An Ontological Analysis of a Proposed Theory for Software Development
This addresses the need for a cohesive framework in software engineering to improve project categorization and understanding, though it appears incremental as it builds on existing ideas without proven results.
The paper tackles the lack of an integrated theory in software development by proposing and analyzing a new theory to unify diverse methodologies, aiming to enhance predictability of outcomes.
There is growing acknowledgement within the software engineering community that a theory of software development is needed to integrate the myriad methodologies that are currently popular, some of which are based on opposing perspectives. We have been developing such a theory for a number of years. In this paper, we overview our theory and report on a recent ontological analysis of the theory constructs. We suggest that, once fully developed, this theory, or one similar to it, may be applied to support situated software development, by providing an overarching model within which software initiatives might be categorised and understood. Such understanding would inevitably lead to greater predictability with respect to outcomes.