Guidelines: Individual Project Critique

160 Points - Due 4pm. Wednesday, December 12, 2000 in SAL 328

Send your ZIPPED electronic copy of Individual Critique to csci577@usc.edu. The file name should be scf-username.zip (e.g., kitapci.zip)

Length:	4-6 pages (+/- a factor of 2) recommended, but not absolutely required. Don't use very small or large fonts
Main Question:	If we were to do the project over again, how would we do it better, and how does that relate to the software engineering principles in the course?

The Individual Project Critique shall consist of the following two elements (more emphasis on element 1, i.e., how your team's process could have been better):

1. Process Improvement (2/3 of emphasis)
Candidate topics include but are not limited to:

Use of the WinWin Spiral Model
Use of various tools (Easy-WinWin tool; Rational Rose; USC-COCOMO tool; etc...)
Guidelines for Model-Based Architecting and Software Engineering (MBASE) deliverables
Information sources (lectures, papers, textbook, course notes, etc...)
Human Resources (Professor, Guest Speakers, Teaching Assistant, Library clients, Library Personnel, Architecture Review Board members, etc...)
Management (staffing, organization, planning, controlling process and product)

We would be particularly interested in feedback on the various tools, that is constructive in suggesting improvements rather than just identifying shortfalls; it should be balanced in identifying things that were helpful as well as obstacles; and it should be relatively high-level in focusing on strategic factors rather than individual bugs (turn in separate bug reports for that).

We would also be interested in well-reasoned improvement suggestions to the MBASE guidelines.

2. Product Improvement (1/3 of emphasis)
Describe possible improvements in the various components of your product: i.e., if you had to design the system again, how would you do it better, knowing what you know now. The Product Improvement section will not be considered in grading the final project, therefore, do not hesitate to discuss some of the potential flaws of the current design: the CSCI 577b teams will consider product improvement suggestions during the rebaselining of the Life Cycle Architecture package.

The Product and Process improvement aspects of your Individual Critique may include the following:

1. Determine the project category or application sub-domain that fits your project best. Then, using the list of developer-side complicators and simplifiers for the category of your project as a guide, discuss how the complicators and simplifiers manifested themselves in your product. You can definitely introduce additional complicators/simplifiers (not listed for your project category), which you think are relevant. In particular, you can discuss:
- How you effectively used or could have used, the simplifiers/complicators to manage your clients' expectations?
- How you effectively used or could have used, the simplifiers/complicators to reconcile your clients' expectations with developer capabilities, schedule constraints (11 weeks for the Engineering Phase, 12 weeks for the Production Phase) or other contraints (ISD constraints--see below), before firmly committing to a set of requirements, and proceeding to architect the system to the requirements?

2. Using the list of client-side complicators, do you foresee any difficulties for the acceptance of your system by the client organization or for the transition of the system to the library, within the CSCI 577ab timeline?

3. Discuss how the Information Services Division's Policies, Resources and Constraints introduced additional complicators or simplifiers.