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Making a decision for the requirements of multi‐stakeholders is a key process, especially in distributed software development projects. Local decision‐making for requirements in distributed software development is really difficult to accomplish as well as communicating these requirements over organizational boundaries and conveying them to the offshore developers is a big task. This study presents an empirical evaluation for the effectiveness of local decision‐making on the customization process of the software in the distributed development against productivity and cost reduction. This empirical evaluation utilizes the Communicating Customization Requirements of Multi‐Clients in a Distributed Domain (CCRD) model. The empirical study estimates the productivity of CCRD in terms of the number of requirements for which decisions are made. In addition, the study estimates the reduction in the total cost of the customization process in terms of the salaries of the required local decision‐makers. Besides, this study finds the critical point at which the CCRD is still valid (i.e. the minimum number of requirements that violate the significance and worthy of CCRD). The study uses a real data set of 18 clients distributed through 16 cities and involved in one customization project requested about 3000 requirements collected in 1290 working hours. The results of this study showed that the local decision‐making improved the productivity of the customization process from 503 requirements in 200 min of simulation to 1,499 requirements. In addition, it reduced 41.5% of the cost. Besides, the results showed that the minimum number of requirements at which CCRD is still valid is 112 requirements.

The business model of architecture has been accused of being technologically deficient. Through case studies, this paper investigates alternatives to the status quo of computation in architecture, with a focus on design-oriented service providers. It first examines the discourse on computation within the field, then describes the experiments of a relevant design firm before discussing implications for the wider industry. In the process, the paper articulates the gap between theoretical computing applications and the realities of the architecture business. It addresses difficult technological adaptations within the industry with concrete use cases of integrated computing expertise, highlighting opportunities, benefits, and, more importantly, the need for a computational workforce.

Many Web applications do not meet the precise needs of their users. Browser extensions offer a way to customize web applications, but most people do not have the programming skills to implement their own extensions. In this paper, we present spreadsheet-driven customization, a technique that enables end users to customize software without doing any traditional programming. The idea is to augment an application’s UI with a spreadsheet that is synchronized with the application’s data. When the user manipulates the spreadsheet, the underlying data is modified and the changes are propagated to the UI, and vice versa. We have implemented this technique in a prototype browser extension called Wildcard. Through concrete examples, we demonstrate that Wildcard can support useful customizations—ranging from sorting lists of search results to showing related data from web APIs—on top of existing websites. We also present the design principles underlying our prototype. Customization can lead to dramatically better experiences with software. We think that spreadsheet-driven customization offers a promising new approach to unlocking this benefit for all users, not just programmers.

The problems with this System Change Project were exacerbated by the choice of third-party software followed by significant software customization. By identifying potential lack of fit between the ...

The design of Engineer-To-Order products needs tools and methods for reducing time and cost during the phase of the quotation preparation. Modularization is one of the more applied design methods for ETO systems; however, it is necessary to integrate traditional tools with practices of design optimization to improve the development of a proposal. Even if commercial design tools for modeling specific types of engineering systems are available, the application of design optimization is still based on the use of tools not integrated with each level of the design phases. Moreover, these tools often require software customization. The integration of geometrical modeling, simulations, analysis, and optimization concerns the interaction between different tools. This paper describes an approach to support the Multi-Object Optimization related to the design of complex ETO systems with a focus on the oil & gas context. In this context, Genetic Algorithms and Constraint Satisfaction Problems are introduced as tools to support the design optimization of steel structures. The approach includes the employment of different and integrated tools throughout the design phases. This paper also shows a collection of tools to support the different levels for the design of different ETO products during the preparation of an offer related to proposal submission.

