The Software Product Lines (SPL) provide a software production approach that is based on planned reuse, which seeks to improve productivity, development times, commercialization, and increase the quality of software products. Features modeling is one of the most popular domain analysis techniques, and is one of the essential elements for the good definition of SPLs, since they allow analyzing the similarity and variability to develop core product assets highly reusable. But defining a features model is a complex activity, because it involves the participation and coordination of a group of people, who use different techniques to manage and elicit sources of information, aspects that, if not well coordinated and related, can lead to a poor definition of the model and therefore, these will be of little use. Consequently, this paper presents the initial progress of the research that has allowed the articulation and base a proposal that seeks to define an approach for the definition of the features models, which allows in an assisted and collaborative way its construction using the own elements of SPL's Engineering in combination with Collaboration Engineering.
The Colombian software industry has problems in its production, which affect low levels of quality, innovation, development, and reuse, causing customers and end-users to disagree about the development of the project and the final product [1]. The academic community and companies have directed efforts to mitigate these problems, have sought to use, adapt and/or define production approaches that allow increasing the quality of the software and consequently improve competitiveness [2] [3]. The Software Product Lines (SPL) provide a software production approach that is based on planned reuse, which seeks to improve productivity, development times, commercialization, and increase the quality of software products [2] [3]. But the construction of an SPL is not trivial, because it requires specialized knowledge of the definition and use of its components, for this it is necessary to follow Domino Engineering (DI) and Application Engineering (AI). The DI is responsible for providing guidelines for the definition of elements that make up the SPL. For its part, the IA uses the infrastructure defined in the DI to develop specific products [4]. Specifically, in the DI, activities are carried out to determine the features of the products by identifying common elements, optional features, points of variation, and variant features, which must be configured and selected depending on the product to be generated, this identification of features is materialized in a Features Model, which is a vital and necessary element for the definition of an SPL. This model captures the features of the software products that will make up the SPL. In addition, the relationships between the features are described and the set that is valid to be used in a given software product is defined [5]. But defining feature models is a complex, time-consuming activity due to the involvement of different people with different ideas and knowledge, where it is necessary to properly understand and interpret heterogeneous opinions of the model needs that should emerge from the modeling team. In addition, when identifying features, it is necessary to abstract and understands the domain knowledge of various experts, as well as to search for information in different sources such as: books, user manuals, design documents, and source programs [6]. All the aforementioned aspects must be combined to define the features model, which makes the activity of its definition complex, since mainly an adequate collaboration between people who use techniques to manage and elicit sources of information is required, the aspect that if they are not well related they can lead to a poor definition of the model and therefore that it will be of little use [6].
On the other hand, collaborative work requires that participants who carry out an activity share the process of creating knowledge [7] [8] which implies providing spaces for interaction between people to meet an objective based on the use of different elements of collaboration (roles, tasks, strategies, tools, metrics, etc.) that allow incorporating the perspectives of the participants and their teamwork [9]. According to the general problem and considering that in the features models construction it is necessary to collaborate effectively and that the adoption of collaborative work elements could support in the features models definition in SPL's, it is pertinent to ask How to support the definition of feature models in product lines using elements of collaborative work? Given that it is convenient to support the definition of these models so that it is of relevant knowledge in the strengthening of the SPL's. Consequently, this paper presents the initial progress of the research that has allowed the articulation and support of a proposal that seeks to define an approach for the definition of feature models, that allows in an assisted and collaborative way its construction using own elements of SPL's Engineering in combination with Collaboration Engineering.
The rest of this paper is structured as follows: Section 2 describes the rationale. Section 3 presents and structures the related works. Section 4 defines the objectives of the proposal. Section 5 describes the methodology to be used for the execution of the project, and finally, section 6 describes preliminary conclusions of the work
SPLs are a software development paradigm that seeks to create product families instead
of creating individual products. These families group a set of products that share
common features while having some variations from each other. SPLs promise benefits
such as reuse, decreased time and development costs [
The features model was first presented as part of the features-oriented domain analysis
(FODA) [
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The Systematic literature review shown in [
General objective To propose a feature model definition approach1 in Software Product Lines that incorporates collaborative work elements.
Specific objectives 1 Approach: For this work, an approach can be: techniques, processes, activities, guidelines, that support the feature models creation.
To characterize from the available literature, techniques, processes, activities, guide-lines, methods, and models used in the definition of feature models. To identify the best elements of collaborative work that are appropriate to the SPL development environment.
To construct a feature models definition approach that is supported by elements of collaborative work
To validate the proposed approach in an academic or industrial context. 5
This work will be carried out following the multi-cycle research-action methodology
with bifurcation which defines three cycles: conceptual, methodological and evaluation
[
Conceptual cycle: planning and execution of systematic mapping are carried out to identify the features of the different approaches existing in the feature model creation. The activities related to the first and second goal are: • Planning of systematic mapping. In this activity, the different research questions and objectives will be defined, inclusion and exclusion criteria will be defined, the databases and search engines to be used in the entire systematic mapping will be identified. • Execution. In this activity, the search terms will be defined, scientific databases will be searched and relevant content and data will be extracted • Analysis. In this activity, information is collected to identify the characteristics of the different approaches in modeling SPL characteristics. • Identify, according to the literature, the collaborative work practices that can support the creation of a model of characteristics in SPL. • Classify and/or define the collaborative work elements to be integrated into the definition of feature models in SPL.
Methodological cycle: the base structure of elements that will be part of the proposed approach is defined. The activities related to the third goal are: • Define the base structure of elements that will be part of the proposed approach. • Incrementally incorporate each of the components of the proposed approach
Evaluation cycle: an evaluation mechanism will be chosen with which the proposed approach will be validated, where the validation must be planned, designed, and executed to refine the approach considering the analysis of the results obtained. The activities related to the fourth goal are:
Select an evaluation mechanism with which the proposed approach will be validated Plan, Design, and Execute the validation of the proposed approach Refine the approach taking into account the analysis of the results obtained in its validation
This paper presents the initial progress of the research that has allowed to articulate and substantiate a proposal that seeks to define an approach for the feature models definition, which allows in an assisted and collaborative way its construction using own elements of SPL's Engineering in combination with the Collaboration's Engineering. In addition, it is identified that defining feature models is a complex activity, which is too time-consuming, due to the fact that diverse people with different ideas and knowledge intervene, where it is necessary to properly understand and interpret heterogeneous opinions that emerge from the modeling team. According to the related works analyzed, there are different perspectives in the literature concerning the feature models, but none, involves or is based on collaborative work, therefore, this aims to be the greatest contribution of this research work, seeking it should be noted that coordination and collaboration between people who share knowledge, techniques, and tools can improve the feature models definition, contributing to the strengthening of the SPLs definition.