Forum for Academic Software Engineering Volume 4, Number 22, Tue Dec 20 15:31:45 CST 1994 Topics: Software Engineering Education Repository Re: SPI Successes and Barriers - from the Pittsburgh SPIN Mailing List: Business Process Re-engineering First Release of GW-GNAT. Happy Birthday Ada! CTI Email Discussion List Book Announcement: Software Systems Construction with Examples in Ada CFP: 3rd Annual Conferance on the Teaching of Computing. CFP: 1995 Asia-Pacific Software Engineering Conference CFP: Second Annual Midwest Small College Computing Conference A------------------------------------------------------- From: kpierce@d.umn.edu (Keith Pierce) Subject: Software Engineering Education Repository On-line information about software engineering education can be found at several sites. David Eichmann (University of Houston -- Clear Lake and FASE Archivist) are beginning a project of providing a central clearinghouse for this information. We envision that it would be accessible via ftp and www. Two sites are currently accessible. David has set up a www and ftp site for FASE back issues and other information at http://ricis.cl.uh.edu/FASE/ and by anonymous ftp at ftp://ricis.cl.uh.edu/ Also, I've set up a prototypical www page at http://ub.d.umn.edu:8080/SE-education/ We'd like your opinions about this seminal effort, and whether you'd be willing to contribute to the effort, say by helping manage and update some piece of information in the repository. With www, information can actually reside anywhere, and we just put appropriate links in the home page (which will likely reside at ricis.cl.uh.edu, thanks to David's generous offer of his machine). A------------------------------------------------------- From: dick@blaze.csci.csusb.edu (Dr. Richard Botting) Subject: Re: SPI Successes and Barriers - from the Pittsburgh SPIN Linda Ibrahim wrote: [...] > BARRIERS EXPERIENCED BY THOSE IN ATTENDANCE [...] > Number of votes > 1 Lack of understanding and knowledge about SPI 17 > 2. Concepts aren't taught at universities 10 [...] I remember complaining to the people who were setting up the ACM/IEEE CSci Core curriculum that they were ignoring some important topics concerning Software Quality Assurance. It is ironic when you think that evaluation, grading, peer review and anonymous inspection are a part of the academic life. In a typical CS teachers life, you are not taught these things because they are not in the curriculum and you were too smart to fail and go where these things are taught (outside of academe). So you don't teach them either... If you are very clever you end up writing the curriculum and the text books. (all case histories are fictional and any resemblance to a real person is coincidental....) EMail: dick@csci.csusb.edu=rbotting@wiley.csusb.edu. ftp://ftp.csci.csusb.edu/dick WWW Disclaimer::=`CSUSB may or may not agree with this message`. Copyright(1994)::=`Copy as long as you include this copyright and signature`. A------------------------------------------------------- From: mikeb@sqi.com (Michael Brendel) Subject: Mailing List: Business Process Re-engineering Included below is the header from a listserver on BPR. It is *very* good, and includes interaction between practioners (in the form of "war stories") and academics. ****************************************************************************** * BUSINESS PROCESS RE-ENGINEERING MAILING LIST BPR-L * * Delft University of Technology * ****************************************************************************** * You can send a message to all members of the mailing list BPR-L by sending * * an e-mail to the following address: BPR-L@IS.TWI.TUDELFT.NL. * * * * It will be distributed AUTOMATICALLY to ALL members of the list, so be * * careful what you submit! Trim down your messages as much as possible!! * ****************************************************************************** * You can ask the list processor to perform various tasks for you by sending * * an e-mail to the following address: LISTSERV@IS.TWI.TUDELFT.NL * * * * This e-mail should contain commands recognizable for the list processor, * * examples are given below: * * * * INFO BPR-L (for obtaining the info letter) * * GET BPR-L BPR-L.FAQ (for obtaining the Frequently Asked Questions list) * * UNSUB BPR-L (for unsubscribing) * * SET BPR-L MAIL ACK (for getting individual messages instead of digests) * * * ****************************************************************************** * SEND YOUR COMMANDS ONLY TO LISTSERV@IS.TWI.TUDELFT.NL, NOT TO BPR-L@IS.TWI.