Introduction to Software

Engineering (LECT 1)

Mayank Singh

1
Organization of this Lecture
● What is Software Engineering?
● Programs vs. Software Products
● Evolution of Software Engineering
● Notable Changes In Software
Development Practices
● Introduction to Life Cycle Models
● Summary

2
What is Software Engineering?
● Engineering approach to develop
software.
– Building Construction Analogy.
● Systematic collection of past
experience:
– Techniques,

– Methodologies,

– Guidelines.
3
 Engineering Practice
● Heavy use of past experience:
– Past experience is systematically arranged.
● Theoretical basis and quantitative
techniques provided.
● Many are just thumb rules.
● Tradeoff between alternatives.
● Pragmatic approach to cost-
effectiveness.
4
 Technology Development
Pattern
Engineering
Esoteric Past
Experience
Technology

Craft
Systematic Use of Past
Experience and Scientific Basis

Unorganized Use of
Art Past Experience

Time

5
 Why Study Software
Engineering? (1)
● To acquire skills to develop
large programs.
– Exponential growth in complexity
and difficulty level with size.
– Thead hoc approach breaks down
when size of software increases.

6
 Why Study Software
Engineering? (2)
● Ability to solve complex
programming problems:
– How to break large projects into smaller
and manageable parts?
– How to use abstraction?

● Also learn techniques of:

– Specification, design, user interface
development, testing, project
management, etc. 7
Why Study Software Engineering?
(3)

● To acquire skills to be a
better programmer:
● Higher Productivity
● Better Quality Programs

8
 Software’s Dual Role
● Software is a product
– Delivers computing potential
– Produces, manages, acquires, modifies, displays, or
transmits information
● Software is a vehicle for delivering a product
– Supports or directly provides system functionality
– Controls other programs (e.g., an operating
system)
– Effects communications (e.g., networking software)
– Helps build other software (e.g., software tools)

9
 What is Software?

Software is a set of items or objects

that form a “configuration” that
includes
• programs
• documents
• data ...

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Characteristics Software?

● software is engineered
● software doesn’t wear out
● software is complex

11
Failure Curve for Hardware

12
Idealized and Actual Failure
curve for Software

13
 Software Myths
● Management
● We already have a book that's full of standards and
procedures for building software, won't that
provide my people with everything they need to
know?
● My people have state-of-the-art software
development tools, after all, we buy them the
newest computers.
● If we get behind schedule, we can add more
programmers and catch up
● If I decide to outsource3 the software project to a
third party, I can just relax and let that firm build
it.
14
 Software Myths
● Customer
● A general statement of objectives is
sufficient to begin writing programs—we can
fill in the details later.

● Project requirements continually change, but

change can be easily accommodated because
software is flexible.

15
Impact of Changes

16
 Software Myths
● Practitioner’s
● Once we write the program and get it to work, our
job is done.

● Until I get the program "running" I have no way of

assessing its quality.

● The only deliverable work product for a successful

project is the working program.

● Software engineering will make us create voluminous

and unnecessary documentation and will invariably
slow us down.
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 Software Crisis?

● "the turning point in the course of a

disease, when it becomes clear whether
the patient will live or die.

18
 Software Crisis
● Software products:
– Failto meet user requirements.
– Frequently crash.
– Expensive.
– Difficult to alter, debug, and
enhance.
– Often delivered late.
– Use resources non-optimally.
19
 Software Crisis (cont.)

Hw cost
Sw cost

1960 Year
2008

Relative Cost of Hardware and Software

20
 Factors Contributing to the
Software Crisis
● Larger problems,
● Lack of adequate training in
software engineering,
● Increasing skill shortage,
● Low productivity improvements.

