Catalog of Software Product Lines

= Software Product Line Hall of Fame member

 

Organization

Product Line name, description

References for more information

Cited improvements

AKVAsmart ASA

Feed control and farm management software

  • Van der Linden, F., Schmid, K., Rommes, E. Software Product Lines in Action, Springer, 2007, Ch. 8.
  • Reduction of code size by more than 70%.
  • Uniform look and feel.
  • Common technological platform and code style.
  • Easier reuse, maintenance and integration.

Argon Engineering

Various: design and development of communication systems that search, identify, and capture signals. Sensor development, data collection and decision support, analysis and design of information retrieval and visualization techniques

  • Shorter development schedules.
  • Lower development and upgrade costs.
  • Lower total ownership costs.
  • Support for an incremental development model.
  • Support for an incremental development model.
  • Shared technology costs.
  • Best-in-class COTS/government off-the-shelf (GOTS) components.
  • Continuous technology insertion.

Asea Brown Boveri (ABB

Gas turbines

Train control

Semantic Graphics Framework

  • Pohl, K., Boeckle, G., van der Linden, F. Software Product Line Engineering, Springer 2005, ch. 21.
  • Ganz, C., Layes, M. “Modular Turbine Control Software: A Constrol Software Architecture for the ABB Gas Turbine Family,” Proceedings of the Second Intl. ESPRIT ARES Workshop, Springer LCNS 1429, 1998, pp. 32-38.
  • Rösel, A. “Experiences with the Evolution of an Application Family Architecture,” Proceedings of the Second Intl. ESPRIT ARES Workshop, Springer LCNS 1429, 1998, pp. 39-48.
  • Eixelsberger, W., Beckman, H. “The TCS Experience with the Recovery of Family Architecture,” in Jazayeri, M., Ran, A., and van der Linden, F (eds.), Software Architecture for Product Familes – Principles and Practice, Addison Wesley 2000, pp. 209-231.
  • Shorter development time, higher code quality, cost savings.

Axis Communications AB

Computer printer servers, storage servers, network camera and scanner servers.
  • Jan Bosch, Design & Use of Software Architectures, Addison Wesley, 2000.
  

Boeing

Bold Stroke Avionics

  • Software Product Line Hall of Fame
  • Sharp, David C., "Reducing Avionics Software Cost Through Component Based Product Line Development", Patrick Donohoe (ed.) Proceedings SPLC1, Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2000.
  • Doerr, Bryan S., and Sharp, David C., "Freeing Product Line Architectures from Execution Dependencies", Patrick Donohoe (ed.) Proceedings SPLC1, Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2000.
  • Sharp, D.C.: “Avionics product line software architecture flow policies,” Gateway to the New Millennium. 18th Digital Avionics Systems Conference. Proceedings (Cat. No.99CH37033), 1999, pt. 2, 9.C.4/8 pp. vol.2 ISBN: 0 7803 5749 3.
  • Schulte, M. “Model-based integration of reusable component-based avionics systems - a case study,” Proceedings. Eighth IEEE International Symposium on Object-Oriented Real-Time Distributed Computing, 2005, 62-71 ISBN: 0 7695 2356 0.
  • Popp, Timothy J., "Software Architecture Development for Product Line Software", AIAA/IEEE Digital Avionics Systems Conference, October 1999.
  • Pohl, K., Boeckle, G., van der Linden, F. Software Product Line Engineering, Springer 2005, ch. 21.
  • Sharp, D. "Object Oriented Real-Time Computing for Reusable Avionics Software," Proc. ISORC 2001.
  • Winter, Don; "Modular, Reusable Flight Software for Production Aircraft," 15th AIAA/IEEE Digital Avionics Systems Conference, p. 40106, 1996.
  • Sharp, D. "Reducing Avionics Software Cost through Component Based Product Line Development," Software Technology Conference, 1998.
  • Improved affordability, quality, and system timeliness.

CelsiusTech

ShipSystem 2000 naval command and control
  • Improved time to delivery, productivity, cost.

