=Paper=
{{Paper
|id=Vol-1372/paper22
|storemode=property
|title=Integrating Network Technique into Distributed Agent-Oriented Software Development Projects
|pdfUrl=https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-1372/paper22.pdf
|volume=Vol-1372
|dblpUrl=https://dblp.org/rec/conf/apn/RoderC15
}}
==Integrating Network Technique into Distributed Agent-Oriented Software Development Projects==
https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-1372/paper22.pdf
Integrating Network Technique into Distributed
Agent-Oriented Software Development Projects
Christian Röder and Lawrence Cabac
University of Hamburg, Faculty of Mathematics, Informatics and Natural Sciences,
Department of Informatics, http://www.informatik.uni-hamburg.de/TGI/
Keywords: Project Management, Network Technique, Software Engineering,
Petri Nets, Modeling
Extended Abstract
The management of local software projects is challenging, due to its complexity.
In case of distributed development projects, the complexity in project manage-
ment increases even more [1]. In this publication we introduce and adapt the
well-proven network technique 1 into Paose, a distributed agent-oriented soft-
ware development approach, by directly integrating a modeling tool for network
technique into the development environment of Paose. We support the project
participants in modeling their interdependent project activities and reason about
them more easily, using an illustrative, graphical syntax. By providing the map-
ping of network technique diagrams onto Petri nets, we utilize formal semantics
and improve integration into our development approach, which is based on Petri
nets.
The participants of distributed software development projects have to tackle
several challenges: Project members, which are organized in sub-teams, perform
activities at spacial and temporal distance from one another. These distances
have an impact on communication, coordination and control [1]. If, in order to
counter these challenges, concepts from agile project management that value
self-responsibility are applied, the sub-teams are required to self-organize and
self-manage their own activities. Therefore, the sub-teams require support.
Naturally, a sub-team has to plan and perform a large number of activities.
These activities may depend logically and temporally. Furthermore, not only
may dependencies exist between the activities of one single sub-team, but also
between activities of multiple sub-teams. Quantities and interdependencies of ac-
tivities complicate the sub-teams capabilities of planning and scheduling: State-
ments regarding the duration of the overall project or about efficiently scheduling
activities are not made easily by participants of the sub-teams. In order to ease
1
The terms network technique or network scheduling (German: Netzplantechnik ) sub-
sume - amongst other concepts - the more known methods CPM (critical path
method), MPM (metra potential method), PERT (program evaluation and review
technique) or PDM (precedence diagramming method). For a short overview about
network technique, see [6, pp. 101 - 108].
322 PNSE’15 – Petri Nets and Software Engineering
the sub-teams’ project management, participants of sub-teams require support
in modeling the complex system of linked activities.
Distributed software development projects can be executed by following the
Petri-net and agent-oriented software engineering (Paose) approach [2,4]. In
prior works, an issue tracking system and continuous integration support were
integrated into Paose in order to support the participants in performing project
management activities [3]. To allow scheduling of activities and reasoning about
time properties further work is required. The current research of Röder [5] is
concerned with the integration of time planning techniques into Paose.
The discipline of project management provides - among other things - the
well-proven network technique. Using network technique, project managers are
able to graphically model projects. Thereby, project activities and relationships
are explicated as net schedules and elements of project flows. In addition, project
managers can make use of the critical path method to obtain prioritization guid-
ance by identifying activities that are critical in regard to the project duration.
In this poster we present a prototypical tool for applying concepts of a net-
work technique to model sets of project activities as net schedules, enabling the
identification of sequences of time-critical activities. The modeler can map net
schedules to Petri nets, whereby the semantics can be altered in principle. This
mapping has three benefits. Petri net analysis can be applied indirectly on net
schedules. Project participants obtain explicit semantics about the net sched-
ules they created. Furthermore, net schedules can indirectly be incorporated as
executable Petri nets into the Petri net-based implementations of Paose.
In the future, the modeling tool can be enhanced in different ways: More
concepts of the network technique can be implemented into the tool, to enrich
the usable syntax. More complex semantics for the mapping of net schedules
to Petri nets can be provided, to generate Petri net-based implementations for
various purposes.
References
1. Pär Ågerfalk et al. A framework for considering opportunities and threats in dis-
tributed software development. In Proceedings of the International Workshop on
Distributed Software Development. Austrian Computer Society, pages 47–61, Au-
gust 2005.
2. Lawrence Cabac. Modeling Petri Net-Based Multi-Agent Applications, volume 5 of
Agent Technology – Theory and Applications. Logos Verlag, Berlin, 2010.
3. Matthias Güttler. Integration einer agilen Projektmanagementumgebung in ein
verteiltes Team. Diploma thesis, University of Hamburg, Department of Informatics,
Vogt-Kölln Str. 30, D-22527 Hamburg, November 2013.
4. Paose web page. http://www.paose.net/. Last accessed on 31st May, 2015.
5. Christian Röder. Prototypische Integration von Netzplantechnik in einen agentenori-
entierten und verteilten Softwareentwicklungsprozess. Diploma thesis, University
of Hamburg, Department of Informatics, Vogt-Kölln Str. 30, D-22527 Hamburg,
planned for September 2015.
6. Stefano Tonchia. Industrial Project Management: Planning, Design, and Construc-
tion. Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg, Berlin, Heidelberg, 2008.