* * In case of problems, send e-mail to listman@is.twi.tudelft.nl (A.verbraeck)* ****************************************************************************** BPR-L Digest 251 Topics covered in this issue include: 1) NEW RTM-CASE tool by psc@saco.ufra.net (Peter Schubert) 2) The UU-Encoded file in BPR-L digest 248 by Alexander Verbraeck 3) Radical and incremental by Alan Dennis 4) Outsourcing/theoretical vs by "Allen Zubatkin" 5) Re: Blended approach to BPR by Learmonth@aol.com 6) Workflow Management Coalition Glossary by "Curtis, David" 7) This and That by "Bill Righter" 8) Process Improvement & Job Loss - Peter von Stackel by john.gancz@cdc.com 9) BPR journal articles and ftp sites... by "Ahsan Zia" 10) FRI by PALMER_MARY_M@ofvax.lanl.gov 11) roach to BPR su! by Con Gregg 12) Re: Workflow Management Coalition Glossary by magnus@comp.lancs.ac.uk (Magnus Ramage) 13) Re: Blended approach to BPR by IRS@HHS.SE (Ragnvald Sannes) 14) Educational Entities by PMGriffin@aol.com 15) Association benchmarks requested by casrsjmp@ibmmail.com 16) 1) Case Studies 1) Business Processes by Sachi Sakthivel A------------------------------------------------------- From: mfeldman@seas.gwu.edu (Michael Feldman) Subject: First Release of GW-GNAT. Happy Birthday Ada! GW-GNAT First Release, December 1994 Prof. Michael B. Feldman Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science The George Washington University Washington, DC 20052 (202) 994-5919 (voice) (202) 994-5296 (fax) mfeldman@seas.gwu.edu (Internet) December 10 is the birth date of Ada Byron, Countess of Lovelace, assistant to Charles Babbage. Ada was born on this date in 1815, and it is for her that the Ada programming language is named. In celebration of Ada's birthday, and of the recent delivery of the revised Ada standard to ISO headquarters for publication just after the start of 1995, the Ada Educational Software Group at The George Washington University, Washington, DC, is pleased to announce the first release of GW-GNAT, a multi-file program editor and development environment for the DOS version of GNAT. GNAT stands for GNU-NYU Ada 95 Translator, and is being developed by a team at New York University and elsewhere. GNAT is a compiler for Ada 95, which generates machine code using the GNU multiplatform code generator. GNAT is not yet complete, but in its current state compiles most of Ada 95. The incompletenesses are well documented and GNAT is already being widely used for Ada 95 development. GW-GNAT is a revision of GW-Ada/Ed, a "Turbo-like" development environment released in 1993 under the GNU General Public License. Developed by Michael B. Feldman, Arthur Vargas Lopes and Charles W. Kann at GWU, GW-Ada/Ed is in current educational use in many universities, companies, and government agencies around the world. The revised version, GW-GNAT, retains most of the useful features of the original development environment, but incorporates GNAT compilation and binding. GW-GNAT is free software; a later version will be released under the GNU GPL with full source code. The first release is available by anonymous ftp from the following locations: Public Ada Library (PAL), wuarchive.wustl.edu, directory languages/ada/compiler/gnat/contrib/gwu New York University (NYU), cs.nyu.edu, directory pub/gnat/contrib/gwu George Washington University (GWU), ftp.gwu.edu, directory pub/ada/gw-gnat Note that GWU is not yet distributing GNAT in a "package" with the environment; GNAT is available from PAL and NYU. Once you have installed GNAT, install GW-GNAT to run it from the editor. A------------------------------------------------------- From: Keith Pierce Subject: CTI Email Discussion List The CTI Centre for Computing, at the University of Ulster, has established a number of subject-specific e-mail discussion lists, to provide a forum for academics to discuss topics of mutual interest. Among others, discussion lists include cti-comp-se software engineering cti-comp-fm formal methods To subscribe, send the single line JOIN listname firstname lastname to mailbase@mailbase.ac.uk A------------------------------------------------------- From: bsanden@isse.gmu.edu (Bo I. Sanden) Subject: Book Announcement: Software Systems Construction with Examples in Ada Software Systems Construction with Examples in Ada by Bo Sanden Prentice Hall 1994 ISBN 0-13-030834-X This book is about practical and economical construction of software systems. It targets graduate or upper-level undergraduate students of software engineering as well as practitioners. The chapters are: 1. Introduction 2. Control structuring 3. Modularization 4. Object-based software 5. Finite automata and software 6. Concurrent tasks 7. Resource sharing 8. Entity-life modeling 9. Case study: Flexible manufacturing system The first 7 chapters covers systematically the canonical knowledge of software construction. According to J.Z., the reviewer for COMPUTER, "it clearly