Forum for Advancing Software engineering Education (FASE) Volume 10 Number 02 (121st Issue) - February 15, 2000 902 subscribers Note: If you have problems with the format of this document, try An HTML version of this issue is available at ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Table of Contents Letter From the ListMaster: Yet Another New Listserv This Month's Topic: Top Ten Contributions - The Readers Speak Upcoming Topics News Items ACM Council Members on SE Licensing: "Not Now, Not Like This" New PhD Program in Software Engineering at Carnegie Mellon Calls for Participation New Survey on SE Academic Programs - Deadline is February 29 A New Web-based Journal Dedicated to SET&P: Survey International Symposium on Multimedia on Software Engineering Asia-Pacific Conference on Quality Software Position Openings Eastern Michigan University - Department Head Contact and General Information about FASE ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ By: Don Bagert (Academic/Misc Editor) Letter From the ListMaster: Yet Another New Listserv Texas Tech's Academic Computing Services is in the process of changing to a new Lyris Mail List Server for all of their listservs. I had thought that the changeover for FASE and FASE-TALK would not be until next month, but problems with the old listserv over the last few days necessitated the change be made on February 15th - the scheduled FASE distribution date. As shown in the information at the bottom of this issue, under "Contact and General Information about FASE", one can subscribe and unsubscribe to FASE and FASE-TALK using as was done for the previous listserv address, and can send messages to FASE-TALK through . However, there is also a web-based interface for using the listserv that can be used instead. To access it, go to http://lyris.acs.ttu.edu and click on "TTU Faculty Mailing Lists", and then "fase" or "fase-talk". A person can subscribe, unsubscribe, receive messages and (in the case of FASE-TALK) send messages from there. In the long run, this should be beneficial to everyone concerned. If you have any problems with new listserv, please contact me at Don.Bagert@ttu.edu. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ This Month's Topic: Top Ten Contributions - The Readers Speak Topic Editor: Don Bagert, Texas Tech University Don.Bagert@ttu.edu In the December 1999 FASE, a panel of experts gave their opinions on what are the top ten contributions of the century in the area of software engineering education, training, and professional (SEET&P) issues. For the next several weeks, we asked you, the reader, for your opinions of the top ten contributions. Here are the results. There were 27 responses. The top ten: 1. Contributions in structured programming and algorithm development by Dijkstra, Hoare, Wirth, Knuth and others (1966-71) - 22 votes 2. Barry Boehm's work in software engineering economics (c. 1981) - 18 votes 3. First USA Master's Programs in Software Engineering at the Wang Institute, Seattle University, and TCU (1978-79) - 17 votes 4. (tie) Development of formal methods for software development by Dijkstra, Hoare, Harlan Mills and others 1970's) - 16 votes 4. (tie) Contributions by Fred Brooks, including The Mythical Man-Month (1975) and No Silver Bullet (1987) - 16 votes 4. (tie) First software engineering textbooks by Pressman, Sommerville, Fairley and others (1982-85) - 16 votes 7. (tie) The SEI Education Program, including the development of curriculum modules (1985-94) - 12 votes 7. (tie) The Carnegie Mellon MSE Program and the SEI Graduate Curriculum Model (1989) 9. NATO Conferences on Software Engineering (1968-69) - 11 votes 10. The Software Engineering Institute CMM(R) and PSP(SM) (1991 to present) (SM)PSP is a service mark of Carnegie Mellon University (R)CMM is registered in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. - 10 votes Seven of these ten appeared on the panel's list; the ones the panel didn't choose were Boehm's work, the work on formal methods, and the contributions by Fred Brooks. The other seven events listed on the web page received the following votes: * The Conference on Software Engineering Education and Training (1987 to present) - 7 votes * The FASE Electronic newsletter (1991 to present) - 6 votes * The development of large-scale corporate SE training programs (late 1970's to present) - 5 votes * Texas Board of Professional Engineers recognizes SE as a discipline, and begins to licensing in that area (1998) - 5 votes * First baccalaureate degrees offered (UK, Australia - late 1980's on; USA - 1996 on) - 3 votes * The creation of several small working groups in SEE&T, such as the Working Group and SWEEP (late 1990's) - 1 vote * Innovative University/Industry Collaborations, as documented by the Working Group on SEE&T and elsewhere (1990's) - 1 vote Of these, the first three (CSEE&T, FASE, and the corporate training programs) were in the panel's top ten. In addition, several events received a single write-in vote: * Kant, E, 'A semester course in software engineering', SIGSOFT Software Engineering Notes, 1981, 6,(40), pp.52-76. * A report on Undergraduate Curricula for Software Engineering, The British Computer Society/The Institution of Electrical Engineers, June 1989. * The development and definition of Standard ML by Robin Milner * SW Methodologies of Parnas, et. al. * Michael Fagan's work on Software Inspections * Bringing Christopher Alexander's patterns into SE: Kent Beck and others. * Terry Winograd's contributions to SE and design. * Commander Grace Murray Hopper and the COBOL system 1954-56: first HL programming language with broad support * Allan Albrecht and Charles Symonds for Function Points Mk1 