Software project management

Software project management is a sub-discipline of project management in which software projects are planned, monitored and controlled.

Software development process

A software development process is concerned primarily with the production aspect of software development, as opposed to the technical aspect. These processes exist primarily for supporting the management of software development, and are generally skewed toward addressing business concerns.

Requirements analysis is a term used to describe all the tasks that go into the instigation, scoping and definition of a new or altered computer system. Requirements analysis is an important part of the software engineering process; whereby business analysts or software developer identify the needs or requirements of a client; having identified these requirements they are then in a position to design a solution.

Risk management is the process of measuring, or assessing risk and then developing strategies to manage the risk. In general, the strategies employed include transferring the risk to another party, avoiding the risk, reducing the negative effect of the risk, and accepting some or all of the consequences of a particular risk. Traditional risk management, which is discussed here, focuses on risks stemming from physical or legal causes (e.g. natural disasters or fires, accidents, death, and lawsuits).

Project planning, monitoring and control

The purpose of project planning is to identify the scope of the project, estimate the work involved, and create a project schedule. Project planning begins with requirements that define the software to be developed. The project plan is then developed to describe the tasks that will lead to completion.

The purpose of project monitoring and control is to keep the team and management up to date on the project's progress. If the project deviates from the plan, then the project manager can take action to correct the problem. Project monitoring and control involves status meetings to gather status from the team. When changes need to be made, change control is used to keep the products up to date.

Problems in software projects

The problems in software projects come from three different viewpoints: project managers, developers and customers.
* The problems project managers face include: poor roles definition, lack of estimating and planning skills, lack of decision making skills. Project managers do need to face the schedule, budget and quality constraints.
* The problems developers face include: lack of knowledge in the application area, lack of knowledge about developing standards, lack of up to date documentations, deadline pressure, changes of application requirements.
* The problems customers face include: monetary constraints, receiving products past the due date.

ee also

*Estimation
*Estimation in software engineering
*Incremental funding methodology
*Project management
*Risk management
*Software development process
*Software engineering

Referenced

Further reading

*cite book | first = Frederick P., Jr. | last = Brooks | authorlink = | year = 1995 | title = The Mythical Man-Month: Essays on Software Engineering | edition = 20th Anniversary Edition | publisher = Adison Wesley | id = ISBN 0-201-83595-9
*cite book | author = Steve McConnell | title = Software Project Survival Guide | year = 1997 | publisher = Microsoft Press | id = ISBN 1-57231-621-7 | url = http://www.stevemcconnell.com
*cite book | author = Scott Berkun | authorlink = | year = 2005 | title = Art of Project Management | edition = | publisher = O'Reilly Media | location = Sebastopol, CA | id = ISBN 0-596-00786-8 | url = http://www.scottberkun.com/
*cite book | author = Andrew Stellman, Jennifer Greene | authorlink = | year = 2005 | title = Applied Software Project Management | edition = | publisher = O'Reilly Media | location = Sebastopol, CA | id = ISBN 0-596-00948-8 | url = http://www.stellman-greene.com
*cite book | author = Robert T. Futrell, Donald F. Shafer, Linda I. Shafer | authorlink = | year = 2002 | title = Quality Software Project Management | publisher = Prentice Hall PTR | id = ISBN 0-13-091297-2
*cite book | first = Robert | last = Wysocki | authorlink = | year = 2003 | title = Effective Project Management: Traditional, Adaptive, Extreme | edition = 3rd ed. | publisher = Wiley | id = ISBN 0-471-43221-0
*cite book | first = Jim | last = Highsmith | authorlink = | year = 2003 | title = Agile Project Management : Creating Innovative Products | publisher = Addison-Wesley | id = ISBN 0-321-21977-5
*cite book | author = Richard H. Thayer, Edward Yourdon | year = 2000 | title = Software Engineering Project Management | edition = 2nd Ed. | publisher = Wiley-IEEE Computer Society Press | id = ISBN 0-8186-8000-8
*cite book | author = Tom DeMarco and Timothy Lister | year = 1997 | title = Peopleware: Productive Projects and Teams | edition = 2nd Ed. | publisher = Dorset House | id = ISBN 0-932633-43-9
*cite book | author = Kieron Conway | year = 2000 | title = Software Project Management: From Concept to deployment | publisher = Coriolis | id = ISBN 1-57610-807-4
*cite book | author = Enzo Frigenti & Dennis Comninos | year = 2002 | title = The Practice of Project Management - a guide to the business-focused approach | publisher = Kogan Page | id = ISBN 0-7494-3694-8
*cite book | author = Lev Virine & Michael Trumper | year = 2007 | title = [http://www.projectdecisions.org Project Decisions: The Art and Science] | publisher = Management Concepts | id = ISBN 978-1567262179
*cite book | author = Johanna Rothman | year = 2007 | title = Manage It! Your Guide to Modern, Pragmatic Project Management | publisher = The Pragmatic Programmers | id = ISBN 0-9787392-4-8 | url = http://www.jrothman.com
*cite book | author = Jared Richardson & Will Gwaltney | year = 2005 | title = Ship It! A Practical Guide to Successful Software Projects | publisher = The Pragmatic Programmers | id = ISBN 0-9745140-4-7