MCC: Planning theRevolution in Software

gli MCC's Software Technology Program aims tomake a dramatic improvement in the productivityof the software development process and thequality of the product.

Ware Myers, Contributing Editor

0 ur mission, over the next percent in some phase of the program-seven to 10 years, is to im- ming process. Belady believes that they

prove the productivity of the software are looking for a basic, even revolu-development process and the quality tionary change in the programmingof the software product by a signifi- process, something well beyond thecant amount," said Laszlo A. "Les" small gains that are going on anyway.Belady, vice president and program To achieve this big gain, they are will-director of the Software Technology ing to invest in a long-term research

MCC's Software Technology Program Program at the Microelectronics and program.intends to find a basic, perhaps revolu- Computer Technology Corp. in Aus-tionary change in the art and science of tin, Texas, in an interview with IEEE Launching the programsoftware engineering. The ambitious Software.program is led by Laszlo A. "Us" "Originally, the improvement was An initial step was to adopt threeBelady, who describes its goals and set at two orders of magnitude. That broad policies to guide the launch ofstrategies in this interview with IEEE would be a tremendous rate of gain for the research program:Software. Belady was origina,ly an a field that has been improving its (1) Understanding the customers.aeronautics engineer who joined the productivity at perhaps seven percent (2) Assessing the future of hardwarecomputer industry as an operating sys- per year. Currently we are thinking in availability, technical application, andtems researcher for IBM in 1961. In terms of extraordinary improvement, research activities outside MCC.the early 1970s, he flirted with com- without trying to put a number on it." (3) Focusing the program, becauseputer graphics and computer security. The companies supporting the STP one group of ultimately 50 or 60 re-But, by 1974, his interest had shifted to (there are 10 participants among searchers cannot spread itself overprogramming development, an area in MCC's 21 shareholder companies) are every research topic.which he has since remained. Upon re- not interested in it for short-term or in-tiring from IBM in 1984, Belady joined termediate research results. They are Understanding the needs. "TenMCCrather than a university to take on not after just another tool or some im- days after my arrival in Austin I col-the riskier challenges that exist in the provement on the order of 20 or 30 lected two technical representativesconsortium's endeavors. from each of the participating com-

panies for a one-day brainstormingsession," Belady recalled. "I wanted

Program members to find out if my experience, limitedThe members of the Software Technology Program at MCC are for two decades to a single company,

Bell Communications Research Motorola, Inc. was extensible to the environments of

Control Data Corp. NCR Corp. these other companies, or whether IDigital Equipment Corp. RCA Corp. would have to learn these environ-Harris Corp. Rockwell International ments from scratch. Second, I wantedLockheed Corp. Sperry Corp. to find out what their problems were

and what they expected from us."

68 0740-7459/85/1100/0068$01.00 ( 1985 IEEE IEEE SOFTWARE

There was a free flow of informa- problems will fall in the category of computer scientists, Belady believes.tion for a whole day and at the end of concurrent or parallel processing." Characterized by vague, intuitive men-the day "we had reached a mutual tal processes, it will probably never beunderstanding," Belady continued. "I Future research. "We have to look completely automated or be as disci-understood that the software problem at the future of MCC's research on the plined as the downstream approach. Itseems to be universal, not only from simple basis that we are not alone," involves the exploration of differentIBM out to the other mainframe com- Belady said. "There are thousands of design alternatives, rejecting some orpanies, but also out to the aerospace excellent minds working outside our continuing others. This area probablycompanies. I found out that all of program, dreaming the same dreams generates the most waste in today'sthem had significant software prob- as we are." programming environment because oflems and had several thousand profes- the lack of computer aids and thesional programmers working for necessity to redo work because so littlethem, whether it was a mainframe The upstream activities knowledge has been accumulated.company or an aerospace company. stat with the usuallyfuzzy In the light of these considerations it

was decided to focus the STP's own ef-

Future hardware. Future software requirements and the forts on the upstream activities. "Atdevelopers are going to work on future downstream activities this level you are defining and decom-hardware. It follows that the software with a reasonablyformal posing a large problem into smaller

concepts that the STP considers specification. problems and selecting algorithms,"should be suited to the hardware capa- Belady noted.bilities and economics of eight to 10years from now. At the beginning of the software de- Design productivity. Computers