and Mk 2; more systematic project estimates * The B family - Tool, Method and Tookit - which has empowered very ordinary engineers to use interactive and automatic proof assistants for a wide class of safety critical software applications. * Java, JavaBeans from Sun Microsystems. (1995 - date) Below are the comments supplied by those completing the survey. ____ The universal adoption of groupwork as a means of furthering SE education marked out the discipline from many others typically found in Universities, especially at the end of the 70s/beginning of the 80s. In many ways this put SE education at the forefront of educational innovation. I started on this route in 1983 and when thinking around my approach found the Kant paper inspirational - groupwork could be done. The BCS/IEE report [on undergraduate software engineering education] had a considerable impact on UK education in crystallizing thoughts on what the discipline was and how it could best be taught. The report above was useful in itself, but what was also useful was the process of developing it, and some of the personal networking that went on. It's very difficult to separate some of the technical innovations in the discipline itself from the education. For example, object- -orientation has had a major impact on both. So one might like to raise a cheer for Smalltalk, especially Smalltalk 80 and the mature development environment that it was part of. Or even further back to Simula67 or maybe Parnas and encapsulation. The list goes on. ____ The [ML] programming language was the first to realize that modules needed external connectors if they were to be useful as reusable components and that the interface type languages play a crucial role in the development of large systems from reusable components. Over the past 10 years people have slowly recognized the educational potential of this idea, and they will finally make use of it over the next ten years. ____ The Top Ten shortlisted in Dec99 FASE have a very North American slant. Although N America dominates software engineering in terms of dollar investment, it does not dominate in terms of intellectual concepts. [Editor's comment: I - Don Bagert - personally agree with these comments. Unfortunately, I was not able to get more than one non-US person on the panel (out of seven), although several were asked. This was a topic of discussion by the panel, who (I believe) made an extra effort to consider contributions outside of North America because of this. However, I wished I could have gotten a wider diversity of panelists.] ____ My thanks to all those who participated. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ By: Don Bagert (Academic/Misc Editor) Upcoming Topics May 2000: SWECC Survey on Software Engineering Academic Programs Guest Editor: Kenneth Modesitt University of Michigan-Dearborn modesitt@umich.edu For more information about a particular issue's topic, please contact the corresponding guest editor. Please refer to the article format provided at the end of each issue when making submissions, which are always made directly to the guest editor. If you are interested in being a guest editor, or have any suggestions for future topics, please contact me at Don.Bagert@ttu.edu. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ News Items ###################################################################### By: Don Bagert (Academic/Misc Editor) ACM Council Members on SE Licensing: "Not Now, Not Like This" In the latest of a series of "Viewpoint" articles on the licensing of software engineers in Communication of the ACM, Fran Allen, Paula Hawthorn and ACM President Barbara Simons, speaking for a majority of the ACM Council, made their contribution to the debate with "Not Now, Not Like This", on pages 29-30 of the February 2000 issue. The authors stated that "Is there a [licensing] test that will assure the person who passes the test will be qualified to write programs that will never endanger the public?...We do not have building codes for programs. We do not have a vocabulary of program design rich enough to discuss structural integrity. Much more research is needed before a test is devised." At the end of the article, the authors state that "ACM is taking proactive steps to address the very significant issues implicit in the licensing debate by creating two task forces (see http://www.acm.org/serving/se_policy/taskforce.html#bok for details)." One task force is assessing the SWEBOK body-of-knowledge project sponsored by the Software Engineering Coordinating Committee (SWECC) and the second is looking at all options for ensuring public safety from the development of software. ###################################################################### From: William L Scherlis New PhD Program in Software Engineering at Carnegie Mellon [Editor's Note: This article was submitted at the request of the editors. This is believed to the second announced PhD program in software engineering in the United States, after the Naval Postgraduate School, as reported in the July 1999 FASE.] PhD in Software Engineering: A New Degree Program at Carnegie Mellon University David Garlan, Phil Koopman, William Scherlis, Mary Shaw Institute for Software Research International School of Computer Science Carnegie Mellon University Pittsburgh PA 15213 isri@cs.cmu.edu www.isri.cs.cmu.edu Introduction The School of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) has recently announced the inauguration of a new PhD program in software engineering. The program is associated with the newly- created Institute for Software Research International (ISRI). ISRI is the principal locus for software engineering research and education at