

EDSER — The Third International Workshop

The goal of software design is to maximize value added—as defined in a given context—for any given investment. This is the premise explored in the Economics-Driven Software Engineering Research (EDSER) workshops. Yet, software design remains formulated in mostly economics-independent terms, and it remains hard to relate software product, process, and portfolio decisions to value-based outcomes. Consequently, the software industry and individual firms and projects are economically inefficient.  The goal of EDSER, and of the supporting National Science Foundation (NSF) project, Strategic Software Design, is to significantly advance the economic efficiency of the software industry as well as individual projects and firms. The approach is to promote the creation, evaluation, and dissemination of scientific models, tools, and practices for software-based value creation.  EDSER-3 focused on four areas: architecture, lifecycle, decision making, and education. An intriguing idea involved the transformation of the industry through the securitization of software risks. A key goal of EDSER-4 is to broaden the community. Warren Harrison of Portland State University (USA) will organize an EDSER-4 having both tutorial and workshop components. For updates, visit the (soon-to-open) web site, softwareeconomics.org.
— Kevin Sullivan