Today, to offer an example, fiber velopment process there is the world of have been used at the downstreamoptics is not in widespread use, but fuzzy ideas. Requirements may not be level, but they have seen practicallyBelady believes that 10 years from now articulated clearly. At the other end of zero use in decomposing the problem,it will be used to pump live, animated the development spectrum is the world aiding the process of selecting alter-data from a central computer to sever- ofbits and bytes. Software engineering native solutions, and seeing the sys-al workstations, removing present transforms these fuzzy requirements temwide consequences. "Althoughbandwidth limitations. to the bits and bytes. Somewhere along our salaries come from telling otherLooking ahead, it is evident that this spectrum is the point at which a people how to use computers," Belady

processor speeds will increase, mem- software engineer can specify, more or observed, "we have not learned to useory capacity will expand further, and less formally, sometimes mathemati- the computer to support our own com-greater graphics capability will appear. cally, what he wants the machine to plex activities. One way of attackingOne broad conclusion-without try- do. the productivity problem is to look foring to make a detailed prediction of "This point divides software engi- activities that are done by software en-what will be available 10 years out-is neering into what I call upstream and gineers, but could be done by com-that, except for shared information downstream activities," Belady ex- puter. That is one kind of waste.that is frequently changing, all of the plained, referring to the well-known "Another kind is doing somethinginformation a user needs can be avail- waterfall diagram. "The upstream ac- all over again because you didn't cap-able in his workstation. tivities start with the usually fuzzy ture and store patterns of knowledge

requirements and the downstream ac- related to the software design process,"tivities with a reasonably formal speci- he complained. "The outcome is that

Future applications. Similarly, the fication. you may have to reinvent it again a yearsoftware developers of the future are "It seemed to us that academic re- later when it comes up again, or some-going to be working on the applica- search is mainly focused on the down- one else who is not aware of your in-tions of that period. "Today, if you stream activities-specification tech- sight, because it was never external-were to take a sample of the work that niques, languages expressing paral- ized, will have to do it over again."programmers are doing, you would lelism, compilers, testing, and formal In large system software, less thanfimd that practically all of them are verification. Probably, these activities half of the cost is related to down-writing sequential programs," Belady can eventually be fully automated. In stream activities and probably some-pointed out. "This kind of work is in any event, we believe that the thou- what more than half is related to thecontrast tothebodyofknowledgethat sands of peopleengaged incomputer upstream activities. "Now supposehas been accumulating in academia science research are very productive that I fullyautomateddownstream ac-with respect to parallel programming. and will produce increasingly inter- tivities, reducing its cost essentially toI expect the nature of programming to esting results." zero," he said. "That would improvechange drastically. In 10 years, a The upstream area, however, has the productivity ofthe whole softwaresignificant proportion of the tough not so far been researched heavily by process by a factor of less than two.

November 1985 69

That is why I was dubious about im-proving productivity by several ordersof magnitude, unless they were binary Integrating design issues:orders of magnitude," he said with asmile. Design issues play such an important role in the STP that an inter-disciplinary symposium was called May 6-7, 1985, to discuss issues

related to complex design problems. The decomposition function existsFocuson professional programmer.s in every design discipline-aircraft design, for example-and MCC's