Carnegie Mellon, and currently has 23 affiliated faculty. ISRI adopts as one of its founding principles that both research and education in software engineering must rely on an intellectual base that includes not only core computer science topics, but also engineering methods and process, organizations and collaboration, information management, and legal and policy issues. ISRI faculty are involved in research projects in embedded systems, dependability, pervasive computing, software architecture, software adaptation and assurance, collaboration technology, digital libraries, distance education, distributed resource management, and other areas. With the start of the new millennium, software has become an essential building material for systems of all kinds, affecting business and everyday living throughout the emerging global economy. As software becomes ubiquitous, the relation between end users and software development is undergoing fundamental changes. Rarely is software produced from scratch by a team of experts and delivered to clients. Increasingly, * Software is developed by adapting and integrating existing components and services; * The Internet and other forms of interconnection provide broad access to computation and information resources that are independently created and managed; * Software systems must be designed and fielded under complex economic and legal constraints; * Systems are being built in which unreliable and unstable software cannot be tolerated; * Clients are intimately involved in the development and configuration of systems; and * Requirements for those systems often emerge only as clients better understand both the technology and the opportunities in their own settings. CMU established the ISRI as a center for long-term interdisciplinary fundamental research, apprenticeship-based education, and international collaborations to address the challenge of designing, developing, integrating, validating, and maintaining practical, large-scale, high-quality software- intensive systems. The creation of the ISRI is a natural extension of Carnegie Mellon's long-standing commitment to research in software systems. By creating a new PhD program in software engineering, we are able to train researchers who can address challenging problems related to practical issues of developing product-quality software- intensive systems. ISRI research activities employ a variety of approaches, including experimental prototyping, empirical modeling, codification of experience, formal analysis, creating design/development strategies for modern software, and developing public policy positions. Educational activities are tightly integrated with research and demonstration projects. The ISRI faculty is drawn from computer science, computer engineering, public policy, and other areas. The ISRI also maintains close ties with the CMU Software Engineering Institute. An important emphasis in ISRI activities is employing a broad view of design. The approach to performing design in practice typically follows a progression of increasing maturity over time, starting as artisanship and leading to a scientifically-based, routinized engineering discipline. This frontier advances at different rates in different sub-disciplines. Aspects for which generic design principles are not yet well articulated must be taught as art; aspects that can be taught via an artisanship approach must be taught in an apprenticeship format; aspects that can be reduced to heuristics and empirical models can be taught as an engineering discipline; and aspects that can be related to a theoretical foundation may best be taught as science. For this reason, ISRI adopts a flexible approach to teaching topic areas, attempting to identify and teach the right topics rather than just focusing in areas that are easy to teach. Additionally, ISRI seeks to advance the understanding of various areas to increase the level of scientific maturity. Expectations for Graduates Graduates will be prepared for faculty positions in software engineering, for research positions in industrial laboratories, and for leadership positions in the computer industry. As faculty, they will be distinguished by their understanding of software design and development issues, and the way this shapes their selection of research problems and evaluation of research results. As industrial developers, they will understand the interplay of academic research issues with engineering constraints that arise from public policy, economic, regulatory, and market issues. As senior software system developers, they will have a perspective that enables them to address specific problems in the context of the principles and results of the field. Graduates will understand practical issues of software design and development, from requirements acquisition to product support. They will be prepared to enter research or advanced development positions in application areas, distributed networks, embedded/critical systems, and other specialties as well as conventional software system development. Admission Criteria Applicants to the program should have proficiency in computer science at least at an undergraduate level, with emphasis on development of software or hardware systems. They should also have evidence of intellectual ability to succeed in an intellectually rigorous doctoral program, demonstrated through transcripts, GREs, and other means. Prior industrial software development experience, especially software design and programming experience as a member of a system team, is a strong asset. We expect that students entering the program will have experience equivalent to three or more years in an industrial software development