2 Background and related work
2.1 Background
Continuous Integration is a software development practice where members of a team integrate their work frequently, usually each person integrates at least daily?leading to multiple integrations per day. Each integration is verified by an automated build (including test) to detect integration errors as quickly as possible. Many teams find that this approach leads to significantly reduced integration problems and allows a team to develop cohesive software more rapidly [7].
Continuous Integration is an agile practice, which has its roots in the agile method- eXtreme Programming (XP)[6].Therefore,agile software development with its methods and practices will be introduced in this section.
By performing
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[1] In agile software development, requirements and solutions are developed through collaboration between self-organizing and cross-functional teams, which utilize the appropriate practices for their context. Agile software development promotes adaptive planning, evolutionary development, early delivery, and continuous improvement, and it encourages rapid and flexible response to change. [2]Among its promotions, early delivery and continuous improvement can be realized through Continuous …show more content…
In the book ?Continuous Integration Improving Software Quality and Reducing Risk?, a standard CI process is described. But in the practice, CI processes are built for the individual requirements. The researcher begins with asking like ?How is your CI process?? as a prelude. After that, questions like ?What effects have CI to your projects? would be asked to research the effects of CI in the practice. Based on the answers for prelude questions, hypotheses and advice for further optimization would be afforded from the researcher. Therefore this thesis has chosen the purpose of Exploratory as research strategy, which finds out what is happening, seeking new insights, and generating ideas and hypotheses for new research [9]
Flexibility: The basis of agile is to accommodate change as software related projects are constantly changing. If there were a change in market or the emergence of a new product, the product could be easily updated. It also enables new ideas and innovation to be implemented mid-project even after the scope has been defined.
The Software Development Life Cycle is seldom used at my place of work. Unfortunately, recent developments in its use are deemed confidential. Due to this fact, this paper will examine in general terms one of the projects we are undertaking right now while at the same time attempting to maintain our confidentiality.
Integration of different modules is undertaken once they have been coded and unit tested. During the integration and system testing phase, the modules are integrated in a planned manner. The different modules making up a software product are almost never
Software design and development is a field that requires various skills and abilities. Companies engaged in the development of software should provide an inclusive work environment where the different strengths of their employees are recognised, utilised and respected. Software development involves far more than programming skills. Personnel are required with strong communication, teamwork, attention to detail, creativity, design and problem-solving skills. Different personnel will possess these skills in varying proportions. It is the job of management to foster and encourage the development and enhancement of skills in the workplace.
Wells, D. (2009). Agile Software Development: A gentle introduction. In Agile Process. Retrieved April 20, 2014, from http://www.agile-process.org.
It is well known that the team work is far better than performing a task individually. Such kind of practice plays a very important role in software engineering. A lot of things can be achieved together with the combination of diversified people, as they input different tactics and skills so that the main objective of a certain mission can be accomplished appropriately. Even though teaming up and working for a project is essential and helpful; there exist some issues that could bring interruptions and conflicts in the team.
By enforcing these decisions through continuous integration, teams can use their existing Development practices to ensure an unwavering--yet attainable and efficient--focus on software
While developing a software many complex activities are required which in turn have dependencies along them. Large software projects require the involvement of programmers, documentation specialists, program managers, architects, database analysts, system analysts, , and trainers and last but not the least testers. Along with their independent responsibilities these persons are also responsible to maintain and keep a check on the software system quality as well.
The Systems Development Life Cycle (SDLC) consists of phases used in developing a piece of software. It is the plan of how to develop and maintain software, and when necessary, replace that software. In 2007 during my hospital’s transition to a new software system, I was fortunate enough to be included in the process. I did not get involved until the implementation phase, but from then on, until now, I remain very active in the process. I decided to highlight the Waterfall Model of SDLC. The Waterfall Model is a “sequential development process” with each phase continuing in a line (McGonigle and Mastrian, 2012, p. 205).
Given the time, it takes to develop large sophisticated software systems it not possible to define the problem and build the solution in a single step. Requirements will often change throughout a projects development, due to architectural constraints, customer’s needs or a greater understanding of the original problem. Iteration allows greater understanding of a project through successive refinements and addresses a projects highest risk items at every stage of its lifecycle. Ideally each iteration ends up with an executable release – this helps reduce a projects risk profile, allows greater customer feedback and help developers stay focused.
Agile leaders help individuals to grow continuously and not encourage to bring new ideas. The Ideas that trigger positive change. But in order to foster structured change and create innovative organization, IT processes, roles and responsibilities, and quality management needs to be well understood and well defined, which helps improve IT governance performance. At the same time, agile leadership must device a continuous agile delivery across structural and architectural quality factors of the software. That quality delivery framework must check everything from security, robustness and performance in addition to functional aspects of the product. Compound all that with applications running in cloud. So agile leaders must design a fast paced, multifaceted testing environment that can keep up with a face paced agile software releases. So automation comes very handy in an agile testing organization. The right level of scale in a continuous integration environment is crucial to ensure that software quality is not compromised. A true leadership comes from simplicity and agility while a good IT decision making and governing process is in place. Leadership welcomes change and work as an enabler to focus on what is next. Leaders keep their eyes on the value for the business. Focus on what makes sense for the business
And there are various instances of system testing which include Usability Testing, GUI software Testing, Security Testing, Accessibility Testing, and Reliability Testing. This testing stage combines all the dissimilar parts into a scheme which is then tested. This procedure not only tests for mistakes and functionality, but also to ensure the end product is what the customer envisioned. And if the integration phase was done precisely then, theoretically, there will be no bugs and this will be the final
As more companies that are leading technology are transforming from the traditional waterfall development model to an Agile software methodology, requirements engineering provides a process for software engineers to understand the problems they need to solve (Martin, Newkirk, & Koss, 2014). It is of key importance to understand the customer 's wants and needs before beginning designing or building the computer-based solution, as developing a solution that ignores the customer’s needs provides value to none of the parties involved. Thus, the intent of requirements engineering is to produce a written understanding of the customer 's problem (Pressman, 2010). Work products that are available to communicate this understanding include user scenarios, function and feature lists, analysis models, and specifications. This paper provides an evaluation of requirement patterns, an assessment of problem solving techniques most effective, a descriptive explanation of the patterns that includes a visual taxonomy, and an explanation of how the patterns identified are related.
Software development follows a specific life cycle that starts with designing a solution to a problem and implementing it. Software testing is part of this software life cycle that involves verifying if each unit implemented meets the specifications of the design. Even with careful testing of hundreds or thousands of variables and code statements, users of software find bugs. “Software testing is arguably the least understood part of the development process” and is also a “time-consuming process that requires technical sophistication and proper planning” (Whittaker 71) It is important to comprehend this concept by understanding the different characteristics and aspects of software testing, and then to examine the techniques, procedures and tools used to apply this concept. This will enable the user to realize the problems faced by software testers and the importance of software testing.
Agile software development is a group of software development methods based on iterative and incremental development, where requirements and solutions evolve through collaboration between self-organizing, cross-functional teams. It promotes adaptive planning, evolutionary development and delivery, a time-boxed iterative approach, and encourages rapid and flexible response to change.