The IT Measurement Compendium

The Estimation Challenges.- Estimation Fundamentals.- Prerequisites for Estimation.- The Implementation of Estimation.- Estimation Methods.- Estimating Maintenance Effort.- Software Measurement and Metrics: Fundamentals.- Product- and Process- Metrics.- Object-Oriented Metrics.- Measurement Communities and Resources.- Benchmarking of IT Projects.- The IFPUG Function Point Counting Method.- Functional Size Measurement Methods (FSMMs).- Variants of the IFPUG Function Point Counting Method.- Using Functional Size Measurement Methods.- Estimation of Data Warehouses, Web-Based Applications: Software Reuse and Redevelopment.- IFPUG Function Point Counting Rules.- Functional Size Measurement Case Studies.- Functional Size Measurement: Additional Case Studies.- Tools for Estimation.

Manfred Bundschuh is an internationally recognized expert on software measurement, estimating and international standards, with more than 40 years' IT experience, as an IT controller, consultant, and project manager. In addition, he has been teaching software engineering and project management at the University of Applied Sciences in Cologne, Germany, for more than 25 years. For the last 5 years he has been President of DASMA e.V., the metrics organization of the German-speaking countries.

Carol Dekkers is the president of Quality Plus Technologies, Inc., and a recognized expert in software measurement, functional size measurement, quality, scope management, and project management. Carol is a frequent keynote presenter at international conferences and the author of more than 60 articles and co-author of three books. She is a delegate to ISO/IEC for the United States (since 1994) and has worked for the Software Engineering Institute (SEI) as a visiting scientist. She is a professional engineer (Canada), a Certified Management Consultant (CMC), a Project Management Professional (PMP), and a Certified Function Point Specialist (CFPS). Carol is active in the International Software Benchmarking Standards Group (ISBSG), International Function Point Users Group (past-president), PMI Metrics SIG (past chair) and a variety of other industry groups.

"This is a most useful and practical book. It should be on every project manager's desk as a handy reference on all things dealing with software measurement, estimation, benchmarking, and process improvement. Easy to read, easy to understand, and easy to apply !"

Peter R. Hill, CEO, International Software Benchmarking Standards Group

 

"Carol Dekkers and Manfred Bundschuh have written an excellent book that should be added to the collections of all software managers and software metrics workers throughout the world.

Measurement and estimation of software projects has been extremely difficult for both technical and sociological reasons. The technical reasons include scores of poorly defined and incompatible metrics, gaps or "leakage" from historical data, and a rather sparse collection of accurate benchmarks that were available to the general software community.

The sociological reasons center around the adversarial relationships between followers of rival metrics and measurement practices. For many years the "lines of code" metrics users have been at odds with the "function point" metrics users. Several other forms of measurement such as Earned Value, Balanced Scorecards, and Goal-Question metrics also have supporters, and tend to ignore other forms of metrics.

In recent years the situation has become even more complex. As of 2008 there are at least 24 function point variants, five methods for counting lines of code, and perhaps 15 other forms of measurement such as Use Case Points, Story Points, object-oriented metrics, and others too numerous to cite.

Dekkers and Bundschuh navigate this tricky area with clarity and objectiveness. All of the major metrics variants are discussed and explained, and their pros and cons are noted.

The book also discusses the organizations that are trying to eliminate competition among the rival metrics camps, and achieve some kind of consensus on what needs to be measured and how to