team. Students with less quantity or quality of experience will spend more time during the program gaining practical experience, through internships, practicums, and other engagements. Extensive, high-quality software development experience may substitute for any of the normal requirements. We especially value the perspective that senior software developers can bring to a research program. Program Requirements The program requires eight courses, distributed across software design and engineering, systems, analysis, and economics or public policy. Two of these courses are principally practical experience courses. In addition to the course requirements, students must demonstrate proficiency in speaking and writing, serve as a teaching assistant in a classroom course and a studio/project course, and participate in ongoing professional activities of the ISRI. As in any PhD program, the program culminates in an original research investigation leading to significant new results. Students can do research in a broad range of areas, such as those mentioned above. Our focus is on systems that exploit the growing infrastructure for high performance, nearly ubiquitous computing and communication, especially systems that the public depends on for services provided through the electronic marketplace. The research approach for each project will be selected to match the needs of the project. Approaches appropriate to PhD theses include (but are not limited to): * Novel methods for software development * Automated support for software activities * Descriptive models that generalized from practical examples * Empirical models with predictive power * Implementation techniques for novel applications * Measurement techniques for system evaluation * Guidance for making classes of design decisions * Analytic models that permit quantitative or symbolic analysis We anticipate that the program will require four years to complete. In the first two years, most students will complete the courses, teaching requirement, and preparation for the research proposal. The last two years will be principally devoted to research, including thesis work and contributions to a sponsoring project. Students without significant prior industrial experience should expect up to spend an additional year gaining practical experience. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Calls for Participation ###################################################################### From: Ken Modesitt New Survey on SE Academic Programs - Deadline is February 29 Dear FASE Member: If you are involved in Software Engineering (SE) efforts at your institution, please reply to this survey request by January 31, 2000. If you are not so involved, would you please just reply "NOT INVOLVED" and then forward it on to the person in your institution who is so involved? Thank you very much! ACM and IEEE-Computer Society would like to make your Software Engineering (SE) academic programs known throughout the world. This would be accomplished by your participation in a just-funded annual survey of international SE programs, somewhat like the renowned annual Taulbee surveys on faculty salaries and enrollments for Computer Science. Nearly one and half years ago, a survey on SE graduate programs and the results were published in the Forum for Academic Software Engineering (FASE): http://www.cs.ttu.edu/fase/v8n09.txt. Thanks to the work of Peter Knoke at the University of Alaska in Fairbanks, that summary listed about 90 M.S. programs in SE and related fields, an increase from the 60 or so several years earlier, as determined by the Software Engineering Institute. Since that time, there has been considerable activity world-wide related to SE: 1. The state of Texas has instituted the licensing of professional software engineers 2. The Naval Postgraduate School developed the first Ph.D. program in SE 3. The United Kingdom has 27 institutions that now offer Bachelor's degrees in SE, as are several other universities/colleges in the U.S., Canada and Australia 4. The Software Engineering Coordinating Committee (SWEcc) was formed by ACM and IEEE-CS and has already sponsored three major initiatives: SWE Body of Knowledge (SWEBoK), Curriculum 2001 (version 1.0 just appeared in November) and an annual survey of international software engineering academic programs (SESURV). This last initiative is the concern of this note. After you complete the following short (16-question) survey and reply to me (modesitt@umich.edu), the mini-survey preliminary results will be posted on the following web site: http://www.engin.umd.umich.edu/CIS. Additional universities and college programs will be added in a second, more detailed survey. Your help in providing such leads to other programs will be invaluable, as you will be asked for such help on the survey. Why should you take the 15-20 minutes to complete this survey? Here are some reasons you might consider, as formulated by the committee that was funded by ACM and IEEE-CS (see list below): 1. It will help make your programs known to a wider audience of prospective students 2. Potential employers will have ready access to your programs via the WWW 3. If you are looking for qualified faculty, this WWW site will be a natural place for SE faculty to check first 4. The dramatic increase in the importance of SE throughout the world will be evident in the breadth and depth of SE programs available as shown in this WWW summary. Please complete the survey by February 29, 2000. The mini-summary of results will be posted a few weeks after that, with a follow-up mailing to the people you have recommended. A second, more complete survey will be administered via the WWW, and you