilization such as memory and bandwidth usage may also be more efficient. Using our streaming method, an embedded device can support a wide range of applications which can be run on demand. Software streaming also enables small memory footprint devices to run applications larger than the physical memory by using our memory management technique. In this dissertation, we present a streaming method we call block streaming to transmit stream-enabled applications, including stream-enabled file I/O. We implemented a tool to partition software into blocks which can be transmitted (streamed) to the embedded device. Our streaming method was implemented and simulated on an MBX860 board and on a hardware/software co-simulation platform in which we used the PowerPC architecture. We show a robotics application that, with our software streaming method, is able to meet its deadline. The application load time for this application also improves by a factor of more than 10X when compared to downloading the entire application before running it. The experimental results also show that our implementation improves file I/O operation latency; in our examples, the performance improves up to 55.83X when compared with direct download. Finally, we show a stream-enabled game application combined with stream-enabled file I/O for which the user can start playing the game 3.18X more quickly than using only the stream-enabled game program file alone.