21
 What is software
engineering?
● Software engineering is an engineering
discipline which is concerned with all
aspects of software production

● Software engineers should adopt a

systematic and organised approach to
their work and use appropriate tools and
techniques depending on the problem to
be solved, the development constraints
and the resources available
22
 Software engineering
● The economies of ALL developed nations
are dependent on software
● More and more systems are software
controlled
● Software engineering is concerned with
theories, methods and tools for
professional software development

23
 What are the costs of
software engineering?
● Roughly 40% of costs are development
costs, 60% are testing costs. For custom
software, evolution costs often exceed
development costs
● Costs vary depending on the type of system
being developed and the requirements of
system attributes such as performance and
system reliability
● Distribution of costs depends on the
development model that is used 24
SE Layered Process

25
 Types of Software Projects
● Software products
● Outsourced projects
● Indian companies have focused
on outsourced projects.

26
 Software Applications

● system software
● application software
● engineering/scientific software
● embedded software
● product-line software
● WebApps (Web applications)
● AI software

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 Programs versus Software
Products
● Usually small in size ● Large
● Author himself is sole ● Large number of
user users
● Single developer ● Team of developers
● Lacks proper user ● Well-designed
interface interface
● Lacks proper ● Well documented &
documentation user-manual prepared
● Systematic
● Ad hoc development. development

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 Evolution of an Art into an
Engineering Discipline
● The early programmers used an
exploratory (also called build and fix)
style.
– In the build and fix (exploratory) style,
normally a `dirty' program is quickly
developed.
– The different imperfections that are
subsequently noticed are fixed.

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 What is Wrong with the
Exploratory Style?
● Can successfully be used for very small
programs only.
Software
Exploratory Engineering
Effort, time,

Machine
cost

Program Size

30
 What is Wrong with the
Exploratory Style? Cont…
● Besides the exponential growth of
effort, cost, and time with problem
size:
– Exploratory style usually results in
unmaintainable code.
– It becomes very difficult to use the
exploratory style in a team development
environment.
31
 What is Wrong with the
Exploratory Style? Cont…
● Why does the effort required
to develop a product grow
exponentially with product size?
– Why does the approach
completely breaks down when the
product size becomes large?

32
Differences between the exploratory
style and modern software
development practices
● Use of Life Cycle Models
● Software is developed through
several well-defined stages:
– requirements analysis and
specification,
– design,
– coding,
– testing, etc.
33
Differences between the exploratory
style and modern software
development practices
● Emphasis has shifted
– from error correction to error
prevention.
● Modern practices emphasize:
– detection of errors as close to
their point of introduction as
possible.

34
Differences between the exploratory
style and modern software
development practices (CONT.)
● In exploratory style,
– errors are detected only
during testing,
● Now,
– focus is on detecting as many
errors as possible in each
phase of development.

35
Differences between the exploratory
style and modern software
development practices (CONT.)

● In exploratory style,
– coding
is synonymous with
program development.
● Now,
– codingis considered only a
small part of program
development effort.
36
 Differences between the exploratory
style and modern software
development practices (CONT.)
● A lot of effort and attention is
now being paid to:
– Requirements specification.
● Also, now there is a distinct design
phase:
– Standard design techniques are being
used.

37
 Differences between the exploratory
style and modern software
development practices (CONT.)
● During all stages of development
process:
– Periodic reviews are being carried out
● Software testing has become
systematic:
– Standard testing techniques are
available.

38
 Differences between the exploratory
style and modern software
development practices (CONT.)
● There is better visibility of design and
code:
– Visibility means production of good quality,
consistent and standard documents.
– In the past, very little attention was being given
to producing good quality and consistent
documents.
– We will see later that increased visibility
makes software project management easier.

39
Differences between the exploratory
style and modern software
development practices (CONT.)
● Because of good documentation:
– fault diagnosis and maintenance are
smoother now.
● Several metrics are being used:
– help in software project management,
quality assurance, etc.

40
Differences between the exploratory
style and modern software
development practices (CONT.)
● Projects are being thoroughly
planned:
– estimation,
– scheduling,
– monitoring mechanisms.
● Use of CASE tools.