Software is not developed in a vacuum. Development teams and organizations must react to various incidents, such as changes in personnel, development practices, project objectives, and business environment, and all kinds of delays occurring during large-scale software development projects. These incidents challenge contemporary communication, collaboration and development practices. They also require an ability to adapt to the new situation. We argue that the problems in reacting to those incidents and the inability in implementing corrective actions are the main reasons for software project failures. We identify four drivers of collaboration. They are named as contract, individual person, group of collaborators, and development process, each being appropriate in different points of time. Yet their emphasis and appropriateness vary over time. This emphasizes the developers’ ability to transit between the drivers of collaboration. publishedVersion

Each scientist is specialized in his or her field of research and in the tools that he or she uses during the research in a specified site. Thus, he or she is the most suitable person for improving the tools by overcoming their limitations to realize faster and higher quality analysis. However, most scientists are not software developers. Hence, it is necessary to provide them with an easy approach that enables non-software developers to improve and customize their tools. This paper presents an approach for easily improving and customizing any hydrogeological software. It is the result of experiences with updating several interdisciplinary case studies. The main insights of this approach have been demonstrated using four examples: MIX (FORTRAN-based), BrineMIX (C++-based), EasyQuim and EasyBal (both spreadsheet-based). The improved software has been proven to be a better tool for enhanced analysis by substantially reducing the computation time and the tedious processing of the input and output data files., R. Criollo thanks Barcelona Cicle de l’Aigua (BCASA) and the Catalan Industrial Doctorates Plan of the Secretariat for Universities and Research, Ministry of Economy and Knowledge of the Generalitat de Catalunya for their financial support. The staff of the Department of Geotechnical Engineering and Geosciences of the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC) and the Institute of Environmental Assessment and Water Research (IDAEA-CSIC) are gratefully acknowledged for their useful comments and suggestions. We also thank Scott Tacker and Dadiyorto Wendy for their contributions which improved the manuscript

It is time for us to welcome you to the Third Workshop on Forming an Ecosystem Around Software Transformation (FEAST 2018)! This year's workshop is held in conjunction with the 25th ACM Conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS) on October 19th, 2018 in Toronto, Canada. As always, the workshop is geared toward discussion and understanding of several critical topics surrounding late-stage software transformation for improving the security and efficiency of all software used in security-critical applications. The scope of discussion for this workshop will include topics that may be necessary to fully explore the power and impact of late-stage software customization efforts, on binary code and beyond. The call for papers attracted strong submissions from both academy and industry. In total, we accepted 5 full technical papers, and augmented them with a number of exciting invited talks, short talks, and planned discussions. Putting together FEAST'18 is a team effort, and we could not have done it without the authors (and their excellent submissions), the program committee (for their insightful reviews), and the Office of Naval Resea rch for the creation of this workshop in the first place. We are excited about this workshop, and we are sure that you will be as well! Please enjoy the programs, the discussions, and the resulting spread and creation of new ideas!

This paper proposes an idea on how to use existing techniques from late stage software customization to improve the security of software employing cryptographic functions. In our vision, we can verify an implemented algorithm and replace it with a faster or more trusted implementation if necessary. We also want to be able to add encryption to binaries that currently do not employ any, or gain access to unencrypted data if an application depends on encryption.

The Second Workshop on Forming an Ecosystem Around Software Transformation (FEAST 2017) is held in conjunction with the 24th ACM Conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS 2017) on November 3, 2017 in Dallas, Texas. The workshop is geared toward discussion and understanding of several critical topics surrounding software executable transformation for improving the security and efficiency of all software used in security-critical applications. The scope of discussion for this workshop includes topics that may be necessary to fully exploit the power and impact of late-stage software customization effort.

Software is an essential asset of an organization in organizing business process. Thus, demand for software gradually increase from day-to-day. However, due to the complex structure of a software and tedious software design has cause delays in making it to be available in market. Consequently it increases the needs for customizing software from existing system. Under those circumstances, software customization is influenced by the flexibility of software that indicates how easy the software is modified to suit the current environment. Thus, the easiness is determined by the flexibility point that resides in software. Since flexibility is a desirable software quality characteristic, determination of flexibility point is essential. In this case, user role transformation from one domain to another domain has been viewed as flexibility point that triggers changes into the software. To demonstrate flexibility point exist at the user role, this study emphasize on the change of class design from Customer Relationship Management System (CRMS) to Tuition Centre Management System (TCMS). As a result, some slight modification on the user oriented class attributes and methods effect the changes on other associated classes. Certainly, slight modification only can be made if the user-oriented class definition is written as general purpose rather than dedicated to one system. Therefore, proper definition of user-oriented class assists in promoting flexibility and at the same time it has been view as software flexibility point.

