Unit iii

Major Learning Outcomes
Topics and Sub-topics

 Prepare and manage Schedule for different software
development activities
Topics and Sub-topics
 Responsibility of software project Manager
 Job responsibility & Required skill to manage software project
 Metrics for Size Estimation
 Line of Code
 Function Points
 Project Estimation Technique
 Empirical , Heuristic , Analytical Estimation Technique
 Scheduling
 Work breakdown structure
 Activity network and critical path Method
 Gantt Chart
 Project Monitoring and control
 Risk Management
 Risk Identification, Risk Assessment, Risk Containment

 Software project managers take the overall
responsibility of a project success. It is very
difficult to objectively describe the job
responsibilities of a project manager.
 The job responsibility of a project manager ranges
from invisible activities like building up team
morale to highly visible customer presentations.

 Most managers take responsibility for
project proposal writing, project cost
estimation, scheduling, project staffing,
software process tailoring, project
monitoring and control, software
configuration management, risk
management, interfacing with clients,
managerial report writing and
presentations, etc.
 These activities can be broadly classified into
project planning, and project monitoring and
control activities.

 The project planning activity is undertaken before
the development starts to plan the activities to be
undertaken during development.
 The project monitoring and control activities are
undertaken once the development activities start
with the aim of ensuring that the development
proceeds as per plan and changing the plan
whenever required to cope up with the situation.

 A theoretical knowledge of different project
management techniques is certainly necessary to
become a successful project manager.
 However, effective software project management
frequently calls for good judgment and decision
taking capabilities.
 In addition to having a good grasp of the latest
software project management techniques such as
cost estimation, risk management, configuration
management, project managers need good
communication skills and the ability get work done.

 However, some skills such as tracking and
controlling the progress of the project,
customer interaction, managerial
presentations, and team building are largely
acquired through experience.
 sound knowledge of the project management
techniques is required.

 Accurate estimation of the problem size is
fundamental to satisfactory estimation of effort,
time duration and cost of a software project.
 In order to be able to accurately estimate the
project size, some important metrics should be
defined in terms of which the project size can be
expressed.
 The size of a problem is obviously not the
number of bytes that the source code occupies. It
is neither the byte size of the executable code.
 The project size is a measure of the problem
complexity in terms of the effort and time
required to develop the product.

 Currently two metrics are popularly being
used widely to estimate size: lines of code
(LOC) and function point (FP).
 The usage of each of these metrics in project
size estimation has its own advantages and
disadvantages.
 Lines of Code (LOC)
 LOC is the simplest among all metrics
available to estimate project size. This metric
is very popular because it is the simplest to
use.

 Using this metric, the project size is estimated by
counting the number of source instructions in the
developed program.
 Obviously, while counting the number of source
instructions, lines used for commenting the code
and the header lines should be ignored.
 Determining the LOC count at the end of a project
is a very simple job. However, accurate estimation
of the LOC count at the beginning of a project is
very difficult.
 In order to estimate the LOC count at the beginning
of a project, project managers usually divide the
problem into modules, and each module into sub
modules and so on, until the sizes of the different
leaf-level modules can be approximately predicted.

 To be able to do this, past experience in
developing similar products is helpful. By
using the estimation of the lowest level
modules, project managers arrive at the total
size estimation.
Function point (FP)
 Function point metric was proposed by
Albrecht [1983]. This metric overcomes many
of the shortcomings of the LOC metric. Since
its inception in late 1970s, function point
metric has been slowly gaining popularity.

 One of the important advantages of using the
function point metric is that it can be used to easily
estimate the size of a software product directly
from the problem specification.
 This is in contrast to the LOC metric, where the
size can be accurately determined only after the
product has fully been developed.
 The conceptual idea behind the function point
metric is that the size of a software product is
directly dependent on the number of different
functions or features it supports.
 A software product supporting many features
would certainly be of larger size than a product
with less number of features.

 So the number of basic functions that a
software performs, and the number of files
and the number of interfaces are also used
the measure the size.
 Function point is computed in two steps. The
first step is to compute the unadjusted
function point (UFP).
 UFP = (Number of inputs)*4 + (Number of
outputs)*5 +(Number of inquiries)*4 +
(Number of files)*10 +(Number of
interfaces)*10

 Once the unadjusted function point (UFP) is
computed, the technical complexity factor (TCF) is
computed next.
 TCF refines the UFP measure by considering
fourteen other factors such as high transaction
rates, throughput, and response time
requirements, etc.
 Each of these 14 factors is assigned from 0 (not
present or no influence) to 6 (strong influence).
 The resulting numbers are summed, yielding the
total degree of influence (DI).
 Now, TCF is computed as (0.65+0.01*DI). As DI can
vary from 0 to 70, TCF can vary from 0.65 to 1.35.
 Finally, FP=UFP*TCF.