There are all kinds of programmers- Software Technology Program director, Laszlo A. "Les" Belady, believeshigh school kids, housewives, engi- that software engineering has much to learn from other disciplines thatneers writing in Fortran occasionally, deal with complex systems.all the way up to the professional pro- To carry out this theme, the program committee obtained a keynotegrammer. For what we are after I am speaker and two invited lecturers from outside the software engineeringnot concerned about the former," field. Keynoter J. Christopher Jones, author of Design Methods: Seeds ofBelady stated. "We should focus our the Human Future (John Wiley & Sons, 1970 and 1981), has studied theeffort on the professionalprogrammer design methods of many disciplines and abstracted 35 design methods.working on large, complex systems in He contendsthat the complexities of software give riseto anew situationteamns." beyond the scope of the previous engineering efforts, obliging students

Characteris.ic of the programmerof the subject to "go outside the rules."Characteristic of the programmer The first invited speaker, Jeffery N. Dennenberg, director of learning

Belady is aiming at is that he works systems at the ITT Advanced Technology Center, derived several insightswith programs like operating, switch- from the experience of designing the ITT System 12, a telecommuni-ing, or network systems. These sys- _ltems are large not only in the sense thatthe product is large, but also in thesense that the organization in whichthe work is done is large. The problemste wohich doewkslarge.otenproeams Solutions need problems. One was logical component in technologyconstrained and distributed, parallel, that for every solution there must be a transfer as there is technical compo-rconstrained and distributed, parallel,problem, that is, only those research nent. "It is not enough to just publishor concurrent systems.

solutions will get transferred that the results," Belady found out. "You

Technology transfer match a problem in the workaday have to prepare the minds of the peo-"You will recall that STP is sup- world. "Fifteen years ago, in IBM ple who will be using the new technol-

posed to improve the productivity of Research, I used to get angry because ogy, as well as those of the manage-the software development process and people did not wish to take my beauti- ment involved; you have to involvethe quality of the product," Belady ful solutions," he recalled. "Now I them in advance in the development ofemphasized. "That will take research, realize that some of my gadgets were the technology itself. You have tobut it will also take effective technol- not solving any of that time's prob- undo the natural resistance to changeogy transfer to make it happen. One of lems. that humans normally have."the things we have learned from past There are companies-he cited Tools. Third, it is easier to transferexperience is that manygood research AT&T Bell Laboratories as an ex- and establish tools and make themresults fail becausetheynever could be ample-that have actually built up lists consistent than it is to transfer meth-transferred." odologies and methods. "The work-

shop finding seems to be that, even ifThree common themes. One of the It is easier some new method has been proven to

repositories of past experience in this to transfer and be more useful than another method,area is the proceedings of the Work- it has to be implemented in some kindshop on Software Engineering Tech- establish tools than of tool and environment where thenology Transfer, held in Miami Beach, methodologies. new method is enforced automaticallyFlorida, in April 1983.' Belady stud- by the machine," he added.ied the reports of the subgroups andthe papers in the proceedings, trying to of problems on the one hand and solu-find some common themes. He found tions on the other. There is a conscious Two cultures. Adding to what hethree. effortto findmatching pairs. Technol- gleaned from the workshop proceed-

ogy transfer flows once there is a good ings, Belady defined another majormatch. obstacletotechnology tranlsfer. "'There

The human factor. The second are two self-contained cultures-thatProc. Workshop on SoftwareEngineering Technolo.gy theme coigout of the workshop ofthe researcher and that ofthe soft-Transfer, IEEE Computer Society, Los Alamitos, Calif., cmn1983, 119 pp. was that there is at least as much socio- ware engineer. The researchers. go to

70 IEEE SOFTWARE

framework for the transfer functionthan researchers have usually had in

The Interdisciplinary Design Symposium | the past."First, there is the continuing task

cations switching system with distributed control structure based on of matching the solutions we may havethousands of small computers that communicate with each other. in mind with problems that exist in theThese Insights included:* Fault tolerance is a necessity. participating companies," Belady ex-* Some probability of error must be tolerated. plained. "We try to keep alert to the* The set of unique parts must be small. necessity to adjust our awareness of* The internal communications structure is critical to success. the problems as they change."* System overhead will increase faster than log (size). Second, MCC has several humanThe second invited speakerwas John Peller, vice president of engineering channels through which new technol-

at Rockwell International's Space Transportation Systems Division. He dis- hogy may reach the participating com-cussed the space shuttle in terms of the process used to develop the design panies. There are the liaison represen-and then test it, placing special emphasis on the differences between thetechniques they used and those suggested by conventional wisdom. These M butwho retr to their com-differences affected the success of the design.