The study in this chapter builds upon the existing body of knowledge on software customization, the concepts of resources, capabilities and value from the RBV as well as the insights presented from the last investigation. It aims to provide an elaborative understanding of software customization activities and their strategic role for a software vendor’s software product management. Building upon the theoretical concept of dynamic capabilities, this study employs a qualitative multiple case study design within two different software vendor firms.

The study in this chapter builds upon the existing body of knowledge on software customization and the concepts of resources, capabilities and value from the RBV as presented in the last two chapters. It aims to provide a deeper understanding of software customization activities from a software vendor firm’s perspective.

The complexity of maintenance and evolution of systems is increased whenever it is necessary to meet different customers and to include diverse requirements, involving customization and adaptation tasks to fix problems and add new features. Currently the development team of the Federal University of Sergipe is working with the customization and maintenance of Integrated Management Systems that automate fundamental operations for the academic and administrative management. Constant changes in the original system source code to meet the requirements of the university are needed. Because of that, it was required the creation and adoption of a process to manage this activity. However, this current approach is not showing to be adequate, since the changes made by the development team are tangled and also crosscutting the original code, complicating the identification and reaplication of the customizations in newer system versions, causing delays in the implementation of new features and maintenance of which are in production. This research presents a case study that evaluates the adoption of Aspect-Oriented Programming in adaptation, maintenance and evolution of customized systems in comparison to the process currently adopted by UFS. As a result, it was observed that it was possible to implement 99.68% of the types of variations using AOP, and a small number of errors were detected after the module update using AOP. However, these errors need to be carefully evaluated due to the occurrence of version conflicts. The results of the study indicate that there are benefits with the adoption of the AOP, but developers confirmed the existence of some obstacles that need to be addressed before the adoption of the POA in this cenario. A necessidade de atender a diferentes clientes e incluir diferentes requisitos aumentam a complexidade da manutenção e evolução de sistemas, envolvendo tarefas de customização e adaptação para corrigir problemas e incluir novas funcionalidades. Atualmente a equipe de desenvolvimento da Universidade Federal de Sergipe vem trabalhando com a customização e manutenção de Sistemas Integrados de Gestão que informatizam operações fundamentais para a gestão acadêmica e administrativa. Para atender aos requisitos da universidade, são necessárias modificações constantes no código fonte original do sistema, isso demandou a criação de um processo adotado atualmente para gerenciar essa atividade. No entanto, a abordagem atual adotada pela UFS não vem se mostrando adequada, pois as adaptações introduzidas pela equipe de desenvolvimento estão espalhadas e entrelaçadas com o código original, dificultando as tarefas de identificar e reaplicar as customizações em novas versões, causando atrasos na implantação de novos recursos e na manutenção dos que estão em produção. Nesta pesquisa é apresentado um estudo de caso que avalia a adoção da Programação Orientada a Aspectos na adaptação, manutenção e evolução de sistemas customizados em comparação ao processo adotado atualmente na UFS. Como resultado, observou-se que foi possível implementar 99,68% dos tipos de variações utilizando a POA e um pequeno número de erros foi detectado após a reintrodução das variações com a POA. Contudo, esses erros precisam ser avaliados cuidadosamente devido à ocorrência de conflitos de versão. Os resultados obtidos com a avaliação do estudo indicam que há benefícios com a adoção da POA, porém os desenvolvedores confirmaram a existência de alguns obstáculos que precisam ser mitigados para adoção da POA no contexto avaliado.

This article describes how the journal site of the School of Humanities and Education Sciences at the Universidad Nacional de La Plata was implemented and developed, so that our experience may be useful for anyone embarking on a similar undertaking. We first review the experience of the School in terms of scientific journal publication and the tasks performed by the Library to help its visualization. Secondly, we mention the work of the Under-Secretariat of Publication Management and Dissemination (PGEyD; its acronym in Spanish) of the School to make launching the site a reality. Special reference is made to software customization, massive information upload to the system (users and previous issues), and the procedures that enable the semi-automatic inclusion of the site content in the institutional repository and in the Web catalogue. Then, we discuss the work that is being carried out in connection with editors’ training and support, and the results obtained after one year of labour: the creation of 10 journals, the migration of the entire works of four titles and the inclusion of 25% of the contributions published in the journals edited by FaHCE. Finally, we point out a series of challenges that the Under-Secretariat has set itself to improve the site and to optimize intra- and inter-institutional workflow.