 Estimation of various project parameters is a basic
project planning activity. The important project
parameters that are estimated include: project size,
effort required to develop the software, project
duration, and cost.
 These estimates not only help in quoting the
project cost to the customer, but are also useful in
resource planning and scheduling. There are three
broad categories of estimation techniques
 Empirical estimation techniques(Based on
experience not principal)
 Heuristic techniques (based on research and
experiment)
 Analytical estimation techniques(based on scientific
formula)

 Empirical estimation techniques are based on
making an educated guess of the project
parameters. While using this technique,
experience of development of similar
products is helpful.
 empirical estimation techniques are based on
common sense.
 Two popular empirical estimation techniques
are: Expert judgment technique and Delphi
cost estimation.

 Expert judgment is one of the most widely used
estimation techniques. In this approach, an expert
makes an educated guess of the problem size after
analyzing the problem thoroughly.
 Usually, the expert estimates the cost of the
different components (i.e. modules or subsystems)
of the system and then combines them to arrive at
the overall estimate.
 However, this technique is subject to human errors
and individual bias. Also, it is possible that the
expert may overlook some factors.
 Further, an expert making an estimate may not
have experience and knowledge of all aspects of a
project.

 A more refined form of expert judgment is
the estimation made by group of experts.
 Estimation by a group of experts minimizes
factors such as individual oversight, lack of
familiarity with a particular aspect of a
project, personal bias.
Delphi cost estimation
 Delphi cost estimation approach tries to
overcome some of the shortcomings of the
expert judgment approach.

 Delphi estimation is carried out by a team
comprising of a group of experts and a
coordinator. In this approach, the coordinator
provides each estimator with a copy of the
software requirements specification (SRS)
document and a form for recording his cost
estimate.
 Estimators complete their individual estimates
and submit to the coordinator.
 The coordinator prepares and distributes the
summary of the responses of all the estimators.
Based on this summary, the estimators re-
estimate.

 This process is iterated for some rounds. However,
no discussion among the estimators is allowed
during the entire estimation process.
 The idea behind this is that if any discussion is
allowed among the estimators, then many
estimators may easily get influenced by the rest of
an estimator who may be more experienced or
senior.
 After the completion of some iterations of
estimations, the coordinator takes the
responsibility of compiling the results and
preparing the final estimate.

 Heuristic techniques assume that the relationships
among the different project parameters can be
modeled using suitable mathematical expressions.
Once the basic (independent) parameters are
known, the other (dependent) parameters can be
easily determined by substituting the value of the
basic parameters in the mathematical expression.
 Different heuristic estimation models can be
divided into the following two classes: single
variable model and the multi variable model.

 In Single variable estimation models one
parameter can be calculated from the other
parameter which is already calculated.
 A single variable estimation model takes the
following form:
 Estimated Parameter = c1 * e^d1.
 In the above expression, e is the parameter of
the software which has already been estimated
(independent variable).
 Estimated Parameter is the dependent parameter
to be estimated. The dependent parameter to be
estimated could be effort, project duration, staff
size, etc. c1 and d1 are constants.

 The values of the constants c1 and d1 are usually
determined using data collected from past projects
(historical data).
 The basic COCOMO model is an example of single
variable cost estimation model.
 A multivariable cost estimation model takes the
following form:
 Estimated Resource = c1*e1^d1 + c2*e2^d2 + ...
 Where e1, e2, … are the basic (independent) parameters
of the software already estimated, and c1, c2, d1, d2, …
are constants.
 Multivariable estimation models are expected to give
more accurate estimates compared to the single
variable models.
 The intermediate COCOMO model can be considered to
be an example of a multivariable estimation model.

 Boehm postulated that any software development
project can be classified into one of the following
three categories based on the development
complexity: organic, semidetached, and embedded.
 In order to classify a product into the identified
categories, Boehm not only considered the features
of the product but also those of the development
team and development environment.
 Boehm’s [1981] definition of organic,
semidetached, and embedded systems are below.

 Organic: A development project can be considered
of organic type, if the project deals with developing
a well understood application program, the size of
the development team is small, and the team
members are experienced in developing similar
types of projects.
 Semidetached: A development project can be
considered of semidetached type, if the
development consists of a mixture of experienced
and inexperienced staff. Team members may have
limited experience on related systems but may be
unfamiliar with some aspects of the system being
developed.