Special-interest sessions at the symposium addressed such topics as panies periodically to brief concernedmanaging complexity in individual and group design, exploration beyond executives. There are the companyrapid prototyping, reusability, and formal and internal aspects of design. assignees who are expected to work

with the STP for a period of years,enough to learn a new technology indepth, but who eventually return totheir companies, taking this knowl-edge with them. There are the regularMCC employees who may also visit athe same conferences, write papers for finished when he completes his prod-M employewh may alo visi asponsoring company from time to

each other, and prefer to talk to each uct within his constraints. time. In addition to these informalother. Their whole feedback comes As the reward system is set up to- channels, MCC is producing writtenfrom the research community itself. day, neither culture is willing to pro- reports, offering periodic symposia,mote~~ ~~~~~eprs newrm technoogies partlybecaus"On the other hand, the software mote new technologies, partly because and providing formal training.engineers build material systems that neither has the money or an explicit Third, "we do not want just to de-may control the researcher's flight to a mission to do so. MCC does have that velop methods, but rather to buildconference or the bank account from mlssion. prototypes that support themethods,"which he receives honoraria, but in "We need organizational relation- Belady declared, "because we recog-other respects the two cultures are ships wheretheresearcher rewardis nize the fact that tools transfer tech-quite separate. The development peo- realized only when his new technology nology much more effectively thanple are motivated to finish their project is actually being used by developers,' pure methods. Unfortunately a legalas soon as possible at minimum cost, Belady proposed. "At MCC we will restriction applies here."and then go on to the next job. consider our research fimshed oniy Under the law permitting research

"They know how the tool that they whenitisbeingUsedbydevelopment consortia, MCC is not allowed toused on one or two previous projects transfer to the participants a wholeworks and they can predict quite ac- product that will be immediately mar-curately how it will work on their cur- We experiment with ketable. It may deliver only a proto-rent project. They don't want to take the prototype to type that must be rebuilt or customizedrisks. They don't want to perturb their by each participant before making usepresent activity by experimenting with prove the concept and of it. "We experiment with the proto-another tool that they do not know. establish its value, type to prove the concept and establishConsequently, it is difficult to com- its value," he explained. "Once con-municate from one culture to the vinced of its worth, the participant hasother, and even good research has a organizations in the participating com- to build the operational tool.hard time crossing the boundary." panies." "Once we deliver a prototype to all

Neither culture is highly motivated the participants, the clock starts,''to find out what happens when a new The transfer function at MCC. The Belady pointed out. For three years thetechnology is actually used. The cycle very nature of MCC-with its spon- participants have exclusive rights, butof the researcher is completed when he soring companies, its liaison represen- after that, MCC may sell the prototypepublishes a paper for his fellow re- tatives and sponsor assignees, and its to others, including shareholders thatsearchers. The cycle of the developer is explicit 'mission-provides a better are not participants in the STP.

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Fourth, in software engineering, the employ researchers with backgrounds Complex design processes. The taskability to experiment on a large scale is in psychology or related disciplines to for this group is to identify the activi-usually missing. "We have toy prob- observe the experiments. ties and information exchanges thatlems on which to establish the validity "It's possible to get a tool that the people and groups of people are in-of some research and prove some researchers think is splendid and really volved in as they design complex sys-tools," Belady said, "but these toy is splendid in some sense, but yet does tems. Examples of these activities areproblems are in a completely different not get across to the users," Belady in- elaborating several alternatives for theclass from complex real-world pro- dicated. "The problem is to find out particular design situation, puttinggrams. There is usually no close-to- why. If we have some psychologists or together on a temporary basis a simpli-full-scale experimental demonstration sociologists on the project, maybe they fied version of the system, studying theof the validity of a new software tech- can find out why. We could modify impact of this design, and judgingnology. The reasons are twofold: we the technology transfer techniques ac- whether it is the right one-whether itdon't have a heritage of doing it, and cordingly. We are really out in a new meets the requirements, either accept-these experiments are expensive." area. I don't think the research com- ing it and going on to the next design

