COMPOSITION OF COTS

ASHIRWAD MEHTA (2K11/SE/013)BHUWAN SINGH(2K11/SE/018)

Definition of COTS • COTS - commercial off-the-shelf-software products

that are ready-made and available for sale to the general public.

• Implementation of commercially available technologies for traditionally customized applications.

• Usually built by a third party vendor. • COTS can be purchased, leased or even licensed to

the general public.

Definition of COTS (Cont’d.)• Application System Reuse:

reusing an entire application by incorporation of one application inside another (COTS reuse)development of application families (e.g. MS Office)

Examples:1. Military 2. Industrial3. Space

COMMERCIAL OFF-THE-SHELF (COTS)

Examples:Software:

Operating Systems (UNIX, Windows/NT, OS2)Databases (Oracle, Sybase)Graphics Packages (Motif)

Hardware:Busses (VME, PCI, cPCI)Processors (Motorola, HP, Sun, Intel)Disk Drives (Western Digital, Red Rock)Peripherals (Printers, Monitors, Keyboards, etc.)

COMMERCIAL OFF-THE-SHELF (COTS)

• Examples where COTS has replaced traditional (custom) systems– Space Shuttle (non mission-critical systems)– Missile Guidance systems– Military ground based and shipboard sensors

(radar, sonar)– Industrial control and monitoring systems– telecommunications– Air traffic control

Introduction to Composition And Integration

• A component should support composition and integration as typical properties.

• Component composition and integration can be distinguished in static and dynamic, where

static refers to integration and composition during development of component based system and

dynamic to those during runtime.• A component should support both types of

composition and integration.

Issues of COTS Composition

Two major issues:• dependence on the vendor.• flexibility in requirements.

Dependence on the vendor

who ultimately makes all decisions on :1. the capabilities of the COTS product,2. the schedule for releases,3. the architecture,4. the level of reliability,5. the documentation,6. the service level

Flexibility in requirements

• At the moment a COTS is selected, some requirements are immediately satisfied, some other requirements become easy to

implement,others become difficult if not impossible to obtain.

• The typical goal of a COTS project is to reduce (cost, effort or schedule) as compared with a traditional project.

THANK YOU