ISR Seminar Series

The Master of Software Engineering Program Presents:
Dr. Lynn Carter,Principal Fellow
Carnegie Mellon University

Thursday, October 12, 2006, noon
Newell Simon Hall 1305
lunch will be provided


Should programming really be at the heart of software engineering?

Abstract:

There are many definitions for the words "software engineering".  The
IEEE standard 610.12 definition appears adequate for my purpose: "the
application of a systematic, disciplined, quantifiable approach to the
development, operation, and maintenance of software, that is, the
application of engineering to software".  From this definition, it is
clear than programming is a critical, but not the only key aspect of
the discipline.  If we were to take a risk management approach to the
question of "Which if these are critical?", I wonder where programming
would rank?

The purpose of this talk is to suggest that maybe it is time to
rethink how we teach software engineering and to consider that maybe
it is actually maturing into something closer to the more traditional
engineering disciplines, where the engineers are quite different from
the folks on the "manufacturing line".  Many schools offering computer
science degrees and software engineering degrees produce people who
may be able to pass tests about software engineering, but it is not
clear how many of them possess any skill or discipline to match their
understanding.  It is also the case that many "developers" join the
software development workforce each year with little or no formal
education at the university level.  With so much pressure to leverage
lower cost development assets, why aren't those of us who do teach the
engineering disciplines spend more time and effort on the higher
leverage and more difficult to outsource skills and help our students
do a better job at partnering with the new form of "manufacturing"
that software development appears to be coming.

BIO:

Lynn Robert Carter has been a senior researcher and educator at
Carnegie Mellon University for over seventeen years.  During his
twelve years at the SEI, his work included onsite software technology
adoption support to numerous military and commercial customers
supporting the following technologies: real time schedulability,
client/server system architectures, object orientation, process
improvement, and organizational change.  He supported the development
and deployment of professional Software Engineering Masters programs
at CMU West and with our partners at the SSN School of Advanced
Software Engineering, Chennai, India.  He is now helping establish an
undergraduate software engineering track within the computer science
degree program at CMU Qatar.  His research focus is the adoption of
new software technologies with a special focus on predictable and
quality software development and management.  He is also an ABET
Commissioner and Executive Committee Member.  Prior to CMU he
developed software, manage teams, and lead research efforts at various
commercial firms for 17 years, including: Tektronix, Motorola, GenRad,
and two startups.  At GenRad, he led a leveraged buy-out of the data
communications test equipment business and ran the spinout as its
president and CEO.  He earned his PhD in Computer Science from the
University of Colorado at Boulder in 1980 and his Bachelors and
Masters in Mathematics with specialization in Computer Science from
Portland State University in 1972 and 1974.