Belady intends to use the MCC munity has done much of this kind of issue or discarding it and trying some-framework to create this experimental work, if any at all." thing else. To some degree this group isopportunity. "Our current plan for If MCC can successfully transfer its engaged in behavioral research, com-technology transfer is to have receiving technology, it may eventually become bined with traditional computerorganizations in the participating com- a self-supporting research organi- science.panies where we will have the chance zation. "This activity overall is what we callto carry out full-scale experimental exploration," Belady stated. "It has ademonstrations of our technology in a serious meaning for us-that there isworking environment," Belady out- no such thing as a straightforward re-lined. "As opposed to hardware, a MCC has copyrighted finement process that starts with glob-software technology demonstration is a historic namefor al requirements and ends up with code.muchmoredifficult. Hardware canlbe its environment: Exploration is a looping process, ameasured on a workbench or in some Leonardo. matter of trial and error. We have tolaboratory environment with little par- learn about the interactions among allticipation by people, because the issue the different elements of the design.is machine performance not people "Once we are able to identify theperformance. Software design envirc;nment elements of exploration, then we may

"In software technology, on the The STP's efforts center around the take those that we judge to be auto-other hand, the issue is mainly how the creation of a computer-aided software matable and put them into the ma-efforts ofhuman beings are to be auto- design environment. MCC has copy- chine," he continued. "Let us supposemated. For a comparative demonstra- righted a historic name for its environ- that we have a database that lists all thetion you have to have the participation ment: Leonardo. Belady calls Leo- possible ways of doing software de-of human beings. Since you want to nardo a comprehensive environment sign. We cannot expect that everymake it close to full scale, you have not to aid all aspects of complex software designer will be an expert in all ofonly the expense of experimenting with development, including requirements them. This knowledge base will let thehuman beings, but also the classical ex- capture, exploration, and early design. designer see what options he has.perimental psychologist's problem- Belady has divided his personnel into "Today it is entirely up to the statethe fact that human beings know they four groups, one on Leonardo archi- of preparedness of the individual de-are in an experiment causes them to tecture and three on component re- signer-sometimes good, sometimesreact differently. search, which includes complex design poor-to select the appropriate design"We realize that we face these prob- processes, design information base, method. Generally, no one else knows

lems," Belady continued, "and we are and design visualization. why a particular algorithm or way ofplanning for technology transfer at the designing was chosen. Typically thesame time that we plan the technical Leonardo architecture. This group designer does not make a record ac-research. We have both a technical is beginning to define the major com- cessible to coworkers of why he madeplan and a technology transfer plan. ponents of the Leonardo environ- his selection," Belady said.You not only have to do good re- ment, to establish linkages with other Selecting the first design that workssearch, you have to worry as early as research organizations, and to prepare may lead to relatively poor productnow about the ways to transfer the re- for technology transfer. It is responsi- quality. However, once knowledge ofsulting technology." ble for handling results imported from the reasons for making design choicesThe STP may use psychological other research organizations and it will accumulates in an organized database,

techniques to observe what goes on in perform the experimentation related even within a single project, it is likelythese experimental situations. It may to technology transfer. that designers will consider more alter-

72 IEEE SOFTWARE

natives, leading to more optimization is easier to get by without it." reason lies in the kind of systems weeffort and ultimately better product This group will no doubt use tradi- expect to see in the future with prob-quality. tional database techniques, but may lems of concurrency and distributed