will be contacted about that during February or March. A final summary with detailed responses will be posted on the official SWECC web-site in April, 2000, for consideration by ACM and IEEE-CS. [Editor's Note: The results will also be published in the May 2000 FASE.] Thank you very much for your efforts in completing the survey and for your continued interest in making a difference in the world of Software Engineering! Kenneth L. Modesitt University of Michigan-Dearborn Don Bagert Texas Tech University Laurie Werth The University of Texas-Austin Peter Knoke University of Alaska-Fairbanks Survey Follows: ____________________________________________________________________ Survey on Software Engineering Academic Programs "Mini" version January 31, 2000 1. Date: _________ 2. Name of institution: _________________________________________ 3. Is there an academic program at your institution that has at least one degree, concentration or track in software engineering? (Use an X for your answer.) ____ Yes ____ No If your answer is "No", please skip to question 16. Otherwise please continue with question 4. 4. Academic unit(s) that house software engineering (e.g. College of Engineering) a. ________________________________ b. ________________________________ 5. The academic department(s) that house software engineering (e.g. Department of Computer Science) a. ________________________________ b. ________________________________ 6. Actual title of degree(s) offered that is (are) related to software engineering, as it would appear on the graduate's diploma, and the field of study for the program, e.g. Bachelor of Science (B.S./B.S.E.) Software Engineering, Computer Science (with concentration in SE identifiable on transcript/degree) Computer Engineering (with concentration in SE identifiable on transcript/degree) Information Systems (with concentration in SE identifiable on transcript/degree) Software Engineering Technology, Other? Master of Science (M.S.) Ditto Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) Ditto a. Title ______________________ Field ________________________ b. Title ______________________ Field ________________________ c. Title ______________________ Field ________________________ (Please add more lines if necessary) For questions 7-10 below, fill in slots a, b, and c with information corresponding to that degree. 7. Approximate date the degree(s) began a. ____ b. ____ c. ____ 8. Number of credit hours required for each degree: use a range of hours if appropriate a. ____ b. ____ c. ____ 9. Approximate number of students in each degree program: a. ____ Total ____ Full-time ___ Part-time b. ____ Total ____ Full-time ___ Part-time c. ____ Total ____ Full-time ___ Part-time 10. Approximate number of graduates in each degree program to date a. ____ b. ____ c. ____ 11. Total number of software engineering courses available: Undergraduate ____ Graduate ____ 12. System used for courses at your institution (mark an X by which answer is the most appropriate): ____ semester system (standard course length is 15-16 weeks) ____ quarter system (standard course length is 10-11 weeks) ____ other (describe) 13. Number of full-time faculty with primary interest in software engineering: ____ 14. Number of part-time faculty with primary interest in software engineering: ____ 15. Web URL address of information about the degree programs: ______________________________________________________ 16. Name, e-mail, phone and postal address of contact person: ______________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________ Optional questions, but the answers would really be helpful!!! Other universities/colleges that may have software engineering programs: ___________________________________ ___________________________________ ___________________________________ The following are some definitions of software engineering. Please place an "X" by the ones with which you agree. If none, what is your definition or one you believe to be more accurate? 1. [Texas Board of Professional Engineers, April, 1998] The practice of software engineering will mean a service or creative work such as analysis, design, or implementation of software systems, the adequate performance of which requires appropriate education, training or experience. Such education, training, or experience shall include an acceptable combination of: computer sciences such as computer organization, algorithm analysis and design, data structures, concepts of programming languages, operating systems, and computer architecture.; software design and architecture; discrete mathematics; embedded and real-time systems; or other engineering education. Such creative work will demonstrate the application of mathematical, engineering, physical or computer sciences to activities such as real-time and embedded systems, information or financial systems, user interfaces, and networks. 2.[Freeman, P. and W. Aspray, The Supply of Information Technology Workers in the United States, Computing Research Association, 1999, as adapted from U.S. Degree Programs in Computing in Computing Professionals - Changing Needs for the 1990s, National Academy Press, 1993] [Software Engineering] Graduates work with the engineering of software, with special attention devoted to large and critical systems. 3. [IEEE Standards Collection: Software Engineering, IEEE Standard 610.12-1990, IEEE, 1993] Software Engineering: (1) The application of a systematic, disciplined, quantifiable approach to the development, operation, and maintenance of software; that is, the application of engineering to software. (2) The study of approaches as in (1). 