Abstract
System and software documentation is a necessity when making selection and acquisition decisions, when developing new and/or improving existing system and software functionality. A proper documentation becomes even more crucial for open source systems (OSS), where, typically, stakeholders from different communities are involved. However there exist only limited or no methodology to assess documentation quality. In this paper we present a quality model and a comprehensive method to assess quality of the OSS documentation availability (DA). Our contribution is threefold. Firstly, based on the criteria defined by Kitchenham et al. we illustrate the theoretical validity of the DA model. Secondly, we execute the first step towards the empirical validity of the DA model. Finally, our work results in a comprehensive and empirically grounded interpretation model of the documentation quality.
Chapter PDF
References
Boehm, B., Brown, J.R., Kaspar, J.R., Lipow, M., MacLoed, G.J., Merritt, M.J.: Characteristics of Software Quality, TRW Series of Software Technology. North-Holland Pub., Amsterdam (1978)
Davis, A., Overmyer, S., Jordan, K., Caruso, J., Dandashi, F., Dinh, A., Kincaid, G., Ledeboer, G., Reynolds, P., Srimani, P., Ta, A., Theofanos, M.: Identifying and Measuring Quality in a Software Requirements Specification. In: Proceeding of the 1st International Software Metrics Symposium, pp. 141–152 (1993)
Deprez, J.-C., Haaland, K., Kamseu, F.: QualOSS Methodology and QualOSS Assessment Method, Deliverable D4.1, http://www.qualoss.org/deliverables (last checked 28.02.2010)
Le Vie Jr., D.S.: Documentation Metrics: What Do You Really Want to Measure? http://www.stc.org/intercom/PDFs/2000/200012_06-09.pdf (last checked 28.02.2010)
El Emam, K., Drouin, J.-N., Melo, W.: SPICE. In: The Theory and Practice and Software Process Improvement and Capability Determination. IEEE Computer Society, Los Alamitos (1998)
Forward, J.A., Lethbridge, T.C.: Qualities of Relevant Software Documentation: an Industrial Study, http://www.site.uottawa.ca/~tcl/gradtheses/aforward/papers/aforward_icse2003_sub.pdf (last checked 28.02.2010)
IEEE: IEEE Recommended Practice for Software Design Descriptions, IEEE Std 1016-1998 (1998)
IEEE: IEEE Standard for Software Maintenance, IEEE Std 1219-1998 (1998)
IEEE: IEEE Recommended Practice for Software Requirements Specification, IEEE Std 830-1998 (1998)
IEEE: IEEE Standard for Software Project Management Plans, IEEE Std 1058-1998 (1998)
IEEE: IEEE Standard for Software Test Documentation, IEEE Std 829-1998 (1998)
IEEE: IEEE Standard for Software User Documentation, IEEE Std 1063-2001 (2001)
ISO/IEC: Information Technology – Software Product Evaluation– Quality Characteristics and Guide Lines for their Use. ISO/IEC IS 9126, Switzerland (1991)
Izquierdo, D., Herraiz, I.: Qualoss 3.1 measurement Targets, Deliverable D3.2, http://www.qualoss.org/deliverables (last checked 28.02.2010)
Jazzar, A., Scacchi, W.: Understanding the Requirements for Information System Documentation: an Empirical Investigation. In: Proceedings of the ACM Conference on Organizational Computing Systems (COOCS 1995), pp. 268–279. ACM, New York (1995)
Kitchenham, B., Pfeeger, S.L., Fenton, N.: Towards a Framework for Software Measurement Validation. IEEE Trans. on Soft. Eng. 21(12) (1995)
Loconsole, A., Borstler, J.: Theoretical Validation and Case Study of Requirements Management Measures. Technical report UMINF-03.02, Department of Computing Science, Umea University (2003)
Matulevičius, R., Kamseu, F., Habra, N.: Measuring Open Source Documentation Availability. In: Proceedings of the 12th International Conference on Quality Engineering in Software Technology (CONQUEST 2009), dpunkt.verlag GmbH, pp. 83–102 (2009)
McCall, J.A., Richards, P.K., Walters, G.F.: Factors in Software Quality, RADC TR-77-369, Vols I, II, III, US Rome Air Development Center Reports NTIS AD/A-049 014, 015, 055 (1977)
Paulk, M.C., Curtis, B., Chrissis, M., Weber, C.: Capability Maturity Model for Software: Version 1.1. Technical Report SEI-93-TR-24, Software Engineering Institute, Carnegie Mellon University (1993)
Singh, N.: Maintaining Quality Control in Documentation. In: Proceedings of Society for Technical Communication (2002)
Schiesser, R.: How does your process documentation measure up?, http://articles.techrepublic.com.com/5100-10878_11-1053164.html (last checked 28.02.2010)
Soto, M., Ciolkowski, M., Deprez, J.-C., Ruiz, J., Herraiz, I., Campos, C.G., Matulevičius, R.: Metrics and Indicators of the Standard QualOSS Assessment Method, Deliverable D4.2, http://www.qualoss.org/deliverables (last checked 28.02.2010)
Wohlin, C., Runeson, P., Høst, M., Ohlsson, M.C., Regnell, B., Wesslen, A.: Experimentation in Software Engineering. Kluwer Academic Publishers, Boston (2002)
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2010 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
About this paper
Cite this paper
Matulevičius, R., Habra, N., Kamseu, F. (2010). Validity of the Documentation Availability Model: Experimental Definition of Quality Interpretation. In: Pernici, B. (eds) Advanced Information Systems Engineering. CAiSE 2010. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 6051. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-13094-6_20
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-13094-6_20
Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Print ISBN: 978-3-642-13093-9
Online ISBN: 978-3-642-13094-6
eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)