Software as a Service (SaaS) represent a form of software distribution on demand and accessible via the Internet. The development of SaaS enables service users (tenants) to benefit from the low cost of deployment and maintenance. The Multi-Tenant (MT) architecture is often used in the development of SaaS, it allows the sharing of software and hardware resources, providing cost savings to the costumers and the service provider. A challenge that the SaaS developer has is to keep sharing the instance of the software in scenarios with tenants who have differing needs. In this project, to address the variability of tenants in SaaS MT were set some patterns, based on Software Product Lines techniques for customizing user interfaces, data, processes and permissions. A framework called FoSaaS (Framework of Software as a Service) has also been developed to support the use of patterns, providing support to developers in SaaS MT coding. In addition to allowing the customization of SaaS MT, experiments in this project indicated that patterns improve reuse, quality and productivity in developed SaaS MT. The applicability of the patterns was evidenced through real projects in developing commercial applications. Softwares como um Serviço (SaaS) representam uma forma de distribuição de software sob demanda e acessíveis via Internet. O desenvolvimento de SaaS possibilita aos consumidores do serviço (tenants) se beneficiarem do baixo custo de implantação e manutenção. A arquitetura Multi-Tenant (MT) é frequentemente utilizada no desenvolvimento de SaaS, pois permite o compartilhamento de recursos de software e hardware, proporcionando a redução de custos ao consumidor e ao fornecedor do serviço. Um desafio que o desenvolvedor de SaaS tem é o de manter o compartilhamento da instância do software em cenários com tenants que possuem necessidades divergentes. Neste projeto, para tratar a variabilidade dos tenants em SaaS MT foram criados alguns padrões, com base em técnicas de linhas de produtos de software, para customização de interfaces de usuários, dados, processos e permissões. Um framework denominado FoSaaS (Framework of Software as a Service) também foi desenvolvido para apoiar o uso dos padrões criados fornecendo apoio aos desenvolvedores na codificação de SaaS MT. Além de permitir a customização de SaaS MT, experimentos realizados neste projeto indicaram que os padrões melhoram o reúso, a qualidade e a produtividade dos SaaS MT desenvolvidos. A aplicabilidade dos padrões foi evidenciada por meio da realização de projetos reais no desenvolvimento de aplicações comerciais.

Customization of open source software systems, such as the development of specific artifacts that meet their functional and non-functional requirements, can be licensed to acquiring organizations. However, it brings future problems to system maintenance, which in parallel is in constant evolution by their creators. The biggest challenge on this scenery is handling the evolutions of the original system made by their creators, which usually impact the acquiring organizations artifacts. In this context, the application of Software Product Lines (SPL) techniques emerges as a proposal to provide support in customizing acquired software. This study aims to evaluate in a real context and through controlled experiments the process of adaptation and maintenance of customized systems by comparing the approach currently used in the customizations, performed directly on the base code of the original system with the LPS techniques AspectJ, FeatureHouse and XVCL. The selection of those techniques for evaluation was based on a comparative analysis of the techniques raised on a systematic study that was realized, taking as a premise the possibility of creating customizable artifacts and the implementation of the variations apart of the base code, keeping it intact. Finally, after the experiment proposed in this study, quantitative and qualitative results regarding the usage of the SPL techniques AspectJ, FeatureHouse and XVCL in the adaptation and maintenance of customizable systems were obtained. These results show that FeatureHouse and XVCL were considered equivalent to each other and to the current approach. AspectJ, though it proved feasible, requires a steep learning curve. However, the adoption of one of those SPL techniques brings qualitative gains due to the possibility of creating customizable software artifacts and to the separation of the variations from the system base code. Customizações em sistema de software open-source, tais como o desenvolvimento de artefatos específicos que atendam seus requisitos funcionais e não funcionais, pode ser licenciada às organizações adquirentes. Contudo, traz problemas futuros à manutenção do sistema, o qual paralelamente está em constante evolução pelos seus criadores. O maior desafio neste cenário é lidar com as evoluções do sistema original realizadas pelos criadores, que normalmente impactam os artefatos das organizações adquirentes. Neste contexto, a aplicação de técnicas de Linha de Produto de Software (LPS) surge como uma proposta para prover suporte na customização de software adquirido. Este estudo objetiva avaliar em um contexto real e através de experimentos controlados, o processo de adaptação e manutenção de sistemas customizados, comparando a abordagem atualmente usada nas customizações realizadas diretamente no código base do sistema original com as técnicas LPS AspectJ, FeatureHouse e XVCL. A seleção dessas técnicas para avaliação foi baseada em uma análise comparativa das técnicas levantadas no estudo sistemático realizado, tomando como premissa a possibilidade de criação de artefatos customizáveis e a implementação das variações separada do código base, mantendo-o intacto. Finalmente, após o experimento proposto neste estudo, resultados quantitativos e qualitativos sobre o uso das técnicas de LPS AspectJ, FeatureHouse e XVCL na adaptação e manutenção de sistemas customizáveis foram obtidos. Estes resultados mostram que FeatureHouse e XVCL foram consideradas equivalentes entre si e à abordagem atual. AspectJ, embora tenha se provado viável, demanda uma acentuada curva de aprendizado. Entretanto, a adoção de uma destas técnicas de LPS traz ganhos qualitativos devido à possibilidade de criar artefatos de software customizáveis e a separação das variações do código base do sistema.

