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Meshing agile and plan-driven development in safety-critical software: a case study

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Abstract

Organizations developing safety-critical software are increasingly seeking to create better practices by meshing agile and plan-driven development processes. Significant differences between the agile and the plan-driven processes make meshing difficult, and very little empirical evidence on using agile processes for safety-critical software development exists. There are four areas of concern, in particular, for meshing the development of safety-critical software concerning: documentation, requirements, life cycle and testing. We report on a case study of a pharmaceutical organization in which a Scrum process was implemented to support agile software development in a plan-driven safety-critical project. The purpose was to answer the following research question: For safety-critical software, what can a software team do to mesh agile and plan-driven processes effectively? The main contribution of the paper is an elaborated understanding of meshing in the four areas of concern and how the conditions for safety-critical software influence them. We discuss how meshing within the four areas of concern is a contribution to existing research.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Management, Aarhus University, Fuglesangs Allé 4, 8210, Aarhus V, Denmark

    Lise Tordrup Heeager

  2. Department of Computer Science, Aalborg University, Selma Lagerlöfs Vej 300, 9220, Aalborg Ø, Denmark

    Peter Axel Nielsen

Authors
  1. Lise Tordrup Heeager
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  2. Peter Axel Nielsen
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Correspondence to Peter Axel Nielsen.

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Communicated by: Per Runeson

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Appendix 1 Interview Guides

Appendix 1 Interview Guides

Table 5 Interview Guide, Phase 1
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Table 6 Interview Guide, Phase 2
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Heeager, L.T., Nielsen, P.A. Meshing agile and plan-driven development in safety-critical software: a case study. Empir Software Eng 25, 1035–1062 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10664-020-09804-z

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