A Technical History of the SEI

The SEI Contribution
The SEI recognized the need to complement the process focus of the CMM with a better understanding
of how to develop integrated software development environments that support both individual
developers and teams throughout the lifecycle. Toward that end, the SEI fostered research
into configuration management concepts both that meet the needs of software configuration management
users and that develop a standard reference model for integrated environments. This research
resulted in a crop of CM tools that more transparently integrated with tool environments.
The SEI continued to promote CM concepts as the software engineering community embraced
model-based engineering and architecture-centric engineering. By taking on technical leadership
of the SAE AADL standard, the SEI was able to integrate two DARPA-funded research architecture
languages (MetaH and ACME) and incorporate CM support to meet practitioners’ needs. By
choosing AADL as a key technology in the SAVI initiative and collaborating with the SEI in establishing
requirements for a model repository that include consistent CM of models, the aerospace
industry has shown its appreciation of SEI’s expertise in CM as well as architecture-centric,
model-based engineering technologies the SEI has developed.
CM has become part of the SEI Product Line Practice Framework.
References
[Burrows 2005] Burrows, Clive & Wesley, Ian. Ovum Evaluates: Configuration Management.
Ovum Ltd., 2005.
[Brown 1992] Brown, A.; Dart, S.; Feiler, P.; & Wallnau, K. “The State of Automated Configuration
Management.” Software Engineering Institute Annual Technology Review. Software Engineering
Institute, Carnegie Mellon University, 1992. ftp://ftp.sei.cmu.edu/pub/case-env/config_mgt/papers/atr_cm_state.pdf
[Brown 1993a] Brown, A. W.; Wallnau, K. C.; & Feiler, P. H. “Understanding Integration in a
Software Development Environment: Issues and Illustrations.” Journal of Systems Integration,
September 1993.
[Brown 1993b] Brown, Alan W.; Carney, David J.; Feiler, Peter H.; Oberndorf, Patricia A.; &
Zelkowitz, Marvin V. “A Project Support Environment Reference Model,” 82-89. Proceedings of
TRI-Ada Conference, Seattle, WA, September 18–23, 1993. ACM 1993.
[Dart 1989] Dart, Susan A. & Feiler, Peter H. “Configuration Management in CASE Tools and
Environments.” Third International Workshop on Computer-Aided Software Engineering. CASE
89, London, July 17–21, 1989. IEEE Computer Society, 1989.
[Estublier 2005] Estublier, Jacky; Leblang, David; van der Hoek, Andre; Conradi, Reidar;
Clemm, Geoffrey; Tichy, Walter; & Wiborg-Weber, Darcy. “Impact of Software Engineering Research
on the Practice of Software Configuration Management.” ACM Transactions on Software
Engineering and Methodology 14, 4 (October 2005): 383-430.
[Feiler 1988] Feiler, Peter H.; Dart, Susan A.; & Downey, Grace. Evaluation of the Rational Environment
(CMU/SEI-88-TR-015). Software Engineering Institute, Carnegie Mellon University,
1988. http://resources.sei.cmu.edu/library/asset-view.cfm?assetID=10637
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