STATISTICS

• Contract Renewed: June 2005
• Number of Employees: more than 500
• Headquarters: Pittsburgh, PA
• Satellite Offices: Arlington, VA; Los Angeles, CA; Frankfurt, Germany

HISTORY

1984 — Carnegie Mellon Software Engineering Institute is established by the U.S. Department of Defense.

1987 — The SEI publishes the first technical reports describing the Capability Maturity Model (CMM) for Software and a methodology for assessing the process maturity of defense contractors.

1988 — At the urging of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), the SEI creates the first computer emergency response team after an Internet worm cripples 10% of computers on the Internet.

1989 — Addison-Wesley begins publication of the SEI Series in Software Engineering. Today the series comprises more than 30 volumes on a wide range of software engineering topics.

1991 — The SEI publishes version 1.0 of the CMM for Software (SW-CMM). More than 30,000 people are eventually trained in the principles and techniques of CMM, and more than 2,400 organizations are assessed on the five-level CMM scale. The SW-CMM is upgraded to CMM Integration (CMMI) in 2000.

1992 — The technical report Introduction to Software Process Improvement, by Watts S. Humphrey, includes recommen-dations for widespread dissemination of software process improvement practices.

1993 — The SEI introduces the SEI Personal Software Process (PSP) methodology, by which individual software engineers use disciplined, repeatable practices to produce software. A Practitioner’s Handbook for Real-Time Analysis: Guide to Rate Monotonic Analysis (RMA) for Real-Time Systems describes the use of RMA techniques, which become widely adopted and are credited with helping NASA restart the Mars Pathfinder in 1998 after a system shutdown.

1994 — The technical report An Introduction to Software Architecture, by David Garlan and Mary Shaw, describes the design problems inherent in large systems and provides an introduction to the emerging field of software architecture. This soon becomes a major focus area for the SEI.

1995 — The People Capability Maturity Model is published, describing best practices in human resources, knowledge manage-ment, and organizational development. Other specialized models are published for software acquisition, systems engineering, and integrated product development.

1996 — The SEI Team Software Process (TSP) methodology is introduced. This methodology enables PSP-trained engineering groups to apply integrated team concepts to the development of software-intensive systems, yielding improved productivity, lower costs, and improved time to market.

1997 — The Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMI) project is initiated by the DoD to establish a framework to accommodate current and future models and bring the CMM approach into line with international industry standards.

1997 — The SEI Architecture Tradeoff Analysis Method (ATAM) framework is developed and used on the Army’s Mortar Fire Control Systems to identify critical architectural risks. The ATAM is now used worldwide to evaluate software architectures.

1998 — The first book on software architecture for practitioners, Software Architecture in Practice, is authored by SEI technical staff members and wins the prestigious JOLT award from Software Development magazine. This book is followed by three other SEI books on software architecture, which together have sold more than 40,000 copies.

1999 — The SEI Framework for Software Product Line Practice, a Web-based compendium of activities and practices necessary to succeed with software product lines, is published.

2000 — The SEI COTS Usage Risk Evaluation (CURE) methodology is developed to help managers prepare to oversee commercial off-the-shelf (COTS)- based programs. CURE is a focused examination of the COTS-related aspects of a system development project.

2000 — The SEI develops the SEI Product Line Technical Probe (PLTP) methodology to determine the prod-uct line readiness of a major commercial organization. This diagnostic method has since been used to evaluate the product line practices of commercial and government organizations in a wide variety of domains.

2001 — The SEI establishes the Acquisition Support Program to help the DoD and other government organizations improve their practices in acquiring software-intensive systems.