Understanding the Role of Knowledge Management in Software Development: A Case Study in Very Small Companies

Rory V. O'Connor and Shuib Basri
Additional contact information
Rory V. O'Connor: School of Computing, Dublin City University, Dublin, Ireland
Shuib Basri: Lero - The Irish Software Engineering Research Centre, University of Limerick, Limerick, Ireland & Department of Computer and Information Science, Universiti Teknologi Petronas, Malaysia

International Journal of Systems and Service-Oriented Engineering (IJSSOE), 2014, vol. 4, issue 1, 39-52

Abstract: Software and systems engineering is distinct from other forms of engineering as it deals with an intangible product, where the progress in construction is not explicitly visible and team members often rely on the documentation of others to follow and review progress. Furthermore unlike traditional engineering disciplines, there is no single standardized unified process. The role of knowledge management in the software engineering literature is becoming more evident, as the software development activity is essentially a human knowledge intensive activity and is seen by many as a key factor. This paper discusses the role of software development knowledge management within software development process and specifically how software development knowledge is managed in software development in order to support software process improvement and the role of knowledge management in this. The authors present the results of a study of knowledge management process practices in very small software companies and discusses these under the major identified issues of: Communication; Learning and sharing; Documentation and Knowledge management process and commitment. The findings in this study give an insight towards knowledge management practices as they relate to software development process practices in very small companies and the important factors that must be considered to preserve knowledge and quality software.

Date: 2014
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://services.igi-global.com/resolvedoi/resolve. ... 18/ijssoe.2014010103 (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:igg:jssoe0:v:4:y:2014:i:1:p:39-52

Access Statistics for this article

International Journal of Systems and Service-Oriented Engineering (IJSSOE) is currently edited by Wuhui Chen

More articles in International Journal of Systems and Service-Oriented Engineering (IJSSOE) from IGI Global
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Journal Editor ().