The SPICE Project Manager relaxing in Tokyo following a successful ISO/IEC15504 week long assessment. .

Where will the next SPiCE photo be taken from?

Terry Rout, the ISO/IEC 15504 Project Editor from Griffith University in Australia, takes a welcome break from the ISO/IEC SC7/WG10 meeting in Helsinki.

In a major initiative, the Automotive Special Interest Group (SIG), a joint special interest group of The SPICE User Group and The Procurement Forum, launched the Automotive SPICE initiative together with the major motor vehicle manufacturers to develop a common framework for the assessment of suppliers in the Automotive Industry.

The members of the Automotive SIG include: AUDI AG, BMW AG, DaimlerChrysler AG, Fiat Auto S.p.A., Ford Werke GmbH, Jaguar / Land Rover, Dr. Ing. h.c. F. Porsche, Volkswagen AG and Volvo Car Corporation.

The release of the Automotive SPICE Process Assessment Model together with the associated Process Reference Model is now available. The Automotive SPICE Process Assessment Model will be used to perform conformant assessments of the software process capability of automotive suppliers in accordance with the requirements of ISO/IEC 15504-2:2003.

This report presents the results of an analysis of the compatibility of the representations of the Capability Maturity Model Integration to ISO/IEC TR 15504-2:1998 - Software Process Assessment - Part 2: A Reference Model for Processes and Process Capability. The analysis was performed by the Software Quality Institute under the terms of the contract with the Defence Materiel Organisation, to support the evaluation of the suitability of the CMMI for use by the Australian Defence Department in managing the acquisition of software intensive systems.

The report can be found at http://www.sqi.gu.edu.au/cmmi/indexFrameset.html and selecting the ‘Research’ menu item.

Alec Dorling podcasting from SPICE 2005 talks to Fritz Stallinger from the Software Competence Centre in Hegenberg. Fritz was coordinator for the OOSPICE initiative.

MP3 File

Alec Dorling podcasting from SPICE 2005 talks to Richard Messnarz from ISCN about SOCRATES a major SPI initiative in Germany.

MP3 File

David H. Kitson, Software Engineering Institute, USA

Terry Rout, the Session Chair, introduces David Kitson. He has been working with the SPICE project since the early days. With his foundation work on the SW CMM and the CCMI, we are in the presence of ‘royalty’. Welcome Dave Kitson!

Talking about the relationship between CMM and international standards.Over the years there has been a move to close the gaps between the CMM product suite and international standards. The next release CMMI v2 is planned for release in 2010.

15504 is a framework standard. 15504 aims to establish a framework for existing models to conform to best practices for process assessment.15504 and SPICE tend to be used interchangeably, however they are not the same.15504 is the international standard.

15504 is in its 3rd generation. The 1st generation was the hard-wired 15504 (the BPG). The 2nd generation was the published Technical Report (TR). The 3rd generation is the published ISO standard (2003–05).

15504 has an architecture that uses  a Process Reference Model in associated with a Process Assessment Model matched against the measurement framework and requirements in 15504.

Regarding CMMI and 15504, the ‘A-spec’ defined a route for close conformance to 15504 identifying the synergies where they exist. CMMI is now defining connectivity with ISO 9001 and ISO/IEC 12207. To do this, the CMMI needs to establish the Process Reference Models of interest. So to be more specific, the relevant PRMs of interest together with a mapping of indicators in CMMI to the associated PRMs is needed. A detailed translation mechanism is also required.

Future directions of the CMMI: – to establish connectivity to 9001, 12207 and 15288. Work is underway on ISO9001. Host organisations have been identified.

Thanks to David for an informative session.