|
|
|
| QSM Welcomes New Clients! |
| We would like to welcome our newest SLIM users to the QSM family. DRS Power and Control, Hong Kong Jockey Club, Raytheon Missile Systems, CMC Electronics, and Kaplan Financial have all recently signed on to see what SLIM tools can do for their software estimating, planning, and benchmarking processes. To learn more about our tools and what's new with QSM, please read on. |
| QSM Rational Webinar a Tremendous Success! |
The QSM and IBM Rational webinar, "Project Planning with QSM SLIM Estimate and IBM Rational Portfolio Manager," attracted over 100 attendees. The webinar, which was presented by QSM managing partner, Larry Putnam, Jr., outlined QSM's SLIM software estimation methodology as implemented in the Rational Unified Process with Estimation, Measurement, and Control plug-in to IBM Rational Method Composer. He also demonstrated SLIM's implementation with Rational Portfolio Manager. To view a replay of the webinar, please visit the Rational Software Global User Group Community Webinar Series. | |
| Don Beckett Awarded "Best Speaker" at CMMI |
| QSM would like to congratulate Don Beckett for receiving the "Outstanding Presentation" award for the Measurement and Perfomance Results track at the CMMI Conference in Denver, CO. Don's presentation, "Using Metrics to Develop a Project Strategy," addresses the idea of measurement as a investment vs. an expense. Don walks us through some case studies that show that, by allowing more time for design and analysis, project managers can not only reduce cost and effort spent on the overall project, they can produce a better project with less defects and reduce the overall project schedule. To find out when Don's next speaking engagement is or ask him a question, please email him. You can also view more of QSM's research on our white papers page. |
| Upcoming Conferences |
|
Please stop by our booth at any of the upcoming conferences we will be attending:
SEPG - March 17-20; Tampa, FL; Booth #301
SSTC - April 29-May 2; Las Vegas, NV Booth #202
IBM Rational Software Developers Conference - June 1-5; Orlando, FL; Booth #610
Better Software Conference & Expo - June 11-12; Las Vegas, NV
PMI Global Congress - Oct. 18-21; Denver, CO; Booth #208
If you would like to set up an appointment at one of the upcoming conferences or for more information regarding SLIM products, services, and training, please contact Keith Ciocco by email at keith_ciocco@qsm.com or phone 703-749-3812. |
| Support Tip - Creating Customized Databases for Use with SLIM-Estimate |
A new SLIM tools user sent in a great question this month.
"When I load history files from SLIM DataManager, the columns available to assist in selecting/deselecting projects are hard-coded. What if I want to use a different field, such as Confidence Level, to screen the projects I load into History Tuning?"
There are actually two ways to accomplish this task, depending upon which SLIM-Suite tools you have licensed.
1. If you have SLIM-Metrics: Create a query to select projects with the desired fields and values (for instance, all records with Confidence of Medium or High). Use the query to select a subset of data from your DataManager file (called a dataset), then export the dataset/database via the File menu (File | Export database subset). SLIM-Metrics was created especially for this type of task. It allows you to perform refined searches of your DataManager files, show a wide variety of charts and reports, create custom trends, and export subsets of your databases.
2. If you don't have a SLIM-Metrics license, you can accomplish the same thing in SLIM-DataManager using the Edit | View Layout menu item function. First, display the Confidence field and any other fields of interest. Sort on the Confidence column by clicking on the column heading. Do a File, Save As to create a copy of your file, then select (shift/click) all records which do NOT have the desired confidence level and delete them from your saved copy of the database.
You can repeat this process with any other fields you are interested in screening on. If you are screening on more than one field, you will want to begin with the one which has the most data values (i.e., the one which returns the most records) so you will not eliminate too many records when you delete the first batch. You can then select the metric with the second largest number of records and repeat the process, and so on. If you have questions or need assistance, don't hesitate to contact Kate Armel ( kate_armel@qsm.com) or Don Beckett ( don_beckett@qsm.com) on the QSM support staff for help. |
| Database Update |
Everyone has questions about productivity, defects, languages, and changes in the software industry, but answering those questions takes a lot of data! To submit data, just send your SLIM-DataManager or SLIM-Control files to kate_armel@qsm.com. We can include only completed projects in the database - no estimates or in-progress projects, please!
All project data is welcome, but the following types are of particular interest since we see a lot of interest in them:
- Large projects (over 100 KESLOC)
- SAP/ERP (enterprise resource planning) projects
- Engineering class projects (projects in the non-IT application domains)
- .NET projects
- Data warehousing projects
- Agile or Xtreme programming
Please identify these types of programs in the description field if there is no applicable default field in DataManager so we can tag them appropriately during the validation process. The more we know about your projects, the more questions we can answer about them. If you are interested in seeing another type of project in the database and have examples, please submit it with a note in the description field - chances are, someone else will be interested also!
Contributing data is the best way to ensure the QSM database reflects a wide spectrum of project types, languages, and development methods. It helps us do ground-breaking research as well as improve our suite of estimation, tracking, and benchmarking tools. And you benefit as well from the ability to sanity-check estimates, ongoing projects, and completed projects against the best industry trends in the business. Please call or email today to find out how you can be a part of the next QSM database update. |
| SLIM Training Schedule |
 QSM holds regular SLIM training courses at our McLean, VA office, just outside of Washington, DC. If you have a need for training, please contact your sales rep or Keith Ciocco by email or call 703-749-3812. Our current schedule for the upcoming months is:
SLIM-Estimate & SLIM-Control: Feb. 20-21
SLIM-Metrics: Feb. 22
SLIM-Estimate & SLIM-Control: March 26-27
SLIM-Metrics: March 28
SLIM-Estimate & SLIM-Control: April 23-24
SLIM-Metrics: April 25
You can always find our up-to-date training schedule by visiting QSM Training. If you are unable to make it to McLean, Va for any of the upcoming scheduled training dates listed, on-site training is available, as is our "Train the Trainer" program for companies with big needs. For availability, please contact Keith Ciocco. |
| Presentations Now Available for Download from QSM Euope's User Conference |
| QSM Europe hosted their 3rd annual user conference on October 25th. Doug Putnam and Larry Putnam, Jr. talked about new product developments from QSM; while SLIM users from Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Rabobank Nederland, Caesar Groep, SIG, and the Dutch Police all spoke about how they applied SLIM to their software development processes. To view some of these presentations, as well as photos from the conference, please visit QSM Europe's website. | |
