The Target Business Environment

Abstract

During the last few years, whoever has been involved in software development and management has noticed that two different kind of projects have arisen: very large projects carried on by large companies over long periods of time (i.e., 1 to 3 years) and small to medium projects developed in a shorter period (generally less than 1 year) by small companies. The second type of project deals mainly with recent technologies; these projects are usually Internet-related and are subject to change often and deeply in the specification (Boehm, 2000; Cusumano, 1999; Kroeker, 1999; Miranda, 2002). Moreover, since the latest technologies are on the edge and change quickly in their specifications, the technologies adopted during the project lifetime are subject to modification, and therefore, the code usually has to deal with deep modifications. The second part of this book is focused mainly on this second type of project that is often described as rapidly changing. In the following chapters, I will offer suggestions on how to manage and develop such projects in an environment that continuously changes and how to adapt to user modified needs and deal with technologies drift.