Cummins

Diesel engine controls
  • Dager, J. C., “Cummins's Experience in Developing a Software Product Line Architecture for Real-time Embedded Diesel Engine Controls,” Donohoe P. (ed.) Proceedings SPLC1, Kluwer, 2000. Page: 23-46. ISBN: 0792379403.
  • Clements, P., Northrop, L. Software Product Lines: Practices and Patterns, Addison Wesley, 2001.
  • Software Product Line Hall of Fame
  • Pohl, K., Boeckle, G., van der Linden, F. Software Product Line Engineering, Springer 2005, ch. 21.
  • Greatly reduced time to market (~1 year vs. ~1 week).
  • Ability to quickly and effectively enter new markets.
  • Increased productivity.
  • Higher quality.
  • Higher responsiveness to customer needs.

Deutsche Bank

Financial global transaction and settlement

  • Faust, D. Verhoef, C. "Software product line migration and deployment," Software - Practice and Experience, v 33, n 10, Aug. 2003, 933-55. ISSN: 0038-0644.
  • $4M/year cost savings.

Dialect Solutions

Internet payment gateway infrastructure products
  • Staples, M., Hill, D. "Experiences adopting software product line development without a product line architecture," Proceedings. 11th Asia-Pacific Software Engineering Conference, 2004, 176-83 ISBN: 0 7695 2245 9.
  • Quality and predictability, development efficiency.
  • Defect fixes only developed once.
  • More rapid improvements in product quality.
  • Configuration control branching reduced, productivity increased.
  • Customers upgraded to new major versions more efficiently.
  • New functionality added across whole family.

DNV Software

Software products and customized solutions for transportation industries

  • Van der Linden, F., Schmid, K., Rommes, E. Software Product Lines in Action, Springer, 2007, Ch. 10.
  • Reduction of service needs.
  • Elimination of administrative tasks.
  • Uniform look and feel.
  • Easier reuse, maintenance and integration.

E-COM Technology Ltd.

Medical imaging workstations
  • Liang, Liang, Hu, Zhiqiang; Wang, Xiangyun. "An open architecture for medical image workstation," Progress in Biomedical Optics and Imaging - Proceedings of SPIE, v 5748, Medical Imaging 2005 - PACS and Imaging Informatics, 2005, p. 470-479, ISSN: 1605-7422.
  • Improved cost, time to market, productivity.
  • Developing and deploying a system in a week.

Enea

OSE real-time operating system for telecom and automotive applications and Element middleware
  • Andersson, J., Bosch, J. "Development and use of dynamic product-line architectures," IEE Proceedings-Software, v 152, n 1, 7 Feb. 2005, pp. 15-28 ISSN: 1462-5970; IEE, UK.
 

Ericsson

AXE family of Telecommunications Switches
  • Adaptability to change and evolution.

Ericsson Mobile Data Design

DPE systems for packet based mobile communication
  • Andersson, J., Bosch, J. "Development and use of dynamic product-line architectures," IEE Proceedings-Software, v 152, n 1, 7 Feb. 2005, pp. 15-28 ISSN: 1462-5970; IEE, UK.
 

General Motors Powertrain

Software for engines, transmissions, and controllers
  • Supporting product variation.
  • Reduced time to market.
  • Eliminating redundant resource.

Hewlett Packard

Firmware for computer peripherals
  • Software Product Line Hall of Fame
  • Peter Toft, Derek Coleman, and Joni Ohta, "A Cooperative Model for Cross-Divisional Product Development for a Software Product Line'" Patrick Donohoe (ed.) Proceedings SPLC1, Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2000.
  • Pohl, K., Boeckle, G., van der Linden, F. Software Product Line Engineering, Springer 2005, ch. 21.
  • Products built with 1/4 of the staff, in 1/3 of the time, and with 1/25 the number of bugs of earlier products.

LG Industrial Systems

Elevator control systems
  • Pohl, K., Boeckle, G., van der Linden, F. Software Product Line Engineering, Springer 2005, ch. 21.
  • Decreased complexity of software base; functions reduced by half.
  • Reduced cost of making changes.

LSI Logic - Engenio Storage Group

RAID controller firmware product line for disk storage units
  • Software Product Line Hall of Fame
  • BigLever Software Case Study: Engenio on http://www.biglever.com/ .
  • Hetrick, W., Moore, J. and Krueger, C. Incremental Return on Incremental Investment: Engenio's Transition to Software Product Line Practice. OOPSLA Proceedings 2006. Portland, Oregon. October 2006.
  • Product variation.
  • Rapid time to market.

Lucent Technologies

5ESS telecommunications switch

  • Software Product Line Hall of Fame
  • Ardis, M., Daley, N.; Hoffman, D.; Siy, H.; Weiss, D. “Software product lines: a case study,” Software - Practice and Experience, v 30, n 7, June 2000, 825-47 ISSN: 0038-0644 CODEN: SPEXBL Publisher: Wiley, UK.
  • W. Howard, editor, “The 5ESS Switching System,” vol. 64, AT&T Technical Journal, July-August, 1985, Special Issue on the 5ESS Switch.
  • Pohl, K., Boeckle, G., van der Linden, F. Software Product Line Engineering, Springer 2005, ch. 21.
  • Productivity improved 3x-5x.
  • High reliability and performance.

Market Maker Software AG

Stock market data and financial news management
  • P. Clements and L. Northrop, Software Product Lines: Practices and Patterns, Addison Wesley, 2001.
  • Software Product Line Hall of Fame
  • Verlage, M., Kiesgen, T. “Five years of product line engineering in a small company,” 27th International Conference on Software Engineering (IEEE Cat. No. 05CH37673), 2005, 534-43. ISBN: 1-59593-963-2.
  • C. Gacek, P. Knauber, K. Schmid, and P. Clements. Successful Software Product Line Development in a Small Organization. A Case Study, Technical Report, Fraunhofer Institut for Experimental Software Engineering (IESE), 013.01/E, 2001.
  • Van der Linden, F., Schmid, K., Rommes, E. Software Product Lines in Action, Springer, 2007, Ch. 11.
  • Pohl, K., Boeckle, G., van der Linden, F. Software Product Line Engineering, Springer 2005, ch. 21.
  • Time to market improvement – systems installed in a few days.
  • Small development team able to support entire product line.
  • Reduction of time to market: 2-4.
  • Break-even: after about five products.
  • Reduction of maintenance costs: ~60%.
  • Reduced cost of quality (reliability in the field).

NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory

Interferometer product line
  • Gannod, G.C., Lutz, R.R.; Cantu, M. "Embedded software for a space interferometry system: automated analysis of a software product line architecture," Conference Proceedings of the 2001 IEEE International Performance, Computing, and Communications Conference (Cat. No.01CH37210), 2001, 145-50 ISBN: 0 7803 7001 5.
 

Nokia

Mobile phones
  • Heie, A. “Global Software Product Lines and Infinite Diversity” (viewgraph presentation).
  • Software Product Line Hall of Fame
  • Kuusela, J. “Architectural evolution: Nokia Mobile Phone case study,” Software Architecture. TC2 First Working IFIP Conference on Software Architecture (WICSA1), 1999, 471-8 ISBN: 0 7923 8453 9.
  • Maccari, A., Riva, C. “Architectural Evolution of Legacy Product Families,” van der Linden (Ed.): Proceedings PFE-4 2001, LNCS 2290, Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2002.
  • Jazayeri, M., Ran, A., van der Linden, F. Software Architecture for Product Families. Addison Wesley, 2000. pp. 169–176.
  • Van der Linden, F., Schmid, K., Rommes, E. Software Product Lines in Action, Springer, 2007, Ch. 12.
  • “Nokia Mobile Phones is the world's largest mobile phone manufacturer, and they believe that software product line engineering has helped it to reach that position.”
  • Unprecedented feature variation and product to market capability.

Nokia

Nokia: Mobile Browsers

  • Jaaksi, Ari. "Developing mobile browsers in a product line ," IEEE Software, v 19, n 4, July/August, 2002, p 73-80. Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Computer Society.
  • “…increased efficiency through reuse as well as accelerated product implementation, lowered cost, and increased quality.”
  • “We could not have developed four different products and six annual releases with our given resources without a product line.”
  • Led to improved working conditions – less than 3% turnover, product line highly rated in Nokia’s internal survey of working conditions.

Nokia Networks

Telecommunication network products for public, private, and cellular networks

  • Jazayeri, M., Ran, A., van der Linden, F. Software Architecture for Product Families. Addison Wesley, 2000. p. 165 – 169.
  • Van der Linden, F., Schmid, K., Rommes, E. Software Product Lines in Action, Springer, 2007, Ch. 13.
  • Improved management of very complex systems.
  • Improved visibility and reuse of available assets.
  • Improved ability to evaluate system level quality properties.
  • Improved decision-making based on fact.
  • Architectural trade-offs are more concrete.

Nortel

Digital loop carriers for telecommunications
  • Dikel, D.; Kane, D.; Ornburn, S.; Loftus, W.; Wilson, J. "Applying software product-line architecture," Computer, v 30, n 8, Aug. 1997, 49-55. IEEE Computer Soc, USA .
  • Reduced cycle time by 45%.

Philips

High-end televisions
  • Software Product Line Hall of Fame
  • Trew, Tim. “Enabling the smooth integration of core assets: Defining and packaging architectural rules for a family of embedded products,” Obbink, H., and Pohl, K. (Eds.), Software Product Lines: 9th Intl. Conf, SPL 2005, Lecture Notes in Computer Science, v 3714 LNCS, 2005, p 137-149. ISSN: 0302-9743. Springer.
  • Van Ommering, R. Building Product Populations with Software Components, Dissertation, University of Groningen, 2004. http://irs.ub.rug.nl/ppn/275169561.
  • Van Ommering, R. “The Koala Component Model,” Ivica Crnkovic, Magnus Larsson (eds.), Building Reliable Component-Based Software Systems, Aretch House, 2002.
  • Van der Linden, F., Schmid, K., Rommes, E. Software Product Lines in Action, Springer, 2007, Ch. 14.
  • Pohl, K., Boeckle, G., van der Linden, F. Software Product Line Engineering, Springer 2005, ch. 21.
  • Reduced faults during integration.
  • “Today, there are 20 different software releases per year, where each release serving 1-5 different product types. The product line supports three different hardware platforms.
  • “When we started, diversity was one of the top three issues on the agenda of architects. Now, diversity has disappeared as issue entirely.”
  • A single product line of software for all of Philips’ mid-range and high-end television products.
  • Able to produce the variability desired by marketing.
  • Software development not on critical path.
  • Variability no longer on architect’s priority issue list.

Philips

PKI telecommunications switching system
  • Software Product Line Hall of Fame
  • Jan Gerben Wijnstra: Critical Factors for a successful Platform-based Product Family Approach, Gary J. Chastek (ed.) Proceedings SPLC2, Springer LNCS 2379, (2002).
  • Frank van der Linden and Jürgen K. Müller: “Creating Architectures with Building Blocks,” IEEE Software, Nov. 1995.
  • Frank van der Linden, Jürgen K. Müller: Composing Product Families from Reusable Components, Bonnie Melhart, Jerzy Rozenblit (eds.), Proceedings 1995 International Symposium and Workshop on Systems Engineering of Computer Based Systems, IEEE, pp. 35 - 40 (1995).
  • Jürgen K. Müller: “Integrating Architectural Design Into The Development Process,” Bonnie Melhart and Jerzy Rozenblit (eds.), Proceedings 1995 International Symposium and Workshop on Systems Engineering of Computer Based Systems, IEEE, pp. 114 - 121 (1995).
  • Jürgen K. Müller: “Feature-Oriented Software Structuring,” Proceedings CompSAC'97, pp. 552-555, (1997).
  • Improved time to market, reuse.

