Case Story: Cross Site Software Development

Summary	Developing software across two institutions
Group / workshop	ALiC	Status	seed
Project details...

Situation

What was the setting in which this case study occurred?

Two institutions (Newcastle and Durham) with level two computer science students who are to develop software by participating in cross-institution companies.

Task

What was the problem to be solved, or the intended effect?

• To give students the learning experience of working in a multi-site software development team, thereby giving them highly employable skills.
• To improve collaboration skills in cross-site or remote site development.
• To give students experience of using industry-grade software tools in supporting the activity.

Actions

What was done to fulfil the task?

• Devise a software product specification for student companies to develop.
• Design an appropriate assessment strategy to deal with cross-institutional assessment policies and working practices.
• Implement a set of supporting services such as software development tools, communication tools (including video conferencing, blogs and wikis), code repositories and instructional materials (including online videos).
• Facilitate team building exercises for students.
• Involvement of industry in setting up the problem scenario; in providing feedback to students on their work; work as a real world customer; provide incentives (prizes).

Results

What happened? Was is a success? What contributed to the outcomes?

• Three years of students undertaking this approach to project work.
• Observations of how students behave before working with a remote team and afterwards.
• Resolution of problems related to devising assessment that works for both institutions and is deemed fair by students.
• Subversion repositories of all student code.
• Data on student effort.
• Increased staff work load and planning effort.

Lessons Learned

What did you learn from the experience?

• Students usually use the remote team as a scapegoat for any percieved problems in the company.
• Communication is very important, and most teams struggle with developing this aspect properly.
• Students use the supporting services, and appreciate the use of tools such as code repositories, wikis and (to a lesser extent) video conferencing.
• Face-to-face meetings between the teams is crucial - those teams that do this regularly usually have much better relationships with remote teams.
• Students struggle with the implementation due to the additional complexity of working with a remote team - particularly in integrating software.
• Students worry about marks when those marks, in some way, could be affected by the remote team (even though this is minimised).

Licensing

This work is licenced under a Creative Commons Licence.