C. Amting Directorate General Information Society, European Commission, Brussels th Under the 4 Framework of European Research, the European Systems and Soft ware Initiative (ESSI) was part of the ESPRIT Programme. This initiative funded more than 470 projects in the area of software and system process improvements. The majority of these projects were process improvement experiments carrying out and taking up new development processes, methods and technology within the software development process of a company. In addition, nodes (centres ofexper tise), European networks (organisations managing local activities), training and dissemination actions complemented the process improvement experiments. ESSI aimed at improving the software development capabilities of European enterprises. It focused on best practice and helped European companies to develop world class skills and associated technologies to build the increasingly complex and varied systems needed to compete in the marketplace. The dissemination activities were designed to build a forum, at European level, to exchange information and knowledge gained within process improvement ex periments. Their major objective was to spread the message and the results of experiments to a wider audience, through a variety ofdifferent channels. The European Experience Exchange (I;UR~X) project has been one ofthese dis semination activities within the European Systems and Software Initiative.~UR~X has collected the results of practitioner reports from numerous workshops in Europe and presents, in this series of books, the results of Best Practice achieve ments in European Companies over the last few years.

Agile Estimating and Planning is the definitive, practical guide to estimating and planning agile projects. In this book, Agile Alliance cofounder Mike Cohn discusses the philosophy of agile estimating and planning and shows you exactly how to get the job done, with real-world examples and case studies. Concepts are clearly illustrated and readers are guided, step by step, toward how to answer the following questions: What will we build? How big will it be? When must it be done? How much can I really complete by then? You will first learn what makes a good plan-and then what makes it agile. Using the techniques in Agile Estimating and Planning, you can stay agile from start to finish, saving time, conserving resources, and accomplishing more. Highlights include: Why conventional prescriptive planning fails and why agile planning works How to estimate feature size using story points and ideal days–and when to use each How and when to re-estimate How to prioritize features using both financial and nonfinancial approaches How to split large features into smaller, more manageable ones How to plan iterations and predict your team's initial rate of progress How to schedule projects that have unusually high uncertainty or schedule-related risk How to estimate projects that will be worked on by multiple teams Agile Estimating and Planning supports any agile, semiagile, or iterative process, including Scrum, XP, Feature-Driven Development, Crystal, Adaptive Software Development, DSDM, Unified Process, and many more. It will be an indispensable resource for every development manager, team leader, and team member.

Project estimating plays a vital role in project management. Typically completed in the initial planning stages, accurate project estimation can be a difficult task. Organizations and project managers should use these initial estimates to baseline the project schedule and cost, then refine these estimates as the project develops. Accurate estimation and refinement of the estimates leads to better and earlier decision making, thus maximizing value.Developed within the framework of A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK&® Guide) &– Sixth Edition and other PMI standards, the Practice Standard for Project Estimating &– Second Edition focuses on providing models for the project management profession in both plan-driven and change-driven adaptive (agile) life cycles. This practice standard describes the aspects of project estimating that are recognized as good practice on most projects most of the time and that are widely recognized and consistently applied.PMI practice standards describe processes, activities, constraints, inputs, and outputs for specific discipline subject areas and are targeted to all practitioners within projectized organizations, not just project managers.

This unique volume explores cutting-edge management approaches to developing complex software that is efficient, scalable, sustainable, and suitable for distributed environments. Practical insights are offered by an international selection of pre-eminent authorities, including case studies, best practices, and balanced corporate analyses. Emphasis is placed on the use of the latest software technologies and frameworks for life-cycle methods, including the design, implementation and testing stages of software development. Topics and features: · Reviews approaches for reusability, cost and time estimation, and for functional size measurement of distributed software applications · Discusses the core characteristics of a large-scale defense system, and the design of software project management (SPM) as a service · Introduces the 3PR framework, research on crowdsourcing software development, and an innovative approach to modeling large-scale multi-agent software systems · Examines a system architecture for ambient assisted living, and an approach to cloud migration and management assessment · Describes a software error proneness mechanism, a novel Scrum process for use in the defense domain, and an ontology annotation for SPM in distributed environments · Investigates the benefits of agile project management for higher education institutions, and SPM that combines software and data engineering This important text/reference is essential reading for project managers and software engineers involved in developing software for distributed computing environments. Students and researchers interested in SPM technologies and frameworks will also find the work to be an invaluable resource. Prof. Zaigham Mahmood is a Senior Technology Consultant at Debesis Education UK and an Associate Lecturer (Research) at the University of Derby, UK. He also holds positions as Foreign Professor at NUST and IIU in Islamabad, Pakistan, and Professor Extraordinaire at the North West University Potchefstroom, South Africa.

To build reliable, industry-applicable software products, large-scale software project groups must continuously improve software engineering processes to increase product quality, facilitate cost reductions, and adhere to tight schedules. Emphasizing the critical components of successful large-scale software projects, Software Project Management: A

Software Project Management explains the latest management strategies and techniques in software developments. It covers such issues as keeping the team motivated, cost-justifying strategies, deaflines and budgets.

Annotation "Integrated IT Project Management: A Model-Centric Approach utilizes practical applications of real-world policies, roles and responsibilities, templates, process flows, and checklists for each of these three component processes. It shows how such processes ensure optimum utilization of people, process, and technology resources during the management and delivery of IT projects. The book provides insight into the key components of the Rational Unified Process from IBM Rational Corporation and the Project Management Body of knowledge PMBOK from the Project Management Institute (PMI) illustrating how they work together and align based on industry processing standards."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved