Software Engineering Institute Carnegie Mellon

DoD Product Line Practice Workshop Report

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1. Introduction

1.1 Why Product Line Practice?

Historically, software engineers have designed software systems for functionality and performance. A single-system mentality prevailed. Little attention was paid to the consequences of a design in the production of multiple software-intensive products or their long-term sustainment. Large software development, acquisition, and reengineering efforts undertaken with this single-system mentality perpetuate a pattern of large investment, long product cycles, system integration problems, and a lack of predictable quality. Each product involves vast investments in requirements analysis, architecture and design, documentation, prototyping, process and method definition, tools, training, implementation, and testing with little carried forward to future products.

Many organizations have realized that they can no longer afford to develop or to acquire multiple software products one product at a time. They have instead adopted a product line approach that uses software assets to modify, assemble, instantiate, or generate multiple products referred to as a product line.

A product line is defined to be a group of products sharing a common, managed set of features that satisfy specific needs of a selected market or mission. A software architecture that capitalizes on commonalities in the implementation of the line of products provides the structural robustness, which makes the derivation of individual software products from software assets economically viable. A software architecture of a computing system is the structure or structures of the system that consist of software components, the externally visible properties of those components, and the relationships among them [Bass 97].1 A software asset is a description of a partial solution (such as a component or design document) or knowledge (such as requirements database or test procedures) that engineers use to build or modify software products [Withey 96].

Some organizations have already experienced considerable savings by using a product line approach for software system production. Other organizations are attracted to the idea but are in varying stages of operationalizing product line practices.

In January 1997, the Software Engineering Institute (SEI) launched a technical initiative, the Product Line Practice Initiative, to help facilitate and accelerate the transition to sound software engineering practices using a product line approach. The goal of this Initiative is to provide organizations with an integrated business and technical approach to the multi-use of software assets so that these organizations can produce and maintain similar systems of predictable quality and at a lower cost. One of the strategies for reaching this goal involves direct interaction with and nurturing of the community interested in product line practice.

This transition strategy has been executed, in part, by a series of product line workshops organized by the SEI. Two of these workshops, in December 1996 and November 1997, brought together international groups of leading practitioners from industry to codify industry-wide best practices in product lines. The results of these workshops are documented in an SEI report entitled Product Line Practice Workshop Report [Bass 97]. The SEI has also refined the results of these previous workshops through work with collaboration partners, participation in other workshops, and continued research. In addition, the SEI is producing a framework for product line practice. The framework identifies the essential elements and practices that an organization should master for successful deployment of a product line. The framework categorizes product line practices according to software engineering, technical management, and enterprise management. These categories do not represent job titles, but rather disciplines. The framework is a living document that will grow and evolve.

1.2 About the Workshop

To share the industrial experience with the DoD product line practice community and to learn the factors and issues in current government approaches that both enable and inhibit software product lines, the SEI held a two day Product Line Practice Workshop, Product Lines: Bridging the Gap - Commercial Success to DoD Practice, in March 1998. All participants in this workshop were from the DoD acquisition and contractor community. They were invited based upon our knowledge of their experience with and commitment to software product lines and strategic software reuse as either DoD system acquirers or DoD system contractors. Together we elucidated and discussed the issues that form the backbone of this report.

The workshop participants included

The workshop presentations and discussions focused on the structure of the SEI Product line practice framework, which identifies essential practices in the areas of software engineering, technical management, and enterprise management. To properly set the context, the workshop began with five presentations. The first three presentations were given by SEI technical leaders of the product line work. They characterized the current state of product line practice by describing the industry's best product line practices, the current contents of the framework, and product line acquisition issues prevalent in the DoD. The remaining two presentations described individual DoD product line experiences, each at rather different ends of the spectrum. These presentations were included to turn the focus toward the DoD and provide a taste of DoD product line approaches. Though there certainly are other examples of DoD product line experiences that have been described at other forums, the emphasis in this workshop was on interactive participation. Presentations were purposely limited to permit ample time for discussion and exploration of the relevant issues.

Following the presentations, the participants divided into four working groups compatible with the framework structure to further explore selected product line practices, barriers, and enablers within the DoD in the areas of software engineering, technical management, enterprise management for DoD acquisition organizations, and enterprise management for DoD contractor organizations. There were two working groups discussing DoD enterprise management practices because we wanted to explore these practices from the perspective of the contractor and the acquisition organization.

Each group was asked to select from among the practices identified in the framework for their area and to describe the following:

Each group was also asked to capture important general issues outside the focus of the working group.

The working groups then presented their results to the entire group. One of the participants, Will Tracz, provided a spontaneous workshop summary.

1.3 About This Report

This document summarizes the presentations and discussions at the workshop. As such, the report is written primarily for those in the DoD who are already familiar with product line concepts, most especially those who are already working or initiating product line practices in their own organizations. Acquisition managers and technical software managers should also benefit from the information in this report.

The report is organized into six main sections that parallel the workshop format:

  1. Introduction
  2. State of Product Line Practice: Digest of SEI Overview Presentations
  3. DoD Product Line Experiences: Digest of DoD Presentations
  4. Product Line Practices: Working Group Reports
  5. Summary
  6. Conclusion

The section following this introduction, State of Product Line Practice: Digest of SEI Overview Presentations, summarizes the three SEI presentations that set the context for the workshop. The next section, DoD Product Line Experiences: Digest of DoD Presentations, summarizes the product line experience of two of the workshop participants. Section 4 is composed of the four working group reports on selected practices, DoD barriers and enablers in software engineering, technical management, enterprise management in acquisition organizations, and enterprise management in contractor organizations, respectively. Each of the working group reports reflects the interests, experiences, and style of the individual group. The emphasis and completeness of the information varies by group and by practice. The practices discussed are important in their very selection. The summary in Section 5 recaps the major themes, and the conclusion in Section 6 provides a brief analysis and suggests future directions. Additionally, there is an Appendix providing a glossary of terms.

 

1The technical report documenting the November 1997 workshop is currently in the external review.

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