4. [Naur, P. and B. Randall (eds.), Software Engineering: A Report on a Conference Sponsored by the NATO Science Committee, NATO, 1969] Software engineering is the establishment and use of sound engineering principles in order to obtain economically software that is reliable and works efficiently on real machines. (Fritz Bauer) 5. [Parnas, D., Software Engineering: An Unconsummated Marriage, Software Engineering Notes, ACM SIGSOFT, November, 1997, pp. 1-3] The members of the Software Engineering profession should know that subset of Computer Science that is relevant to software design, but they must also share the knowledge about design, mathematics, and other sciences that are traditionally known by Engineers. 6. Yours ??? ###################################################################### From: Peter J. Knoke A New Web-based Journal Dedicated to SET&P: Survey SWEETPI A New International Web-based Journal Dedicated to Software Engineering Education, Training, and Professional Issues (SWEETPI) This new periodical, with a first issue planned for October 2000, is aimed at the emerging software engineering education and research community. It has the goals of high quality via peer reviews, short times to publication, and very low cost compared to printed journals. It is unique because it is focused solely on software engineering education and research. Feature articles will be complemented with such items as: reports on training and educational developments reviews on national and international policies (e.g., on certification and licensing) and programs selected standardization issues forum and book reviews columns model curricula and programs reviews (what works what does not work) course announcements readers forums SURVEY The purpose of this survey is to assist in shaping the content and form of the first few issues of SWEETPI. We thank you for taking a few minutes to answer the following questions. Please send the survey results to ffpjk@aurora.alaska.edu as soon as possible, and preferably no later than 29 Feb 2000. 1) Do you think that current journals adequately cover the following areas of interest: * SE education? * SE practice? * SE training? 2) Would you be likely to subscribe to SWEETPI assuming it maintained high quality at very low cost? (the first two issues will be free) 3) Would you consider SWEETPI a potentially viable vehicle for publishing your own work? (If your answer is no, why not?) 4) Which of the following would POSITIVELY influence your decision to send your own work to an online journal such as SWEETPI? * quick reviews * 3 months to publication * highly reputable editorial board * other 5) If you are in academia, what concerns would NEGATIVELY influence your decision to send your own work to an online journal such as SWEETPI (e.g., tenure and promotion concerns) 6) To which computing and SE journals do you currently subscribe? ###################################################################### From: Peter J. Knoke International Symposium on Multimedia on Software Engineering I n t e r n a t i o n a l S y m p o s i u m o n M u l t i m e d i a S o f t w a r e E n g i n e e r i n g December 11-13, 2000 Taipei, Taiwan Co-sponsored by the IEEE Computer Society and Tamkang University --------------------------------------------------------------------- CALL FOR PAPERS With the advance of computer and telecommunication technologies, the demand for multimedia systems had increased dramatically. Despite the growing importance of multimedia applications, we still know relatively little about how to develop and maintain this class of complex applications in a systematic manner. The purpose of this symposium is to bring together active researchers in the area of multimedia systems, AI, database, HCI, computer and software engineering to exchange and evaluate the issues, experience, and trends in the areas. MSE2000 will be conducted as a combination of paper presentations, invited talks, and panel discussion. Submission of high quality papers describing mature results or on-going work are invited. The Conference Proceedings will be published by the IEEE Computer Society Press. A selected number of the accepted papers will possible be expanded and revised for publication in journals. Topics of interest include, but are not limited to: * multimedia architecture * multimedia communications & networking * multimedia and metamodeling techniques * architecture specification languages * software development using multimedia techniques * multimedia authoring * multimedia file systems and databases * multimedia over mobile systems * user-interface design * requirements and design specification techniques * distributed software development environment * metrics, analysis, testing and debugging techniques * intelligent agents * visual programming * neural networks * signal processing * image processing * parallel processing * distributed multimedia systems & applications PAPER SUBMISSIONS Papers are solicited from potential participants of this workshop. Papers must be written in English, with the length of no more than 20 pages, and printed using at least 11-point type and double spacing. Authors are requested to submit their paper electronically (postscript or pdf format only) and followed by a hard copy to the respective Program Co-Chairs. The paper should have a cover page which includes a 200-word abstract, a list of keywords, and author's phone number and e-mail address. For authors in Americas and Africa Professor Jaideep Srivastava Department of Computer Science and Engineering University of Minnesota Minneapolis, MN 55455, USA Email: srivasta@cs.umn.edu For authors in Europe and Japan Professor Masahito Hirakawa Faculty of Eng. Infor. Systems Hiroshima University 1-4-1 