Objective
Until recent years, the Information Technology society has focused its attention on the software development process and software process improvement. However, improvement of the software process does not guarantee the "fitness-for-use" of software products, as experienced by the actual user. Recent European projects and standardisation efforts have addressed software product quality, but primarily from a "technical" point of view. Other projects aimed at user related software quality, but only partly covering the software quality spectre as described by ISO 9126. Users now feel an increasing need to be able to assess the "fitness-for-use" software quality. Manufacturers wish to be able to prove this quality by means of generally accepted standards. They intend to reduce the "time-to-market" and the number of software changes of release by taking the user needs into account effectively, in an early development stage. User oriented software quality principles will not only improve the effectiveness of the evaluation of software products in final development stages, but will also improve the specification of software, as the basis for software design and evaluation of intermediate products.
The main objective of the project is the development of the SPACE-UFO methodology for specification and evaluation of software product quality requirements with an emphatic user focus. A second main objective is the acceptance of the methodology by the IT market so that it becomes a widely recognized de-jure or de-facto standard which may be considered as a best practice. Derived objectives are the development of techniques and tools which support the application of the methodology and the dissemination of results.
The results of the project will be:
- The SPACE-UFO methodology. User oriented software quality depends on characteristics of the user(s), business, environment and product profile. The SPACE-UFO methodology translates these profiles into software quality requirements and evaluation criteria.
- Methods, techniques and prototype instruments, allowing software quality specification and evaluation to be deterministic but flexible. Required new methods, techniques and tools will be developed; usable existing materials will be adapted if necessary.
- Training materials. These will consist of an "academic" and an "industrial" package, which will include syllabi, illustrations and case-studies.
The project will be divided into eight workpackages, each further subdivided into tasks. The technical workpackages comprise development of the SPACE-UFO methodology, framework, development of techniques and tools for user oriented quality specification and evaluation, experimentation on the application, validation of the methodology and development of training materials. Supporting workpackages consist of technical coordination and integration, dissemination of results, market research, exploitation and project management.
Application of the SPACE-UFO methodology, techniques, tools and training material will enable users to assess the quality of software. This will result in better "fitness-for-purpose" and lower costs and risks. Benefits for software developers will be that user needs can be taken into account for software quality specification and evaluation and that software can be evaluated with respect to user needs. This will lead to reduction of the number of releases and of the time-to-market. Evaluators will be able to evaluate the software quality in a deterministic and widely accepted way. The methodology, methods and techniques are expected to affect existing and newly developed standards and methods, including software process improvement.
The results will be licensed to end-users and other organisations. They will be used by the participants for their software evaluation, consultancy and training services, which will be available to the European market. The industrial partners will apply the results for internal software product improvement and reduction of product time-to-market. The results will be disseminated to the IT market by several means. The methodology and techniques will be submitted for international standardisation in order to contribute to the international harmonisation and standardisation efforts.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
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Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Topic(s)
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
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Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Coordinator
6800 AR Arnhem
Netherlands
The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.