The Measurement of Environmental Factors during Function Point Calculations

• Main Author: Caccioppo, Donna L.
• Published: NSUWorks 2003
• Subjects: Computer Sciences
• Online Access: http://nsuworks.nova.edu/gscis_etd/437

The forecast of pertinent project information, such as project costs, resource allocation, test case estimation and true software cost, is often needed early in the software development life cycle. Numerous sizing estimation models do exist to assist with obtaining (his type of data and currently the defacto standardization is the Function Point Analysis (FPA) model. This paper proposes an enhancement to FPA, referred to as the Function Point Environmental Analysis (FPEA), (0 address a specific FPA weakness identified by many experts within the field of software metrics. The component of the FPA model being questioned is the current estimation procedure of general system characteristics (GSC). It has been reported that the use of general system characteristics (GSC) within the FP A model does not add additional prediction accuracy to the unadjusted function point (UFP) count. By integrating environmental factors with GSCs, the UFP count could result in a more precise estimation procedure. If integrated successfully, this improvement will better equip information technology (IT) professionals to evaluate, plan, manage and control software production. The validation method of this proposal consists of a comparison of output from both the FP A and FPEA models obtained early within the software development life cycle