Advances in system, software and service process improvement and innovation

EuroSPI is an annual conference series devoted to Software Process Improvement (SPI), and the exchange of best practices in related domains organized since 1994. In 2009, EuroSPI created the SPI manifesto and, also, enriched the term SPI over the last 25 years: System, Software, Services, Safety, Security Process and Product Improvement, Innovation, and Infrastructure (SPI). From 2017 onwards, EuroSPI created a set of thematic workshops, which deal with specific knowledge areas for the European 2030 agenda. Big changes towards networked societies, self‐driving cars and planes, new e‐mobility concepts will arise, and more exchange of best practices will be needed to support these new developments. Lead papers from those thematic topics will be selected for the journal in the years to follow. EuroSPI 2017 received a large amount of submissions from authors. All submissions were peer reviewed by top experts in the given research area. From the set of accepted papers, seven articles were selected for their publication in this special issue based on established quality criteria, novelty, and interest. Editors hope this new set is able to provide insights on software process, its evolution, and new developments to practitioners and researchers alike. In what follows, the seven papers are presented and briefly discussed: The paper “ISO 31000‐based Integrated Risk Management Process Assessment Model for IT Organizations” by Barafort, Mesquida, and Mas presents an integrated risk management process assessment model based on ISO 31000 for information technology (IT) organizations integrating also dimensions with other relevant standards like ISO 9001, ISO 21500, ISO/IEC 20000‐1, and ISO/IEC 27001. Process assessment models have been very popular in the software and IT service management scenarios, however, specializations of process assessment models devoted to risk management are not prevalent in the scientific literature. In the paper, authors describe the elicitation and description of processes for the construction of an integrated risk management process assessment model for IT organizations. In “GSEPIM: A Roadmap for Software Process Assessment and Improvement in the Domain of Global Software Development” by Khan, Keung, Niazi, Hussain, and Shameem, authors present the initial steps towards a model to support organizations embracing Global Software Development (GSD) to assess and improve SPI initiatives. GSD began to be a hot topic by the beginning of the 21st century also pioneered in the EuroSPI community and is still one of the main fields of research in the software engineering arena. This paper cannot only be seen as a continuation of a set of efforts on the topic but also a good path towards future developments in the field. “Integration of accessibility design patterns with the software implementation process of ISO/IEC 29110” is authored by Sánchez‐Gordón et al. In the paper, authors enrich ISO/IEC 29110 by introducing design patterns defined to make web applications accessible for users with visual impairments. The approach is validated in an online course. Although studies surrounding ISO/IEC 29110 are quite pervasive in the community, eg, the enrichment of this standard with patterns to improve accessibility is a novel effort that deserves attention. Rajaram, Loane, MacMahon, and McCaffery are the authors of the paper entitled “Taxonomy Based Testing and Validation of a new Defect Classification for Health Software.” The Association for the Advancement of Medical Instrumentation is developing a defect taxonomy that will be published as a standard for health software. In this work, authors validate this taxonomy by means of three different methods. Health software and its process have been in the focus of research recently, and this paper follows the trend with increasing importance in the software community of testing and validation, this time, in the health software domain. In the paper “Formulation of process improvement knowledge: 7 components of a good PI story”, Norimatsu, Endo, Usugi, Niwa, and Tange present a knowledge model developed at the Japan Software Process Improvement Consortium that consists of seven information elements that can be used to present process improvement information in papers or reports. These elements form a template that can be used for any process improvement effort as a valid tool for monitoring or assessment. Knowledge management is a key aspect in software process improvement, and initiatives like the one presented here by Norimatsu et al provide a useful tool to practitioners and researchers alike. The paper “Lean and Agile Software Process Improvement in Traditional and Agile Environments” by Poth, Sasabe, Mas, and Mesquida overview agile and lean approaches and their connection to continuous SPI approaches. The integration of agile and lean approaches in SPI scenarios is not new, and the literature reported many and recent efforts, eg, Poth et al present a review not only based on experience but also on an in‐depth study of the synergies that occur between these two not‐so‐opposed worlds.