Philips Medical Systems

Diagnostic imaging equipment
  • Pronk, B.J. “Medical product line architectures,” Software Architecture. TC2 First Working IFIP Conference on Software Architecture (WICSA1), 1999, 357-67. ISBN: 0 7923 8453 9.
  • Van der Linden, F., Schmid, K., Rommes, E. Software Product Lines in Action, Springer, 2007, Ch. 15.
  • Pohl, K., Boeckle, G., van der Linden, F. Software Product Line Engineering, Springer 2005, ch. 21.
  • Time to market, consistent and integrated behavior of applications.
  • 2-4 times effort reduction.
  • Reduction to less that 50% time-to-market.
  • Product defect density to 50% of original rate.
  • Ease of feature propagation from one product to others.
  • Common look-and-feel.
  • Better product planning & use of roadmaps.

Raytheon; U.S. National Reconaissance Office

Control Channel Toolkit, satellite ground control station software
  • Clements, P., Northrop, L. Software Product Lines: Practices and Patterns, Addison Wesley, 2001.
  • Clements, Paul; Cohen, Sholom; Donohoe, Patrick; Northrop, Linda. Control Channel Toolkit: A Software Product Line Case Study (CMU/SEI-2001-TR-030), Software Engineering Institute, 2001.
  • Pohl, K., Boeckle, G., van der Linden, F. Software Product Line Engineering, Springer 2005, ch. 21.
  • Improved cost, time to delivery, quality.

Ricoh

Ricoh: Office appliances

  • Kolb, R. Muthig, D.; Patzke, T.; Yamauchi, K. "A case study in refactoring a legacy component for reuse in a product line," Proceedings of the 21st IEEE International Conference on Software Maintenance, 2005, 369-78.
  • Kolb, R., Muthig, D.; Patzke, T.; Yamauchi, K. "Refactoring a legacy component for reuse in a software product line: a case study," Journal of Software Maintenance and Evolution Research and Practice, v 18, n 2, March-April 2006, 109-32. Wiley, UK.
  

Robert Bosch Corp.

Automotive gasoline systems

(Nominee)
  • Steger, M.; Tischer, C.; Boss, B.; Muller, A.; Pertler, O.; Stolz, W.; Ferber, S. "Introducing PLA at Bosch Gasoline Systems: Experiences and Practices,” Nord, R. (ed.), Proceedings SPLC3, Lecture Notes in Computer Science 0302-9743, vol. 3154. Springer, 2004. Page: 34-50. Boston. ISBN: 3540229183.
  • Tischer, C., Mueller, A., “Bosch Gasoline Systems: Engine Control Software Product Line,” (viewgraph presentation).
  • Van der Linden, F., Schmid, K., Rommes, E. Software Product Lines in Action, Springer, 2007, Ch. 9.
  • 25% less memory consumption.
  • Reduction of calibration effort (-20%) and maintenance.
  • Reduction of the resource consumption: 20%-30%.
  • Product line definition reflecting market variance.

Rockwell Collins

Commercial flight control system avionics

  • Faulk, S. "Product-line requirements specification (PRS): an approach and case study," Proceedings Fifth IEEE International Symposium on Requirements Engineering, 2000, 48-55 ISBN: 0 7695 1125 2, IEEE Comput. Soc, Los Alamitos, CA, USA.
 

Rockwell Collins

Common Army Avionics System (CAAS), avionics for U.S. Army helicopters
  • Eliminating duplicative maintenance contract (saving $3-4M).
  • Expected to save $4M per year in integration cost.
  • Reduced cost to develop new fleet-wide functionality.
  • Reduced documentation cost.
  • Simplified training, reduced training costs ($1M per platform vs. $50K per platform).
  • Reduced flight test costs.
  • Reduced time to deployment (10 years vs. 5 years).
  • Reduced system development costs ($30-45M vs. $10-15M).
  • Shorter time to airworthiness certification.
  • Increased competitiveness.

Salion, Inc.

Revenue acquisition management systems
  • Clements, P. and Northrop, L., Salion, Inc.: A Software Product Line Case Study (CMU/SEI-2002-TR-038), Software Engineering Institute, 2002.
  • Software Product Line Hall of Fame
  • Buhrdorf, R. and Churchett, D. Product Line Agility in the Face of Turbulence - The Salion Success Story, on http://www.SoftwareProductLines.com.
  • Krueger, C. and Churchett, D., Eliciting Abstractions from a Software Product Line, in Proceedings of the OOPSLA 2002 PLEES International Workshop on Product Line Engineering. Seattle, Washington. November 2002, pages 43-48.
  • Buhrdorf, R., Churchett, D. and Krueger, C. Salion's Experience with a Reactive Software Product Line Approach, in Proceedings of the 5th International Workshop on Product Family Engineering. Siena, Italy. November 2003.
  • Pohl, K., Boeckle, G., van der Linden, F. Software Product Line Engineering, Springer 2005, ch. 21.
  • Time to market.
  • Scalability of product portfolio.

