Sunday, February 3, 2008

Software Development Process Automation

Few days ago I attended a session here in ITWorx called Engineering Processes. It was a very good session by an excellent speaker Alyaa Ali from the process improvement team.

I confess that before the session I wasn’t know enough and clear information of the CMMi and its parts and how we apply it, which have changed – thanks for Alyaa – after attending this great session.

But what I want to talk about now is a different thing. I got an idea during the session and I can’t stop thinking in it, so I’m writing it now to know your comments about it.

Let’s start with a simple question,
why clients want software at all? Why they pay a lot of money in it?
As the question is simple, the answer is simple too. In abstract, as we learned in faculty, clients need software to automate their current ordinal paper based system. I know that this is a very abstract answer – which may you have comments about it - but can you put it in mind just for a while.

Back to the Alyaa’s great session about Engineering Processes or exactly about CMMi.
She shows us many documents that are used during the software development phases.
Shoe also mentioned a lot tools that is used through different phases by different members having different roles.

This led me to think about the software development from a little different perspective, which can be summarized into the following points:

  • Software development all in all is an industry like any of our clients’ industry.
  • We use a lot of documents in our work.
  • We have many roles in the software development process, having different view points, having different activities in the process.
  • Software development is a complicated process that is hard to manage.

    All these and many other – which I can’t list all of them now – have led me to a final big idea.

Software development process needs an automation system that automates its activities, and achieves the goals that any automated system targets in its life environment.

I know it looks a crazy idea and unfeasible. But I think it worth thinking and worth a trail of us.

Finally remember that all human achievements, begin with ideas that looks unfeasible and some times begins with dreams