Kagamiyama Higashi-Hiroshima 739-8527, Japan Email: hirakawa@huis.hiroshima-u.ac.jp For authors in Asia and Australia Professor Ching-Tang Hsieh Department of Electrical Engineering Tamkang University 151 Ying-Chuan Road Tamsui, Taipei Taiwan 25137 Email: hsieh@ee.tku.edu.tw MSE 2000 will also include few special tracks dedicated to focused interest areas. For submission to these focused tracks, contact the Track Chair(s) in the respective areas, listed below. Papers from these Focused Tracks will be presented during MSE 2000. These papers will also be published in the IEEE Proceedings. End-to-End Design Issues for Distributed Multimedia Systems Track Chair: Jonathan C.L. Liu Room E444, CSE Building Department of Computer & Information Science and Engineering P.O. Box 116120 University of Florida Gainesville, FL 32611-6120, USA Phone: (352) 392-6834 Fax: (352) 392-1220 Email : jcliu@cise.ufl.edu Multimedia Tools for Scientific Applications Track Co-Chairs: Jason T. L. Wang Department of Computer and Information Science New Jersey Institute of Technology University Heights Newark, New Jersey 07102, USA Email: jason@cis.njit.edu Takenao Ohkawa Department of Information Systems Engineering Graduate School of Engineering Osaka University 2-1, Yamadaoka, Suita, Osaka, 565-0871, JAPAN Email: ohkawa@ise.eng.osaka-u.ac.jp Important dates: Papers due May 1, 2000 Paper acceptance notification August 1, 2000 Camera ready paper due September 1, 2000 More Information: http://www.ee.tku.edu.tw/mse2000.htm ###################################################################### From: T.H. Lee THE FIRST ASIA-PACIFIC CONFERENCE ON QUALITY SOFTWARE (APAQS 2000) http://www.csis.hku.hk/~apaqs HONG KONG OCTOBER 30-31, 2000 ______________________________________________________________________ ORGANIZED BY - The Software Engineering Group, The University of Hong Kong - Software Technology Centre, Vocational Training Council, Hong Kong ______________________________________________________________________ BACKGROUND The quality of software has an important bearing on the financial and safety aspects in our daily lives. Unfortunately, software systems often fail to deliver according to promises. It is well known that there are still unresolved errors in many of the software systems that we are using every day. The Asia-Pacific region is far from being immune to these problems. The prime objective of the conference is to provide a forum to bring together researchers and practitioners from this region to address this issue seriously. ______________________________________________________________________ CALL FOR PAPERS We are soliciting full-length research papers and experience reports on various aspects of software testing or quality assurance. Specific topics include, but are not limited to, the following areas: - Automated software testing - Configuration management and version control - Conformance testing - Debugging - Economics of software testing - Formal methods - Metrics and measurement - Performance testing - Process assessment and certification - Quality management - Quality measurement and benchmarking - Reliability - Review, inspection, and walkthroughs - Robustness testing - Safety and security - Testability - Testing tools - Testing standards - Testing of object-oriented software - Testing of real-time systems - Testing processes - Testing strategies - Application areas such as e-commerce, component-based systems, digital libraries, distributed systems, embedded systems, enterprise applications, information systems, Internet, mobile applications, multimedia, and Web-based systems All the papers submitted to the conference will be refereed by three members of the program committee according to technical quality, originality, significance, clarity of presentation, and appropriateness for the conference. The conference proceedings will be published by IEEE Computer Society. ______________________________________________________________________ SUBMISSION GUIDELINES Manuscripts should be full-length papers in English, double-spaced, and must not exceed 20 pages. Both electronic and hard copy submissions will be accepted, although electronic submissions are preferred. Manuscripts must not have been submitted or published elsewhere. ELECTRONIC SUBMISSION An electronic copy of the manuscript should be emailed to the conference account mailto:apaqs@csis.hku.hk, to reach us by March 15, 2000. Electronic submission must be in PDF or portable Postscript format with no encoding, condensing, or encapsulation. Please use TrueType 1 fonts wherever possible. Do not use bitmapped versions of fonts such as Computer Modern if you can avoid it. Some printer drivers have settings that directly address the portability issue, offering the options for "optimizing speed" or "optimizing portability". You should select the "optimize for portability" setting(s) wherever possible. Word processor or LaTeX source files will not be accepted. HARD-COPY MANUSCRIPT SUBMISSION Six hard copies of the manuscript should be sent to one of the program co-chairs below, to reach him by March 15, 2000. In addition, an abstract in plain text, not more than 150 words in length, should be emailed to the conference account mailto:apaqs@csis.hku.hk, to reach us by the same deadline. - Dr. T.H. Tse Department of Computer Science and Information Systems The University of Hong Kong Pokfulam Road Hong Kong Email: mailto:tse@csis.hku.hk Fax: +852 / 2559 8447 Telephone: +852 / 2859 2183 - Dr. T.Y. Chen Department of Computing and Mathematics Hong Kong Institute of Vocational Education Vocational Training Council 30 Shing Tai Road Chai Wan Hong Kong Email: mailto:tychen@vtc.edu.hk Fax: +852 / 2505 4216 Telephone: +852 / 2595 8152 ______________________________________________________________________ FURTHER INFORMATION More details of the conference are accessible at the Web site http://www.csis.hku.hk/~apaqs. Please feel free to contact the conference organizers for any queries. We can be reached by email at mailto:apaqs@csis.hku.hk. ______________________________________________________________________ IMPORTANT DATES - March 15, 2000 Deadline for submission - May 15, 2000 Notification of acceptance - June 30, 2000 Deadline for camera-ready copies of accepted manuscripts - October 30-31, 2000 Conference ______________________________________________________________________ COMMITTEES GENERAL CHAIR - Mr. Danny Tang Kowloon-Canton Railway Corporation Hong Kong KEYNOTE SPEAKERS - Professor Stephen Yau Arizona State University - Mr. K.C. Kwong Secretary for Information Technology and Broadcasting The Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region PROGRAM COMMITTEE Co-Chairs - T.H. Tse, The University of Hong Kong - T.Y. Chen, Vocational Training Council, Hong Kong, and The University of Melbourne, Australia Members - Mikio Aoyama, Niigata Institute of Technology, Japan - Paul Bailes, University of Queensland, Australia - Maarten Boasson, Hollandse Signaalapparaten BV, The Netherlands - Jonathan Bowen, The University of Reading, UK - Kai-Yuan Cai, Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, China - K.P. Chan, The University of Hong Kong - Carl K. Chang, University of Illinois at Chicago, USA - Huo Yan Chen, Jinan University, China - Shing-Chi Cheung, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology - William Chu, TungHai University, Taiwan - Doug Grant, Swinburne University of Technology, Australia - Jifeng He, UNU/IIST, Macau - Lucas C.K. Hui, The University of Hong Kong - S.L. Hung, City University of Hong Kong - John Jenkins, Middlesex University, UK - Kouichi Kishida, Software Research Associates, Japan - David Kung, The University of Texas at Arlington, USA - H.F. Leung, Chinese University of Hong Kong - Hareton Leung, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University - Shaoying Liu, Hiroshima, Japan - Michael Lyu, Chinese University of Hong Kong - Karl Reed, La Trobe University, Australia - Barrie Thompson, University of Sunderland, UK - Wei-Tek Tsai, University of Minnesota, USA - Feng-Jian Wang, National Chiao Tung University, Taiwan - Chris Yang, Chinese University of Hong Kong - Y.T. Yu, City University of Hong Kong ORGANIZING COMMITTEE - Chair: F.T. Chan, The University of Hong Kong - Vice-Chair: Karl R.P.H. Leung, Vocational Training Council, Hong Kong - Secretary, Publicity, M.F. Lau, The Hong Kong Institute of and Publication: Education - Treasurer: Wai Wong, Hong Kong Baptist University - Registration: Emily Chui, Vocational Training Council, Hong Kong - Local Arrangement: P.K. Wong, Vocational Training Council, Hong Kong ______________________________________________________________________ * The above line-up will be subject to final confirmation ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Position Openings ###################################################################### From: William W. McMillan Eastern Michigan University - Department Head My department is searching for a department head and would welcome applications from people who have an interest in furthering the development of a promising computer science department. We're right by Ann Arbor, not far from Detroit, and amidst swarms of high tech companies. The position announcement: http://compsci.acad.emich.edu/pos_head.html (The deadline has been extended until the position is filled.) Please get in touch with me if there are questions. Bill McMillan Computer Science Eastern Michigan University. csc_mcmillan@online.emich.edu ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Contact and General Information about FASE The Forum for Advancing Software engineering Education (FASE) is published on the 15th of each month by the FASE editorial board. Send newsletter articles to one of the editors, preferably by category: Articles pertinent to corporate and government training to Kathy Beckman ; Academic education, and all other categories to Don Bagert . If the article for a FASE topic where there is a guest editor, the submission should instead be to that person. Items must be submitted by the 8th of the month in order to be considered for inclusion in that month's issue. Also, please see the submission guidelines immediately below. FASE submission format guidelines: All submissions must be in ASCII format, and contain no more than 70 characters per line (71 including the new line character). 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Back issues (dating from the very first issue) can be found on the web (with each Table of Contents) at in chronological order, in reverse order, or through ftp at . The FASE Staff: Don Bagert, P.E. -- Academic/Misc Editor, ListMaster, and Archivist Dept. of Computer Science 8th and Boston Texas Tech University Lubbock TX 79409-3104 USA Phone: 806-742-1189 Fax: 806-742-3519 Email: Don.Bagert@ttu.edu URL: http://www.cs.ttu.edu/faculty/bagert.html Kathy Beckman -- Corporate/Government Editor Computer Data Systems One Curie Ct. Rockville MD 20850 USA Phone: 301-921-7027 Fax: 301-921-1004 Email: kbeckman1@erols.com Laurie Werth -- Advisory Committee Taylor Hall 2.124 University of Texas at Austin Austin TX 78712 USA Phone: 512-471-9535 Fax: 512-471-8885 Email: lwerth@cs.utexas.edu Nancy Mead -- Advisory Committee Software Engineering Institute 5000 Forbes Ave. Pittsburgh, PA 15213 USA Phone: 412-268-5756 Fax: 412-268-5758 Email: nrm@sei.cmu.edu