building vs. enhancing

[Praveen Kallakuri]

hi.

given a product which has gone through a few releases. a major overhaul
is considered and the problem is whether to take off from where the
previous release ended or start from scratch. are there any guidelines?
esp. effort estimation methods in either case.

thanks

-praveen

[Praveen Kallakuri]

Praveen Kallakuri wrote:
hi. given a product which has gone through a few releases. a major overhaul is considered and the problem is whether to take off from where the previous release ended or start from scratch. are there any guidelines? esp. effort estimation methods in either case. thanks -praveen
i reread my posting and thought there were some grey areas. say the
developers are all going to be new (not the one's who developed the
previous releases.) i guess it will be costlier to develop based on what
already exists. (??) but are there any methods to put some numbers to that?

thanks

[Dan Ligett]

----- Original Message -----
From: "Praveen Kallakuri" <prav@cox.net>

Praveen Kallakuri wrote: given a product which has gone through a few releases. a major overhaul is considered and the problem is whether to take off from where the previous release ended or start from scratch. are there any guidelines? esp. effort estimation methods in either case. -praveen i reread my posting and thought there were some grey areas. say the developers are all going to be new (not the one's who developed the previous releases.) i guess it will be costlier to develop based on what already exists. (??) but are there any methods to put some numbers to
that?

The COCOMO II software estimation model addresses these issues.

As an estimator, you'd rate factors such as "Assessment & Assimilation",
"Software Understanding", and "Unfamiliarity with Software".

We have a commercial version of COCOMO:
http://www.softstarsystems.com/

Dan Ligett, (603) 672-0987, Softstar Systems