Securitas Larm AB (now Matsushita Electric Works Fire & Security Technology ASB)

Safety and security systems
  • Jan Bosch, Design & Use of Software Architectures, Addison Wesley, 2000.
  

Siemens

Software for viewing and quantifying radiological images

  • Pohl, K., Boeckle, G., van der Linden, F. Software Product Line Engineering, Springer 2005, ch. 21.
  • Schwanke, R.W., Lutz, R.R. “Experience with the architectural design of a modest product family,” Software - Practice and Experience, v 34, n 13, 10 Nov. 2004, 1273-96. ISSN: 0038-0644 CODEN: SPEXBL. Wiley, UK.
  • Van der Linden, F., Schmid, K., Rommes, E. Software Product Lines in Action, Springer, 2007, Ch. 16.
  • Reduction of unplanned dependencies.
  • Resilience to unanticipated changes.
  • Reduction of Development Cycle Time: ~25%.

Symbian

EPOC operating system
  • Jan Bosch, Design & Use of Software Architectures, Addison Wesley, 2000.
  

Telvent

Industrial supervisory control and business process management systems

  • Van der Linden, F., Schmid, K., Rommes, E. Software Product Lines in Action, Springer, 2007, Ch. 17.
  • Server platform extended to other markets.
  • Introduction of run-time variability.
  • Improved reference process framework.
  • Centralised roadmaps for platforms.

Testo

Climate and flue gas measurement devices
  • Kolb, R., John, I.; Knodel, J.; Muthig, D.; Haury, U.; Meier, G. “Experiences with product line development of embedded systems at Testo AG,” 10th International Software Product Line Conference, 2006, 10 pp. ISBN: 0 7695 2599 7.
  • Pohl, K., Boeckle, G., van der Linden, F. Software Product Line Engineering, Springer 2005, ch. 21.
  • Schmid, Klaus; John, Isabel; Kolb, Ronny; Meier, Gerald. “Introducing the PuLSE Approach to an Embedded System Population at Testo AG,” 27th International Conference on Software Engineering. ICSE'2005 (2005), 544-552.
  • Ability to develop more complex products addressing new market segments.
  • “…these products would not have been possible without product line engineering.”
  • Increased developer satisfaction.
  • All projects on time and of high quality.

U. S. Naval Undersea Warfare Center

Test range facilities
  • Cost of new products at least 50% lower.
  • Development time reduced from years to months.
  • Staff resources reduced by up to 75%.
  • High customer satisfaction.
  • Increased competitiveness.

U.S. Army

Command and control simulator for Army fire support
  • Batory, D., Johnson, C.; MacDonald, B.; Von Heeder, D. "Achieving extensibility through product-lines and domain-specific languages: a case study," ACM Transactions on Software Engineering and Methodology, v 11, n 2, April 2002, 191-214. ACM, USA.
  • Time to add a mission reduced from about one month to about 3 days.
  • Able to add, remove, replace missions independently of each other.
  • Reduced code complexity.

Unnamed

Legal expert systems
  • Fritsch, C., Renz, B. "Four mechanisms for adaptable systems: a meta-level approach to building a software product line," Nord, R. (ed.), Proceedings SPLC3, Lecture Notes in Computer Science 0302-9743, vol. 3154. Springer, 2004. Page: 34-50. Boston. ISBN: 3540229183. Revised and extended in Software Process Improvement and Practice, v 10, n 2, April-June 2005, 103-24, ISSN: 1077-4866 CODEN: SPIPFL . Wiley, UK.
  • Increased modifiability, testability, usability (through uniform behavior), and adaptability.