"Suppose that we store not only the also end up with a natural path to a control. Unfortunately, mankind lackscurrently accepted design choice, but knowledge base for software system an intuition for parallel activities. Evenalso capture the rationale behind that design. "I refuse to start on the basis to understand existing parallel systemsdesign decision," Belady speculated. that we will use expert systems for soft- takes lots of insight; to design such sys-"We believe that much information ware design," Belady asserted. "We tems takes even more insight.that appears to be extraneous to the should do it in the right order. First, we "To explore design alternatives insimple description of the product is should understand the problems we this environment, we must turn toreally worth recording, at least if we are up against and then we should look animation. We must be able to replayhave a machine-based system for do- for existing techniques that fit the what happens as we choose one algo-ing so. problems. Maybe expert systems will rithm or another. We must be able to

"This information should include support this activity." see how different processes going on atthe process of choosing, including the There is a difference between the the same time work out."things that were not chosen and the way an expert system would be used Animation, or simulation, is anoth-reasons for not choosing them. Such for this application and the way it is er way to increase the quality of de-information would help reduce the typically used, Belady pointed out. sign. "It is an old saying that goodwaste that is generated when some one Most expert systems are geared to cap- designers are formed by their experi-has to relearn the system before he is ture knowledge that has been accumu- ence," he recalled. "Now with ani-able to modify or extend it, perhaps a mated simulation we can accelerate theyear or two later." rate at which design experiences areThe Complex Design Processes generated. Without simulation it may

Group is involved in finding out what People will not be three years later, when the systeminformation in the design process has poke into the machinefor starts in operation, before we mayto be externalized-brought outside information if it is easier observe it and then we can observethe skull-and captured in some ma- to get by without it. only that single version."chine for later reuse. "That is why Isaid this is to some degree a behav- The eventual Leonardo environ-iorally oriented study," he reiterated. lating slowly like medical informa ment. Ten years from now Belady

In addition, although there are some ting sowl ie diainforma- visualizes Leonardo as a network ofsparse research efforts concerning tn.w"In softw are s emhav a workstations with each one rich in ca-sparse concerning ~knowledge base that starts empty anddesign as a mental activity, there is fills with knowledge as exploration pability due to the availability ofpractically zero research in the area of sophisticated components at a muchproceeds."team design. "What are the items of Some of this information should lower price than today, connected byinformation that are typically ex- survive a single project I should be broadband communication to a cen-changed among people in team de- carried over to other designs That is tral database or knowledge base thatsign?" Belady asked. "Is it rational to design reusability a further respon contains all the information relevantcapture these items? Can they be to a project, both process and product.ranked in order of importance? The The workstations will serve all theitems must be organized in some man- Design visualization. The infor- functions of the design team-modu-ner, for otherwise, as their number ex- mation from this rich database has to lar structure, reliability, performance,ploded, you couldn't extract the infor- be presented effectively to the various system maintainability, and so on-mation you want." classes of people who have to interact not only designers, Belady predicted.

with it. "We believe that the two- There could be one workstation with aDesign information base. That leads dimensional graphics display as a way program specialized for the person

into the question ofhow to organize all of designing and describing software studying the performance of the evolv-this design information, which is the systems is not, as of today, really ing product, for instance. As theprovince of this group. "You have to utilizable," Belady observed. "It is a design database evolves, it will be ablemanage the capture of this informa- rich area, there has been work in it, to offer different projections of thetion, including rationale and perhaps and some of it is promising." It is the system, and the machine will keepeven management information, in a responsibility of the Design Visualiza- these views mutually consistent.smooth and perhaps pleasant way," tion Group to develop graphic ways of Management may have worksta-Belady posited. "You have to index it. capturing, displaying, and manipulat- tions where it can track the whole pro-You have to make its access later on ing information. cess from the point of view of sched-natural. People will not poke into the "We intend to put special emphasis ules, cost of development, and impactmachinesearching forinformation if it on animation," Belady said. "The ofoperational costs later. C

November1985 73