For the Special issue on Qualitative Software Engineering Research

Almost twenty years have passed since the first qualitative research study in software engineering was published [14]. Using qualitative methods and a qualitative analytical framework, Curtis, et al. found communication and cooperation to be critical factors in developing large-scale software systems. Given the importance of this study, it is perhaps surprising that research publications using qualitative methods are still scarce. Therefore, our goal in creating this special issue is to make existing qualitative research more visible and further the understanding of qualitative research and its importance in the software engineering community. Qualitative research has its main strength in exploring and illuminating the in situ practice of software engineering. This is the everyday practice where software engineers interpret, appropriate, and implement the methods, techniques and processes of the trade. A better understanding of these in situ methods can – in turn – provide a base for their improvement. From 23 submissions we selected eleven articles. The articles represent a diverse set of theoretical frameworks and methods, while focusing on a wide range of software engineering activities from requirements engineering, project management to software process improvement. The selected articles illustrate the richness of existing research and showcase important and applicable results which will further the discussion of qualitative methods – not only about the concrete results but importantly so, on the value of qualitative research in software engineering in general. To make the papers more accessible to an audience that may not be used to qualitative research, we introduce this special issue more thoroughly than what is normally seen. By doing so we answer a number of questions related to the practice of qualitative research in the software engineering domain. In turn, each article selected for this special issue addresses some or all of the questions in the context of real research problems. The editorial proceeds as follows. First qualitative research is introduced and related to the tradition of software engineering. Then we present an overview of the different discourses in which qualitative research on software engineering is published followed by a discussion of potential quality criteria for qualitative research. We end with an introduction to the articles published in this special issue. There is no 'one way' of doing qualitative research. The only common denominator of qualitative research is that it is based on qualitative data. Some see the possibility to develop an understanding of the software engineering process from a …