and gradually presents the background of software construction that I would like to see mastered by all college graduates in computer science and engineering." The book promotes an object-based design style where the software is patterned as closely as possible after objects and object structures in the problem environment. The goal is a clear and modifiable software solution that is cast in terms of the problem, with a minimum of extra apparatus. The two final chapters present a novel approach to concurrent software based on the object-based design style. It is called entity-life modeling and is relevant in problems where multiple events can occur simultaneously. Threads of events are identified such that each event occurrence in the problem belongs to exactly one thread. These threads become the tasks in the software. Entity-life modeling results in intuitive software designs where tasking is used to address the timing concerns in the problem directly. This is in contrast with prevailing methods based on structured analysis where tasks are seen as functional modules and created by combining transforms in data and control flow diagrams. Ada was chosen as a design language since object-based programming and tasking are integral parts of its syntax. The book is not an Ada text and can be understood based on the knowledge of any block-structured language. Entity-life modeling may be applied in any environment supporting light-weight processes. The book contains a wealth of practical examples worked from analysis to design in Ada. Concurrent examples include the remote temperature sensor, the buoy and elevator problems, and a substantial case study of a flexible manufacturing system (FMS). There are 8 major student projects and 50 end-of-chapter exercises. A solutions manual is available separately from the publisher. The book was reviewed in COMPUTER, June 1994, and SIGPLAN Notices, July 1994. A complete table of contents and other information are available from bsanden@gmu.edu A------------------------------------------------------- From: dj.mcmullan@ulst.ac.uk Subject: CFP: 3rd Annual Conferance on the Teaching of Computing. 3rd ANNUAL CONFERENCE ON THE TEACHING OF COMP|UTING 29 August - 1 September 1995 Dublin City University ANNOUNCEMENT AND CALL FOR PARTICIPATION The Centre for Teaching Computing, in conjunction with the Computers in Teaching Initiative Centre for Computing at the University of Ulster is hosting the 3rd Annual Conference on the Teaching of Computing at Dublin City University from Tuesday 29 August to Friday 1 September 1995. This conference is the only European forum to bring together computer science teachers and researchers from both the further and higher education sectors who are concerned with the effective teaching and assessment of their subject. The pressures of increasing student:staff ratios and the introduction of teaching quality assessment, mean that a sharing of experiences between academics is more urgent than ever. The format of the 1995 conference will be similar to the previous conferences, including keynote addresses, parallel paper sessions, hands-on workshop sessions and curriculum discussion groups as well as poster demonstrations. The conference should be of interest to anyone teaching computing science in Universities or Colleges of Further Education, who wish to share their ideas with others and to gain an insight into alternative methods for the development and delivery of computing curricula. Full proceedings will be published as a special edition of 'Monitor', the CTI Centre for Computing newsletter. SUBMISSIONS Submissions are invited in the following categories: Paper presentations Lecture presentations (30 minutes). These will run in parallel streams. Workshops An opportunity for delegates to explore topics of common interest (90 minutes). A typical workshop will include a short presentation or demonstration but the focus will be on interactive discussion and activity. Poster demonstrations Posters will be on display throughout the conference and special times will be allocated when stands will be manned. Participants will be provided with both poster space and a table for computer demonstrations. N.B. Authors of paper presentations and workshops are strongly encouraged to submit a poster illustrating their work. All submissions should be made in the form of an abstract of up to 500 words. Every submission should include a cover sheet detailing: - Type of submission - Title of submission - Names of all contributors plus address, phone number and e-mail address of main author. Please send 3 copies of your submission to the address overleaf. Abstracts should also be forwarded in machine readable form or by e-mail for