Um molde para o processo de produção de software comercial: ilustrações com software unix de prateleira.

Abstract

Production Process Models are part of the planning and control phases of a software life cycle. Currente literature proposes several processes models for this purpose. Practice, however, shows that the existing process models do not conform with the production scenario of the software industry (commercial software) due to their great focus on development issues. This work proposes a more realistic and generic template for modelling the production and delivery of commercial software upon which other models can be built and validated for specific and real industry cases. This template extends the tradicional approach of process models identifyng criticai aspects for the succes of a commercial software such as marketing, sales, distribution and technical support, which play an important role on software project budgets and schedules. After defining the template, a case study of its utilization in the software production within the Unix segment is carried out. This study concentrates on the preparation and delivery phases of commercial software, where technical and management procedures were found to be vital for the composition of a realistic model for the production and delivery of commercial software. The definition of the template and its case study allow the identification and ilustration of procedures considered criticai for the succes of both the production and delivery of commercial software. The application of the template to other software market segments (besides Unix) is a natural pathway to further pursue this research.