Software Engineering Research Network

Background

The Software Engineering Research Network is a joint venture of the Department of Computer Science and the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Calgary. It is sponsored by Motorola, Computing Devices, ACTC, Northern Telecom, the Government of Alberta and the University of Calgary.

Membership in SERN is open to industry and research organizations concerned with applied software engineering. In particular, SERN supports its industrial sponsors through joint projects, a database of experience and best practice accessible through the World Wide Web, requirements engineering and software engineering workflow tools, and an industrial software engineering degree specialization at Masters level.

The web database and the masters program are available to other software development organizations, and SERN membership is open to such organizations with a particular focus on SMEs in Alberta.

Report of the Industrial Research Chair in Software Engineering July 1996 to July 1997

Objectives

The primary focus of SERN is to treat software development as a manufacturing discipline, and the objectives of SERN are to establish:

a centre of excellence in research and development concerned with the knowledge flows and processes underlying the software manufacturing life cycle; research and graduate training activities that will develop highly qualified personnel in industrial software manufacturing; an organizational infrastructure at the University of Calgary supporting a long-term program of university-industry collaborative research on software manufacturing.

Participation

The Director of SERN is Dr Mildred L G Shaw who holds the Industrial Research Chair in Software Engineering at the University of Calgary with a mandate involving establishing SERN and the associated MSc specialization in software engineering.

Three other University of Calgary Chairs and their associated organizations are collaborating with SERN in its research and teaching activities:-

Knowledge Science Institute, directed by Dr Brian R Gaines, Killam Memorial Research Chair
Project Management Group, directed by Dr Francis Hartman, NSERC/SSHRC Chair in Project Management
Intelligent Manufacturing Systems Group, directed by Dr Douglas Norrie, Industrial Chair in Intelligent Manufacturing Systems

There are also close links with the Software Engineering Management (SEM) Certificate program of the Faculty of Continuing Education.

A total of 4 new faculty positions in the area of software engineering have been established in the Departments of Computer Science and of Electrical and Computer Engineering.

Structure

The organization of SERN is shown in Figure 1, and involves cross-disciplinary laboratories at the University undertaking fundamental research, joint projects with the Industrial Partners, and maintaining a database of knowledge, experience, problems and issues that can be widely accessed and will be used to manage the activities of the network.

Figure 1: Software Engineering Research Network

SERN operates as a networked organization providing associated university and industry personnel and students with a virtual institution which manages joint projects. There is a two-way flow of knowledge and personnel in which the Industry Partners introduce new problems, the University researchers introduce new technologies, and the relation between the problems and technologies is investigated through joint projects. Graduate students and university personnel work on the projects at the industry sites, and that industry personnel are seconded to the University for varying periods of time. The network is open to new partners and to the introduction of new technologies from elsewhere. In particular, active links with a range of other relevant institutions are being developed.

Further Information

Enquiries from individuals, companies and other software engineering research organizations are welcome. Contact Dr Mildred L G Shaw at mildred@cpsc.ucalgary.ca.

Links to Related Information

Mildred's Homepage

mildred@cpsc.ucalgary.ca, 20-Feb-98