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68 PART TWO MANAGING SOFTWARE PROJECTS

(Chapter 5). Because both cost and schedule estimates are functionally oriented, some
degree of decomposition is often useful.
As an example, consider a project that will build a new word-processing product.
XRef
Among the unique features of the product are continuous voice as well as keyboard
A useful technique for
problem decomposition, input, extremely sophisticated “automatic copy edit” features, page layout capability,
called a grammatical automatic indexing and table of contents, and others. The project manager must first
parse, is presented in
Chapter 12. establish a statement of scope that bounds these features (as well as other more mun-
dane functions such as editing, file management, document production, and the like).
For example, will continuous voice input require that the product be “trained” by the
user? Specifically, what capabilities will the copy edit feature provide? Just how sophis-
ticated will the page layout capability be?
As the statement of scope evolves, a first level of partitioning naturally occurs. The
project team learns that the marketing department has talked with potential cus-
tomers and found that the following functions should be part of automatic copy edit-
ing: (1) spell checking, (2) sentence grammar checking, (3) reference checking for
large documents (e.g., Is a reference to a bibliography entry found in the list of entries
in the bibliography?), and (4) section and chapter reference validation for large doc-
uments. Each of these features represents a subfunction to be implemented in soft-
ware. Each can be further refined if the decomposition will make planning easier.

3.4 THE PROCESS

The generic phases that characterize the software process—definition, development,
and support—are applicable to all software. The problem is to select the process
model that is appropriate for the software to be engineered by a project team. In Chap-
ter 2, a wide array of software engineering paradigms were discussed:
• the linear sequential model
• the prototyping model
• the RAD model

Once the process • the incremental model
model is chosen, • the spiral model
populate it with the
minimum set of work • the WINWIN spiral model
tasks and work • the component-based development model
products that will result
in a high-quality • the concurrent development model
product—avoid • the formal methods model
process overkill!
• the fourth generation techniques model
The project manager must decide which process model is most appropriate for (1)
the customers who have requested the product and the people who will do the work,