Page update: 28 July 2005

This workshop is a merge of two major workshops in the area of distributed software engineering: the GSD (Global Software Development) and CSSE (Computer Support for distributed Software Engineering), organized at ICSE and other Software Engineering conferences in the past 5 years.

Workshop Theme

Software development in geographically distributed settings (Distributed Software Development) is increasingly becoming common practice in the software industry. More and more software companies use computer-supported cooperative tools to overcome the geographical distance and benefit from access to a qualified resource pool and a reduction in development costs. However, the increased globalization of software development creates software engineering challenges due to the impact of temporal, geographical and cultural differences, and requires development of techniques and technologies to address these issues.

The processes of communication, coordination, and collaboration are key enablers of software development processes. In particular, one set of development activities directly affected by challenges in communication is Requirements Engineering (RE) activities that pervade the entire development life-cycle. Industrial case studies reveal the significant impact that distance has on the management of requirements and how well-known problems of RE are exacerbated in Distributed Software Development. The majority of distributed projects are characterized by distributed customer-developer relationships, be they inter-organizational projects or projects internal to multinational organizations. Failure to achieve a common understanding of system features, reduced trust and the inability to effectively resolve conflicts result in budget and schedule overruns and, ultimately, in damaged client-supplier relationships. Further, the developer team itself is often geographically distributed and experiences significant problems in requirements management and related activities such as testing and project management (e.g. project planning, progress tracking).

The goal of this workshop is to provide an opportunity for researchers and industry practitioners to explore both the state-of-the art and the state-of-the-practice in Distributed Software Development. In particular, we intend to explore the specific challenges experienced by Distributed Software Development projects in conducting effective Requirements Engineering.

Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:

• Case studies describing experiences of challenges of Distributed Software Development and Requirements Engineering in Distributed Software Development in particular
  
  
• Theories of communication, coordination, collaboration and knowledge management in Distributed Software Development
  
  
• The multifaceted nature of challenges in requirements management in Distributed Software Development
  
  
• Collaboration infrastructure to support Distributed Software Development teams and requirements management activities in particular
  
  
• Requirements Engineering processes and tools specifically targeted for Distributed Software Development projects.
  
  
• Teaching Distributed Software Development
  

Organization

Program Committee Co-Chairs

Daniela Damian (University of Victoria, Canada)

Schahram Dustdar (Vienna University of Technology, Austria)

Steering Committee

Filippo Lanubile, University of Bari, Italy
Harald Gall, University of Zurich, Switzerland
Andrea de Lucia, University of Salerno, Italy

Program Committee

1. Kevin Ryan, University of Limerick, Ireland
2. Christof Ebert, Alcatel, France
3. Andreas Braun, Accenture GmbH, Germany
4. Heather Oppenheimer, Lucent Technologies, USA
5. Lerina Aversano, University of Sannio, Italy
6. Cornelia Boldyreff, University of Lincoln, UK
7. Paolo Ciancarini, University of Bologna, Italy
8. Gianpaolo Cugola, Politecnico di Milano, Italy
9. Rick Dewar, Heriot-Watt University, UK
10. Paul Gruenbacher, University of Linz, Austria
11. Frank Maurer, University of Calgary, Canada
12. Pierluigi Ritrovato, CRMPA, Italy
13. Andre Van Der Hoek, University of California, Irvine, USA
14. Rafael Prikladnicki, Pontificia Universidade de Rio Grande du Sul, Brazil
15. Liam Banon, University of Limerick, Ireland
16. Brian Fitzgerald, University of Limerick, Ireland
17. Allen Dutoit, Technical University München, Germany
18. Stephen Rank, University of Lincoln, UK
19. Bernd Bruegge, Technical University München, Germany

Submission Details

We are inviting both technical papers as well as position papers. We expect that technical papers describe research finished and empirically evaluated or in progress, while the position papers will describe research problems or ideas. We specifically invite industry practitioners to present challenges as well as case studies that illustrate successful strategies or failures of RE in Distributed Software Development.

The submissions will be evaluated through a review process that considers each paper based on its potential to foster fruitful discussions at the workshop, while advancing the knowledge about Distributed Software Development and specifically, the topics included above.

The proceedings of the Workshop will be published by the Austrian Computer Society (OCG). The book will have an ISBN number.
Paper formating rules and style-guidelines in RTF and LaTex formats can be found here.
Research papers should be no longer than 15 pages (OCG format) and position papers up to 5 pages (OCG format).

The submission is closed. We thank Rafael Prikladnicki for providing technical support for hosting the submission site.

Important Dates