ObjectOrientedSoftwareEngineerin ngPracticalsoftwaredev velopmentus singUMLandJava

Sec condedition

Softw ware and softwar re engin neering

In this chapter you will learn about the following How do oes software e differ from other produ ucts? How do oes software e change ov ver time? Wh hat do we me ean when we w talk about t high-quality y software? W What types of software are there an nd what are their main differences? d How ar re software projects p orga anized? How w successfu l are typical projects? How ca an we define e software engineering? Why will folllowing a dis sciplined approach h to software e engineering help us pr roduce succe essful software systems s? What activities a occ cur in every software s pro oject? What should s we ke eep in mind as a we perfor rm any softw ware enginee ering activity?

1.1 The nature of software Softwar re differs in important ways w from the types o of artifacts p produced b by other types of engineers:
Softwa are is largely intangible. It is the erefore diffic cult for peop ple to asses ss its quality y or to app preciate the amount of work involved in its develo opment. The ma ass-producti ion of duplic cate pieces of o software is s trivial. Almost all a the cost of o software is s therefore in n its develop pment, not it ts manufactu uring. The so oftware indus stry is labor intensive. It is all too easy fo or an inadeq quately traine ed software developer t to create a p piece of soft tware that is dif fficult to understand and d modify. Softwa are is physic cally easy to modify; how wever, beca use of its co omplexity it is very diffic cult to make cha anges that are a correct. Softwa are does not wear out with w use like e other eng ineering artiifacts, but in nstead its de esign deteriora ates as it is changed c repeatedly. changes tend to intro oduce new defects; d Taken to ogether, the above chara acteristics mean m that mu uch existing software is of relatively y poor quality an nd is steadily y becoming worse. : Off fshoring The soft tware engine eering labor market ha as been inc creasingly a affected by the recent trend towards offshoring: this t occurs when w organ nizations in d developed c countries ou utsource soft tware developm ment to countries that t have muc ch lower la abor costs yet have highly educ cated populatio ons and are politically sta able.

Types of o software e and their difference es

There are e many diffe erent types of o software. One O of the m most importa ant distinctio ons is betwee en custom software, generic softw ware and em mbedded so oftware.

om softwar re: Custom software is developed d to specific nee eds of a particular Custo o meet the s customer and tends to be of little use to others. Much custom soft ftware is dev veloped in-h house hat uses it; consulting c c companies. Custom soft ftware is typ pically within the same organization th

Chapter1: 1 Softwarean ndsoftwareengine e