Purpose The chapter aims to present a case study of what is involved in implementing the VuFind discovery tool and to describe usability, usage, and feedback of VuFind. Design/methodology/approach The chapter briefly documents Western Michigan University (WMU) and University of Richmond’s (UR) experience with VuFind. WMU Libraries embarked on a process of implementing a new catalog interface in 2008. UR implemented VuFind in 2012. The usability result and usage of Web 2.0 features are discussed. Findings The implementation processes at WMU and UR differ. At WMU, users’ input was not consistent and demanded software customization. UR strategically began with a very focused project management approach, and intended the product as short-term solution. The usability and feedback from several sites are also presented. Practical implications The benefits of using open source software include low barrier and cost to entry, highly customizable code, and unlimited instances (libraries may run as many copies of as many components as needed, on as many pieces of hardware as they have, for as many purposes as they wish). With the usability studies presented, VuFind is proved to be a valid solution for libraries. Originality/value The chapter provides a unique account of library’s experience providing an alternative catalog interface using open source software. It also uniquely reports on VuFind usability and initial testing results and evaluation.

In typical enterprise applications, schema and data layout have to be changed from time to time. The main cases for such changes are software upgrades, software customization, or workload changes. Therefore, the option of database reorganization, such as adding an attribute to a table or changing attribute properties, is required.

Software customization in a large scale for a big number of customers can be as lucrative as well as expensive and challenging. From a business perspective it allows strengthening existing market positions and market shares, supports the expansion of businesses into new market segments and enables the satisfaction of customers with even exotic requirements and demands. From an engineering perspective, however, large scale customization is often associated with high implementation, testing and maintenance effort, resulting in high costs and also increased risks when realizing a large number of customized variants of a system. There is clearly the potential to introduce drastic improvements in terms of business opportunities, but massive investments and risks on both organizational and engineering level are hampering progress. The gap between the potential benefits and the foreseeable obstacles often causes tensions between marketing/market research and engineering groups in companies.

This research studies a new business model in the IT industry, the customization of standard software as the sole foundation for a software company’s earnings. Based on a theoretical background which combines the concepts of inter-organizational networks and open innovation we provide an interpretive case study of a small software company which customizes a standard product. Weinvestigate the company’s interactions with a large global software company which is the producer of the original software product and with other companies which are involved in the software customization process. We find that the customizing company and software customizations depend not only on initiatives which are set off internally in the company, but on how the ustomizingorganization’s inter-organizational network and interaction with other organizations is built up. The case company has built its network primarily on complex, formal partnerships, in which also opportunistic behavior occurs and where informal relations are invaluable sources of knowledge. In addition, the original software producer’s view and treatment of these companies has a vital impact on the customizing company’s practice which is influenced by the open innovation initiatives which the producer of the original software instigates.

peer-reviewed When configuring customizable software, it is useful to provide interactive tool-support that ensures that the configuration does not breach given constraints. But, when is a configuration complete and how can the tool help the user to complete it? We formalize this problem and relate it to concepts from non-monotonic reasoning well researched in Artificial Intelligence. The results are interesting for both practitioners and theoreticians. Practitioners will find a technique facilitating an interactive configuration process and experiments supporting feasibility of the approach. Theoreticians will find links between well-known formal concepts and a concrete practical application.

