International Business Machines Corporation

Murray Robert Cantor

Mark N Wegman

Paul Michael Matchen

Peter Kenneth Malkin

Evelyn Duesterwald

Clay Edwin Williams

Tamir Klinger

Peri L Tarr

Stanley M Sutton

Vadakkedathu Thomas Rajan

Giuseppe Valetto

Sunita Chulani

Mary Elizabeth Helander

Kate Ehrlich

Jacquelyn Annette Martino

Peter C Bahrs

Segev Eliezer Wasserkrug

Dharmashankar Subramanian

Sergey Zeltyn

John A Cook

Amit Fisher

Sarah C McAllister

Avik Sinha

Annie T T Ying

Robert Delmonico

Sateesh S Kannegala

Vedakkedathu T Rajan

Sunita Devnani Chulani

Giuiseppe Valetto

A graphical interface module may provide a set of graphical presentations comprising at least: a Likelihood of Delivery chart showing a probability distribution of predicted delivery dates; a Delivery Date Risk Trend chart showing how the completion time for the project predicted according to the Likelihood of Delivery chart has changed over time; and a Burndown chart that shows at least work-items of planned work for the project. Each of the Likelihood of Delivery chart, the Delivery Date Risk Trend chart, and the Burndown chart has a timeline axis.

GUI support for diagnosing and remediating problems that threaten on-time delivery of software and systems

A system and method are provided for direct manipulation of a triangular distribution of information. The system includes a graphical user interface for receiving user inputted values. The system further includes a data calculator for generating estimates based on the user inputted values, and for generating curves for display on a grid based on at least one of, the user inputted values and the estimates. The graphical user interface respectively receives the user inputted values based at least on a current position of a pointer on the grid. The graphical user interface is capable of applying a direct manipulation to at least one of the user inputted values and the estimates, such that a result of the direct manipulation is displayed on the grid and enters triplets corresponding to an expected value, an upper bound for the expected value, and a lower bound for the expected value.

System and method for direct manipulation of a triangular distribution of information using a graphical user interface

Historic and current development data associated with the project may be gathered. A catalog of patterns, each pattern associated with a data measure and an analysis routine capable of detecting the pattern according to the data measure in a given data set may be obtained. A pattern describes a particular indication in the historical and development data, which arises one or more of, at a discrete point in time or over a period of time. The analysis routine may be applied to the historic and current development data. A notification may be issued responsive to identifying the pattern in the historic and current development data. The applying and the issuing may be performed for each pattern in the catalog of patterns.

Detecting patterns that increase the risk of late delivery of a software project

Incorporating user insights in predicting, diagnosing and remediating problems that threaten on-time delivery of a project may comprise gathering information. The information may be conveyed to one or more users. A user may be allowed to input a new value associated with the project, the new value assessed based on the information and representing an expert assessment of the information. The user may be allowed to also indicate a period of time the user considers the information to be applicable. The new value and the period of time may be incorporated into data used in a prediction algorithm that predicts probability distribution of completion time of the project as the project is progressing.

Incorporating user insights into predicting, diagnosing and remediating problems that threaten on-time delivery of software and systems

A user may be allowed to specify a change in one or more parameter data associated with the project, the one or more parameter data used previously to compute a probability distribution of completion time of the project. The probability distribution of completion time of the project may be recomputed based on the change. The recomputed probability distribution of the completion time of the project may be presented. An option to save the recomputed probability distribution may be provided. An option may be provided to specify another change in one or more parameter data associated with the project and repeat the recomputing and the presenting procedures based on another change in one or more parameter data associated with the project.

Exploring the impact of changing project parameters on the likely delivery date of a project

A task effort estimator may determine a probability distribution of an estimated effort needed to complete unfinished tasks in a project based on one or more of a set of completed tasks belonging to a project and attributes associated with the completed tasks belonging to the project, a set of completed tasks not belonging to the project and attributes associated with the completed tasks not belonging to the project, or the combination of both. A project completion predictor may determine a probability distribution of completion time for the project based on the probability distribution of an estimated effort needed to complete the unfinished tasks in the project, and one or more resource and scheduling constraints associated with the project.