inclusion in the conference handbook. All abstracts must reach the conference organiser by Friday 27 January 1995. KEY TOPICS Although contributions on any area of computer science education will be considered the organisers are particularly interested in receiving contributions in the following areas: - Delivery mechanisms - Curriculum issues - Assessment - Authoring and courseware development - Models for computer science education - Supporting aids - New technologies - Evaluating teaching and assessment methods - Peer tutoring - Computing science for non-specialists - Computing for those with physical disabilities THE CONFERENCE VENUE Dublin City University is Dublin's newest university and occupies a spacious site on the north side of the city. The campus is easily accessible by road, rail or by air (it is only two miles from Dublin International airport). The university has fine halls of residence, a superb sports centre and a new suite of computer teaching laboratories. The School of Computer Applications also hosts the national Centre for Software Engineering, organised through the Office of Science and Technology in the Department of Industry and Commerce. Regular buses provide transport to the city centre. The City of Dublin has many attractions to offer -- a stroll along the River Liffey, providing an opportunity to view the famous architecture of Gandon or a visit to Grafton street, Dublin's most fashionable shopping area. In addition, visitors can follow the pavement plaques which mark the path taken by Leopold Bloom in James Joyce's renowned Ulysses. For those who prefer something less energetic, there are a variety of good theatres and museums or one can always relax and enjoy traditional Irish hospitality at one of the many local pubs. It is even possible to pay a visit to the world famous Guinness brewery where you can sample Irelands most famous export. Visits to some of the attractions of Dublin will be arranged for those delegates who wish to stay in Dublin over the weekend in order to avail of special travel deals. ADDRESS FOR COMMUNICATION All enquiries or submissions should be send to: Ms Sylvia Alexander CTI Centre for Computing Faculty of Informatics University of Ulster at Jordanstown Co Antrim BT37 0QB Tel: +44 232 365131 Ext: 3020 Fax: +44 232 352859 E-mail: CTIComp@uk.ac.ulster.ujvax A------------------------------------------------------- From: apsec@cs.uq.oz.au ( APSEC) Subject: CFP: 1995 Asia-Pacific Software Engineering Conference Preliminary Call For Papers The 1995 Asia-Pacific Software Engineering Conference: APSEC'95 (incorporating ASWEC'95) Tutorial Day: Wednesday December 6, 1995 Conference: Thursday December 7 - Saturday December 9, 1995 Location: Brisbane, Australia Sponsored by ACS in co-operation with IREE and IEAust THEMES The conference will address the following principal themes, but any topic relevant to the field of software engineering will be considered. Requirements Engineering, Specification, Analysis and Design, Testing, Maintenance, CASE, Software Metrics, Software Process, Reuse, Reverse Engineering, Object Orientation, Re-engineering, Distributed Systems, Domain Modelling, Formal Methods, Reliability, Information System Development, Project Management, Quality Assurance, Education. INSTRUCTIONS TO AUTHORS TECHNICAL PAPERS APSEC'95 Program Committee solicits original technical papers. All contributions will be reviewed and evaluated based on originality, technical quality, and relevance to Software Engineering. Industrial experience reports are welcome. Technical papers must be no longer than 6000 words. All papers must include a separate cover sheet which provides the following information: the title, authors' names, postal and electronic mail addresses, telephone and fax numbers, a 200 words abstract and a list of keywords. Experience papers or practical papers are also welcome. Submitted papers must be written in English and identify what is new and significant about the presented work. Accepted papers will be published by an international publisher. Six (6) copies of technical papers should be sent by April 30, 1995: Papers from Australia, Oceania and America should be sent to Roger Duke Dept. of Computer Science University of Queensland QLD 4072, Australia TEL. +61 7 365 2097 FAX +61 7 365 1999 E-mail rduke@cs.uq.oz.au Papers from Asia, Africa and Europe should be sent to Kyo C. Kang Dept. of Computer Science and Engineering Pohang University of Science and Engineering Pohang, KyungBuk, KOREA email: kck@vision.postech.ac.kr TUTORIAL PROPOSALS The Program Committee invites proposals for half day (3 hour) tutorials. For further details, email Roger Duke at rduke@cs.uq.oz.au. IMPORTANT DATES Submission Deadline: 30 