In studying the dynamics of ant nest excavation, the nest volume has to be continuously monitored. In many laboratory studies, the excavated substrate, such as sand, was collected, and the volume of excavation was calculated by converting the weight of the collected sand into the volume. The excavated sand can be manually collected and weighed; however, manual collection is tedious, particularly when frequent collections have to be performed for a period of several days. Manual collection may also introduce disturbance to the ants. The volume of excavation can also be monitored using a video system by transferring images into volume data. Unfortunately, it requires sophisticated software customization. A simple automatic system for continuously collecting and weighing the excavated sand is described. This system does not disturb the ants while collecting data and requires no software customization. It can display the digging curves while it is still collecting data.

Projecte fet en col.laboració amb Air Europa This project is an End-of-Studies thesis of an ENAC student performed in the Spanish airline Air Europa in Palma de Mallorca. It deals with the integration in terms of datalink of a new aircraft type in airline’s fleet, the Embraer 195, and with the development of new applications that make use of this new technology. The project starts with a brief introduction to aviation communication and datalink in particular, focusing in Air Europa’s trajectory until present situation. This complex domain is undergoing severe changes in recent years so all involved parties are detail introduced for a smooth understanding of following chapters. Likewise, a short presentation of Embraer’s modular avionics is presented. It follows the description of the steps taken and the problems encountered that led to have all Embraer messages correctly managed from its initial situation where only four messages where processed. Once familiar with the aircraft avionics, ground systems and datalink environment, three cases of datalink data integration are presented, highlighting the difficulties that arose in the process. The intermediate conclusions drawn in this part –some functions are missing in Embraer’s datalink- led to the customization of Embraer’s onboard datalink application, a complex process that benefitted from the fact that changing onboard’s datalink was inevitable given the circumstances. Finally, a short mention of AIRE test flights is included as it is the most innovative application of datalink. Key

Model Driven Development (MDD) of complex software systems can require manual adaptations of the generated artifacts. In fact, in order to cope with unforeseen requirements which are not completely satisfiable by means of the involved modeling languages, developer interventions could be needed. The optimal solution to deal with this issue, is based on the expressiveness improvement of the involved metamodels and refinement of the used model transformations. Nevertheless, these adaptations are not always possible or cost-effective especially if the new functionalities that have to be introduced affect only the single application being developed.This paper discusses and attempt to hand-tune the generated code by providing an approach supporting its merging with hand written modifications. For this purpose, the behaviour model of the system under study is considered to graphically specify the injection points where the modifications have to occur. The discussions are based on a running example consisting of a simple Web application.

This paper tackles the problem of signal period measurements by means of oscilloscopes. First, the performance of two last-generation scopes, implementing a zero-crossing algorithm, is evaluated. Then, after a brief resume of alternative measurement techniques, a solution to enhance the period-measurement capability of scopes is proposed and implemented in the LeCroy WaveMaster 8620A software. Finally, the results of the tests carried out on different signal waveforms are reported and analyzed.

The paper tackles the problem of signal period measurements by means of oscilloscopes. At first the performance of two last generation scopes implementing a zero-crossing algorithm is evaluated. Then, after a brief resume of alternative measurement techniques, a solution to enhance the period measurement capability of scopes is proposed and implemented in the Lecroy WaveMaster 8120A software. Finally, the results of tests carried out on different signal waveforms are reported and analyzed.

During recent years, the amount of variability that has to be supported by a software artefact is growing considerably and its management is evolving into a major challenge during development, usage, and evolution of software artefacts. Successful management of variability in software leads to better customizable software products that are in turn likely to result in higher market success.The aim of this tutorial is to present software variability management both from a 'problems' and from a 'solutions' perspective by discussing experiences from industrial practice and from applied research in academia. Issues that are addressed include, but are not limited to, technological, process, and organizational aspects as well as notation, assessment, design, and evolution aspects.