Predicting likelihood of on-time product delivery, diagnosing issues that threaten delivery, and exploration of likely outcome of different solutions

A system for analyzing one or more process of software defect handling using one or more percentile-based statistical metric is provided herein. The system may include: a monitoring unit that is configured to monitor one or more processes of software defect handling, to yield monitored samples. The system further includes a percentile-based generator configured to generate one or more statistical metric that are at least partially based on percentile, further based on the monitored samples and further responsive to user selection; and a statistical calculation unit configured to apply the generated one or more statistical metric to real-time handling time samples obtained from the one or more processes of software defect handling, to yield a percentile-based analysis of the processes of software defect handling. The system may further include and a visual representation unit configured to visually present the percentile-based analysis responsive to preferences specified by the user.

Analyzing a process of software defects handling using percentile-based metrics

A system and method are provided for direct manipulation of a triangular distribution of information using a graphical user interface. The system includes a graphical user interface for receiving user inputted values. The system further includes a data calculator for generating estimates based on the user inputted values, and for generating curves for display on a grid based on at least one of, the user inputted values and the estimates. The graphical user interface respectively receives the user inputted values based at least on a current position of a pointer on the grid. The graphical user interface is capable of applying a direct manipulation, based at least on the current position of the pointer on the grid, to at least one of the user inputted values and the estimates, such that a result of the direct manipulation is displayed on the grid.

System, method and graphical user interface for a simulation base calculator provides one or more selectable distribution models. One or more input fields are provided for inputting rules with one or more random variables. A processing module inputs one or more of the selectable distribution models and the rules into a simulator running on the system. An output field is provided for displaying one or more aspects of a result determined by the model run on the simulator.

System, method and graphical user interface for a simulation based calculator

Method and system for determining estimation variance associated with project planning are provided. In one aspect, information associated with a project is obtained and initial estimations for the tasks in the project are determined using available information. The tasks are performed and actual measurements are obtained from the completed tasks. The actual measurements are used to revise the estimates of the remaining tasks. The revised estimates are used to compute a project level estimate and a variance on that estimate, and to enable better project management.

Determining estimation variance associated with project planning

A method and system of reducing risk in the life cycle of a product, in one aspect, obtain one or more tasks required to achieve an overall task, determine risk impact of each task, the risk impact being an impact of each task on the likelihood of failure for the overall task and compute risk of overall task based on risk impacts of the tasks. The method and system utilize said risk impact of each task to schedule the tasks in such a way so as to reduce said risk of overall task as rapidly as possible.

Method for reducing risk associated with a task

A method and system for scoring and ranking a plurality of component links in a social technical system having a plurality of components representing people and objects are provided. In one aspect, a degree of consistency relative to two or more people working on one or more objects and dependencies between the objects is determined to derive scores for the component links. The method and system identifies gaps in the link and determines the impact of filling the gaps. In another aspect, component links may be ranked and scores aggregated to provide system level quantifications.

Method and system for scoring and ranking a plurality of relationships in components of socio-technical system

A method and system constructs a socio-technical network representing design and development processes. In one aspect, a network of inter-personal interactions comprising at least a plurality of nodes representing actors in design and development process is established; an artifacts network comprising at least a plurality of nodes representing a plurality of heterogeneous artifact types is established; one or more relationships between the nodes in the network of inter-personal interactions are determined; one or more relationships between the nodes of the artifacts network are determined; and one or more relationships between the nodes in the network of inter-personal interactions and the nodes of the artifacts network are determined.

Method and system for understanding social organization in a design and development process

Embodiments of the present invention address deficiencies of the art in respect to iterative project management and provide a method, system and computer program product for utilizing real options based iterative development program metrics. In an embodiment of the invention, a data processing system configured for software project management can include a computer aided software engineering tool enabled to use a methods architecture configured to manage iterative development, said as Rational Unified Process (TM) (RUP) methodware. The data processing system also can include a data store of unified process data produced by the computer aided software engineering tool. Finally, the data processing system can include real options-based computational logic.

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Westwood, MA, United States of America

Murray Robert Cantor