41
Evolution of Other Software
Engineering Techniques
– life cycle models,
– specification techniques,
– project management techniques,
– testing techniques,
– debugging techniques,
– quality assurance techniques,
– software measurement techniques,
– CASE tools, etc.
42
 Software Life Cycle
● Software life cycle (or software
process):
– Series of identifiable stages that a
software product undergoes during its
time:
life time:
● Feasibility study
● Requirements analysis and specification,
● Design,
● Coding,
● Testing
● maintenance. 43
 Life Cycle Model
● A software life cycle model (or
process model):
– a descriptive and diagrammatic model of
software life cycle:
– identifies all the activities required for product
development,
– establishes a precedence ordering among the
different activities,
– Divides life cycle into phases.

44
 Life Cycle Model (CONT.)

● Several different activities may

be carried out in each life cycle
phase.
– For example, the design stage might
consist of:
● structured analysis activity followed by
● structured design activity.

45
 Why Model Life Cycle ?
● A written description:
– Forms a common understanding of
activities among the software
developers.
– Helps in identifying inconsistencies,
redundancies, and omissions in the
development process.
– Helps in tailoring a process model for
specific projects.
46
 Why Model Life Cycle ?

● Processes are tailored for

special projects.
– A documented process model

● Helps to identify where the

tailoring is to occur.

47
 Life Cycle Model (CONT.)

● The development team must identify a

suitable life cycle model:
– and then adhere to it.
– Primary advantage of adhering to a life
cycle model:
● Helps development of software in a
systematic and disciplined manner.

48
 Life Cycle Model (CONT.)

● When a program is developed by

a single programmer ---
– hehas the freedom to decide his
exact steps.

49
 Life Cycle Model (CONT.)

● When a software product is being

developed by a team:
– there must be a precise understanding
among team members as to when to do
what,
– otherwise it would lead to chaos and
project failure.

50
 Life Cycle Model (CONT.)

● A software project will never

succeed if:
– one engineer starts writing code,
– another concentrates on writing the
test document first,
– yet another engineer first defines the
file structure
– another defines the I/O for his
portion first.
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 Life Cycle Model (CONT.)

● A life cycle model:

– defines entry and exit criteria
for every phase.
– A phase is considered to be
complete:
● only when all its exit criteria are
satisfied.

52
 Life Cycle Model (CONT.)

● The phase exit criteria for the software

requirements specification phase:
– Software Requirements Specification (SRS)
document is complete, reviewed, and
approved by the customer.

● A phase can start:

– only if its phase-entry criteria have been
satisfied.

53
 Life Cycle Model (CONT.)

● It becomes easier for software

project managers:
– tomonitor the progress of the
project.

54
 Life Cycle Model (CONT.)

● When a life cycle model is adhered

to,
– the project manager can at any time
fairly accurately tell,
● at which stage (e.g., design, code, test,
etc. ) of the project is.
– Otherwise, it becomes very difficult
to track the progress of the project
● the project manager would have to
depend on the guesses of the team 55
members.
 Life Cycle Model (CONT.)

● This usually leads to a problem:

– knownas the 99% complete
syndrome.

56
 Life Cycle Model (CONT.)

● Many life cycle models have been proposed.

● We will confine our attention to a few
important and commonly used models.
– Classical waterfall model
– Iterative waterfall,
– Evolutionary,
– Prototyping, and
– Spiral model

57
 Summary

● Software engineering is:

– Systematiccollection of decades
of programming experience
– Togetherwith the innovations
made by researchers.

58
 Summary

● A fundamental necessity while

developing any large software
product:
– Adoption of a life cycle model.

59
 Summary
● Adherence to a software life cycle
model:
– Helps to do various development
activities in a systematic and
disciplined manner.
– Also makes it easier to manage a
software development effort.

60
 Reference
● Ian Sommerville “Software Engineering,
7th Edition”, Chapter 1.
● Rojer S. Pressman, “ Software
Engineering: A Practitioner’s Approach
6th Edition”, Chapter 1.
● Pankaj Jalot,Introductionto Software
Engg. Chapter 1.
● R. Mall, “Fundamentals of Software
Engineering,” Chapter1.
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