 Embedded: A development project is considered to
be of embedded type, if the software being
developed is strongly coupled to complex
hardware.
 COCOMO
 COCOMO (Constructive Cost Estimation Model) was
proposed by Boehm [1981]. According to Boehm,
software cost estimation should be done through
three stages: Basic COCOMO, Intermediate
COCOMO, and Complete COCOMO.

 The basic COCOMO model gives an approximate
estimate of the project parameters. The basic
COCOMO estimation model is given by the
following expressions:
 Effort = a1 х (KLOC)^a2 PM
 Tdev = b1 x (Effort)^b2 Months
 Where KLOC is the estimated size of the software
product expressed in Kilo Lines of Code,
 a1, a2, b1, b2 are constants.
 Tdev is the estimated time to develop the software,
expressed in months,
 Effort is the total effort required to develop the
software product, expressed in person months
(PMs).

 Estimation of development effort
 For the three classes of software products, the formulas
for estimating the effort based on the code size are
shown below:
 Organic : Effort = 2.4(KLOC)^1.05 PM
 Semi-detached : Effort = 3.0(KLOC)^1.12 PM
 Embedded : Effort = 3.6(KLOC)^1.20 PM
 Estimation of development time
 For the three classes of software products, the formulas
for estimating the development time based on the effort
are given below:
 Organic : Tdev = 2.5(Effort)0.38 Months
 Semi-detached : Tdev = 2.5(Effort)0.35 Months
 Embedded : Tdev = 2.5(Effort)0.32 Months

 It is important to note that the effort and the
duration estimations obtained using the COCOMO
model are called as nominal effort estimate and
nominal duration estimate.
 The term nominal implies that if anyone tries to
complete the project in a time shorter than the
estimated duration, then the cost will increase .
 But, if anyone completes the project over a longer
period of time than the estimated, then there is
almost no decrease in the estimated cost value.

 The basic COCOMO model assumes that effort and
development time are functions of the product size
alone.
 However, some other project parameters also affect
the effort required to develop the product as well
as the development time.
 Therefore, in order to obtain an accurate
estimation of the effort and project duration, the
effect of all relevant parameters must be taken into
account.
 The intermediate COCOMO model recognizes this
fact and refines the initial estimate obtained using
the basic COCOMO expressions by using a set of
15 cost drivers (multipliers) based on various
attributes of software development.

 Bohem suggests appropriate cost driver values which
should be multiplied with the initial estimate obtained
using the basic COCOMO.
 In general, the cost drivers can be classified as being
attributes of the following items:
 Product: The complexity of the product, reliability
requirements of the product, etc.
 Computer: the execution speed required, storage
space required etc.
 Personnel: The attributes of development
personnel that are considered include the
experience level of personnel, programming
capability, analysis capability, etc.

 Development Environment: Development
environment attributes capture the development
facilities available to the developers. An important
parameter that is considered is the sophistication
of the automation (CASE) tools used for software
development.
 Complete COCOMO model
 A major shortcoming of both the basic and
intermediate COCOMO models is that they consider
a software product as a single homogeneous entity.
 However, most large systems are made up several
smaller sub-systems. These subsystems may have
widely different Features.

 For example, some subsystems may be
considered as organic type, some semidetached,
and some embedded.
 Development complexity, reliability requirements
may be different for the sub system.
 The complete COCOMO model considers these
differences of the subsystems and estimates the
effort and development time as the sum of the
estimates for the individual subsystems.
 The cost of each subsystem is estimated
separately. This approach reduces the margin of
error in the final estimate.

 The following development project can be considered as
an example application of the complete COCOMO
model.
 A distributed Management Information System (MIS)
product for an organization having offices at several
places across the country can have the following sub-
components:
 Database part
 Graphical User Interface (GUI) part
 Communication part
 Of these, the communication part can be considered as
embedded software. The database part could be semi-
detached software, and the GUI part organic software.
 The costs for these three components can be estimated
separately, and summed up to give the overall cost of
the system.

 Analytical estimation techniques derive the
required results starting with basic assumptions
regarding the project.
 Thus, unlike empirical and heuristic techniques,
analytical techniques do have scientific basis.
 Halstead’s software science is an example of an
analytical technique.
 Halstead’s software science is especially useful for
estimating software maintenance efforts.