April 1995 Acceptance Notification: 15 August 1995 Camera-ready Copy Due: 30 September 1995 GENERAL CONFERENCE COMMITTEE Conference Chair Gordon Rose (University of Queensland) Conference Deputy Chair Paul Bailes (University of Queensland) Program Co-Chairs Roger Duke (University of Queensland) Kyo C. Kang (Pohang University of Science and Engineering) Organisation and Publicity Leon Tighe (Qld ACS Branch Chairman) Treasurer Jon Heales (Qld ACS Branch Vice Chairman) STEERING COMMITTEE MEMBERS Ken-ichi Harada (Keio University, Japan) Sadahiro Isoda (NTT, Japan) Yong Rae Kwon (KAIST, Korea) Lin-shan Lee (Academia Sinica, Taiwan) Karl Leung (Hong Kong Polytechnic University) Danny Poo (National University of Singapore, Singapore) Karl Reed (La Trobe University, Australia) Vincent Shen (The Hong Kong University of Science & Technology, Hong Kong) Chi Su Wu (Seoul National University, Korea) PROGRAM COMMITTEE The Program Committee is to be announced; it will comprise industry and academic representation from a range of Asia-Pacific nations including Australia, Hong Kong, Japan, Korea, Singapore and Taiwan. -- Roger Duke Dept. of Computer Science, Univ. of Queensland Queensland, Australia, 4072 rduke@batserver.cs.uq.oz.au (ACSNET) A------------------------------------------------------- From: wmyers@encore.ncren.net (Belmont Abbey College) Subject: CFP: Second Annual Midwest Small College Computing Conference MIDWEST SMALL COLLEGE COMPUTING CONFERENCE SPONSORED BY THE CONSORTIUM FOR COMPUTING IN SMALL COLLEGES December 17, 1994 CALL FOR PARTICIPATION The Second Annual Midwest Small College Computing Conference will be held at the Marriott in Fort Wayne, Indiana, on September 29, and 30, 1995. The conference host is Taylor University in Fort Wayne. The conference theme is "Innovations and Challenges of Computing in Small Colleges." The conference sponsor is The Consortium for Computing in Small Colleges. Ideas for panels and tutorials, as well as papers, are solicited on the following suggested topics: Computer Education Curriculum Issues Course Development Issues Course Content Issues Computer Uses Across the Curriculum Administrative Issues Sharing Resources Faculty Support Services Budget Faculty/Staff Workshops Long-range Planning Student Research Projects In addition, student papers are solicited. Papers will be refereed and published in the _Journal for Computing in Small Colleges_. Send three complete copies of your paper by March 15, 1995, (up to 15 pages, double spaced) with an abstract with no identifying reference (for blind review) to: Dr. Jean Mehta Dept. of Mathematices and Computer Science St. Xavier University 3700 West 103rd Street Chicago, IL 60655 Mehta@sxu.edu Send an extended abstract (2 pages) for panel and tutorial suggestions to: Dr. Bill Marion Dept. of Mathematics and Computer Science Valparaiso University Valparaiso, IN 46383-9978 bmarion@exodus.valpo.edu Notification of acceptance will be sent on May 21, 1995, and the deadline for final drafts (in WordPerfect or clean ASCII format) is July 1, 1995. For further information, contact: Dr. Dave Bergue dbergue@depauw.edu (317)659-4735 To be placed on the mailing list to receive registration materials in August, send you name, mailing address, and e-mail address to: wmyers@encore.concert.net William Myers, Registrar Midwest Small College Computing Conference Department of Computer Studies Belmont Abbey College Belmont, NC 28012-2795 (704)825-6823 FAX:(704)825-6670 E------------------------------------------------------------------- FASE Volume 4 Number 22 Send newsletter articles to fase-submit@d.umn.edu or fase@d.umn.edu Send requests to add, delete, or modify a subscription to fase-request@d.umn.edu Send problem reports, returned mail, or other correspondence about this newsletter to fase-owner@d.umn.edu or kpierce@d.umn.edu You can retrieve back issues by anonymous FTP from from ricis.cl.uh.edu. You can access them through WWW at URL http://ricis.cl.uh.edu/FASE/ Keith Pierce, Editor Laurie Werth, Advisory Committee Department of Computer Science Dept. of Computer Science University of Minnesota, Duluth Taylor Hall 2.124 Duluth, MN 55812-2496 University of Texas at Austin Telephone: (218) 726-7194 Austin, Texas 78712 Fax: (218) 726-6360 Telephone: (512) 471-9535 Email: kpierce@d.umn.edu Fax: (512)471-8885 Email: lwerth@cs.utexas.edu David Eichmann, FASE Archivist Asst. Prof. / RBSE Director of R & D Web: http://ricis.cl.uh.edu/eichmann/ Software Engineering Program Phone: (713) 283-3875 University of Houston - Clear Lake fax: (713) 283-3810 Box 113, 2700 Bay Area Blvd. Email: eichmann@rbse.jsc.nasa.gov Houston, TX 77058 or: eichmann@cl.uh.edu RBSE on the Web: http://rbse.jsc.nasa.gov/eichmann/rbse.html