 Halstead’s software science is an analytical
technique to measure size, development effort, and
development cost of software products.
 Halstead used a few primitive program parameters
to develop the expressions for over all program
length, potential minimum value, actual volume,
effort, and development time.
 For a given program,
 η1 be the number of unique operators and η2 be
the number of unique operands used in the
program,
 N1 be the total number of operators and N2 be the
total number of operands used in the program,

 length N = N1 +N2 where N1 = η1log2η1
And N2 = η2log2η2.
 Length N = η1log2η1 + η2log2η2.
 program vocabulary η = η1 + η2.
 Program Volume V = Nlog2η.
 Potential Minimum Volume
V* = (2 + η2)log2(2 + η2).
 The program level L is given by L = V*/V.
 effort E = V/L, E = V²/V* (since L = V*/V).
 The programmer’s time T = E/S, where value
of S is estimated 18.

Let us consider the following C program:
 main( )
 {
 int a, b, c, avg;
 scanf(“%d %d %d”, &a, &b, &c);
 avg = (a+b+c)/3;
 printf(“avg = %d”, avg);
 }
 The unique operators are:
 main,(),{},int,scanf,&,“,”,“;”,=,+,/, printf
 The unique operands are:
 a, b, c, &a, &b, &c, a+b+c, avg, 3, “%d %d %d”,
“avg = %d”

Therefore,
η1 = 12, η2 = 11
 Estimated Length = (12*log12 + 11*log11)
= (12*3.58 + 11*3.45)
= (43+38)
= 81
 Volume = Length*log(23)
= 81*4.52
= 366

 Project-task scheduling is an important project
planning activity. It involves deciding which tasks
would be taken up when.
 In order to schedule the project activities, a
software project manager needs to do the following
1. Identify all the tasks needed to complete the
project.
2. Break down large tasks into small activities.
(Work Break Down Structure)
3. Determine the dependency among different
activities. (Activity network)

4. Allocate necessary time durations necessary to
complete the activities.
5. Allocate resources to activities.(Gantt Chart
and PERT chart)
6. Plan the starting and ending dates for
various activities.
7. Determine the critical path. A critical path is
the chain of activities that determines the
duration of the project.

 Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) is used to
decompose a given task set recursively into small
activities.
 The root of the tree is labeled by the problem
name.
 Each node of the tree is broken down into smaller
activities that are made the children of the node.
 Each activity is recursively decomposed into
smaller sub-activities until at the leaf level, the
activities requires approximately two weeks to
develop.
 Following Fig. represents the WBS of an MIS
(Management Information System) software.

 WBS representation of a project is transformed into
an activity network by representing activities
identified in WBS along with their
interdependencies.
 An activity network shows the different activities
making up a project, their estimated durations, and
interdependencies (as shown in the following Fig.).
 Each activity is represented by a rectangular node
and the duration of the activity is shown
alongside each task.

 From the activity network representation following
analysis can be made.
 The minimum time (MT) to complete the project is
the maximum of all paths from start to finish.
 The earliest start (ES) time of a task is the
maximum of all paths from the start to the task.
 The latest start (LS) time is the difference between
MT and the maximum of all paths from this task to
the finish.
 The earliest finish time (EF) of a task is the sum of
the earliest start time of the task and the duration
of the task.
 The latest finish (LF) of a task is the sum of the
latest start time of the task and the duration of the
task.

 The slack time (ST) is LS – ES and equivalently can
be written as LF – EF.
 The slack time (or float time) is the total time that a
task may be delayed before it will affect the end
time of the project.
 The slack time indicates the “flexibility” in starting
and completion of tasks.
 A critical task is one with a zero slack time.
 A path from the start node to the finish node
containing only critical tasks is called a critical
path.
 The critical paths are all the paths whose duration
equals MT.
 These parameters for different tasks for the MIS
problem are shown in the following table.

Task ES EF LS LF ST
Specification 0 15 0 15 0
Design database 15 60 15 60 0
Design GUI part 15 45 90 120 75
Code database 60 165 60 165 0
Code GUI part 45 90 120 165 75
Integrate and
test
165 285 165 285 0
Write user
manual
15 75 225 285 210

 Gantt charts are mainly used to allocate resources
to activities. The resources allocated to activities
include staff, hardware, and software.
 Gantt charts (named after its developer Henry
Gantt) are useful for resource planning.
 A Gantt chart is a special type of bar chart where
each bar represents an activity. The bars are drawn
along a time line.
 The length of each bar is proportional to the
duration of time planned for the corresponding
activity.

 In the Gantt charts each bar consists of a
white part and a shaded part.
 The shaded part of the bar shows the length
of time each task is estimated to take.
 The white part shows the slack time, that is,
the latest time by which a task must be
finished.
 A Gantt chart representation for the MIS
problem is shown in the following fig.

 PERT (Project Evaluation and Review Technique)
charts consist of a network of boxes and arrows.
 The boxes represent activities and the arrows
represent task dependencies.
 in a PERT chart instead of making a single estimate
for each task, pessimistic, likely, and optimistic
estimates are made.
 The boxes of PERT charts are usually annotated
with the pessimistic, likely, and optimistic
estimates for every task.
 In PERT charts there are more than one Critical
path is possible so analysis of critical path is very
complex.

 PERT charts are a more sophisticated form of activity
network.
 In activity network only the estimated task durations are
represented.
 Since, the actual durations might vary from the
estimated durations, the utility of the activity diagrams
are limited.
 Gantt chart representation of a project schedule is
helpful in planning the utilization of resources, while
PERT chart is useful for monitoring the timely progress
of activities.
 Also, it is easier to identify parallel activities in a project
using a PERT chart. Project managers need to identify
the parallel activities in a project for assignment to
different engineers.
 The PERT chart representation of the MIS problem is
shown in the following Fig.

 Once the project gets underway, the project
manager has to monitor the project continuously to
ensure that it progress as per the plan.
 Project manager has to define some milestone in
every phase so once the milestone is reached the
project manager can that measurable progress has
been made.
 If any delay is noticed than corrective action might
have to be taken and because of this reworking all
the schedules and producing a fresh schedule.
 PERT chart is mainly used in project monitoring
and control.
 In this graph critical path is a path in which every
milestone is critical to meeting the project timeline.

 If any delay occurs in critical path than entire
project would get delayed.
 So identify all the critical paths in schedule and
give them prime importance.
 There may be more than one critical path in
schedule so if necessary then project manager may
switch resources from non critical task to critical
task so that all milestone in critical path are met.
 There are some tools available to make schedule
and identify the critical path but till it is very
difficult to find out optimal schedule with limited
resources and large number of parallel task.
 MS-project software is used to make this type of
schedule

Risk Identification
 A software project can be affected by a large
variety of risks. In order to be able to
systematically identify the important risks which
might affect a software project, it is necessary to
categorize risks into different classes.
 The project manager can then examine which risks
from each class are relevant to the project.
 There are three main categories of risks which can
affect a software project: Project risks, Technical
risks, Business risks.

 There are many Project risks like budget, schedule,
personnel, resource, and customer-related problems.
 An important project risk is schedule slippage(Missing
dead line). Since, software development is invisibile, it is
very difficult to monitor and control a software project.
 It is very difficult to control something which cannot be
seen. For any manufacturing project, such as
manufacturing of cars, the project manager can see the
product taking shape. He can for instance, see that the
engine is fitted, after that the doors are fitted, the car is
getting painted, etc. Thus he can easily assess the
progress of the work and control it.
 The invisibility of the product being developed is an
important reason why many software projects
suffer from the risk of schedule slippage.

 Technical risks concern potential design,
implementation, interfacing, testing, and
maintenance problems.
 Technical risks also include ambiguous
specification, incomplete specification, changing
specification, technical uncertainty.
 Most technical risks occur due to the development
team’s insufficient knowledge about the project.
Business risks.
 This type of risks include risks of building an
excellent product that no one wants, budget or
personnel commitments, etc.

 The objective of risk assessment is to rank the
risks in terms of their damage causing potential.
 For risk assessment, first each risk should be rated
in two ways:
1. The probability of a risk coming true
(denoted as r).
2. The effect of the problems associated with that
risk (denoted as s).
 Based on these two factors, the priority of each risk
can be computed:
p = r * s

 Where, p is the priority with which the risk
must be handled, r is the probability of the risk
becoming true, and s is the damage caused
due to the risk becoming true.
 If all identified risks are prioritized, then the
most likely and damaging risks can be handled
first and more powerful risk reduction
procedures can be designed for these risks.

 After all the identified risks of a project are
assessed, plans must be made to Control the most
damaging and the most likely risks.
 Different risks require different containment
(Controlling) procedures.
 There are three main strategies to plan for risk
containment:
1. Avoid the risk: This may take several forms such
as discussing with the customer to change the
requirements to reduce the scope of the work,
giving incentives to the engineers to avoid the risk
of manpower turnover, etc.

2. Transfer the risk: This strategy involves getting
the risky component developed by a third party,
buying insurance cover, etc.
3. Risk reduction: This involves planning ways to
control the damage due to a risk. For example, if
there is risk that some key personnel might leave,
new recruitment may be planned.

Unit iii

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Unit iii