Abstract: Various tools have been produced to assist personal software process (PSP) practitioners in xD;implementing their processes, which require strong discipline from the individual software engineer. xD;Nevertheless, most of the currently available tools still require software engineers to become involved xD;in time-consuming manual processes and offer limited assistance. This research study presents the xD;substantial potential for software agents to be incorporated into PSP automated tools by introducing xD;four new agent-based features. These features are the proactive interface agent, an integrated Gantt xD;chart with sensor-based scheduling, prediction ability and indirect management through multi-agent xD;deployment. This agent has the additional features of flexibility and privacy. Integrated with the xD;proactive assistant, the proposed tools are capable of collecting and processing accurate PSP data xD;metrics and translating them into informative and meaningful information for both the software xD;engineer and the project manager. The use of agents demonstrated in this paper is meant to xD;significantly help engineers to practice all of the PSP processes effectively and in a timely manner and xD;to get feedback on their performance with a visualisation platform at any time.
Abstract: Poor requirements analysis process results in incomplete software applications. Some requirements xD;appear as scattered and tangled concerns within requirements document. Hence it is difficult to identify xD;such requirements. A number of research approaches such as Theme/Doc, early aspects identification, xD;information retrieval and aspects identification using UML have been developed to identify crosscutting xD;concern at the requirements level. Nevertheless, these approaches are only supported by semiautomated xD;tools whereby human intervention is required to achieve the desired results. This research xD;focuses on developing a tool to automatically identify crosscutting concern at the requirements level. A xD;model based on Theme/Doc and early aspects identification approaches is formulated as the basis of xD;this tool, 3CI. 3CI adopts natural language processing (NLP) techniques such as verb frequency xD;analysis, part-of-speech tagging and dominant verb analysis. The tool usability, efficiency and xD;scalability are evaluated by comparing the performance of a requirements engineer conducting similar xD;task manually. Our evaluation on 3CI demonstrates 75% of accuracy.
Abstract: The aim of this review is to study the methods of steganography using the video file as a cover carrier. The steganography is the art of protecting the information through embedding data in medium carrier, for instants this study illustrate historically this art, as well as the study describes methods as a review for this art in the video file. The video based steganography can be used as one video file, separated images in frames or images and audio files. Since that, the use of the video based steganography can be more eligible than other multimedia files. As a result of this study, the video based steganography has been discussed and the advantages of using the video file as a cover carrier for steganography have been proposed.
Abstract: There are two techniques used to hide information - one is steganography while the other is digital watermarking. The objective of this paper is to investigate the functionality and reliability of using the current metrics, which are used to measure the distortion caused by secret data embedding. These metrics are used to measure the quality of the steganographic or watermarked objects. The signal-to-noise ratio, peak signal-to-noise ratio, mean square error, root mean square error, histogram and human vision test are the current measurements for the steganographic object. The paper will also discuss the widely used metrics and their limitations. Apart from this, it will also look at how researchers have criticized the metrics and how these metrics are used to measure the quality of steganographic or watermarked objects.
Notes: Hmood, Ali K. Kasirun, Z. M. Jalab, Hamid A. Alam, Gazi Mahabubul Zaidan, A. A. Zaidan, B. B.
Abstract: The increase dependence on software aspects has led the society to emphasize the importance of software quality and metrics. At present there are two categories of quality metrics; dynamic and static. Although dynamic metrics can provide a clearer insight into the software quality issue; it is observed that static metrics are often used for such a purpose. This is due mainly to the technical difficulties associated with the collection of dynamic metrics. One of the known issues when dealing with dynamic metrics is the need for instrument code by inserting points for data collection. This is a very tedious and counterproductive task. Aspect-Oriented Programming (AOP) is a promising technology that is currently used to add cross-cutting concerns to the software applications. AOP can be easily used to transparently instrument the code at compile-time. This work proposes AOP as a technique that can be used for collecting software maintainability dynamic metrics data. Therefore, an AOP-based framework for collecting dynamic coupling metric has been designed, implemented; and evaluated. Evaluation results showed that the framework is a reasonable approach for collecting a maintainability dynamic metrics. This approach allowed for the total separation of the metric's code (the metric aspect) from the application's source code. Thus, the AOP-based framework provides an effective way for the transparent collection of a maintainability dynamic metrics data. The designed framework can be extended to fit other kinds of quality dynamic metrics.
Notes: Tahir, Amjed Ahmad, Rodina Kasirun, Zarinah Mohd
Abstract: The aim of this study is to review the strength and weakness for the possible multimedia cover for the steganography approaches. In addition, the security level of each approach and how is probable to combine the steganography and cryptography. Steganography is an art on which the data can be hide in other data as cover, the multimedia files is the commonly used for hiding data. The main aspects of the steganography is the capacity and security, where the capacity refer to how much data can be hidden in the cover carrier, while the security concern with the ability of disclose or altering the data by unauthorized party. The multimedia files, such as, image, video, audio and text are the possible covers for hiding secure information or data. Each of these covers has advantages and disadvantages; as a result of this study we will discuss the possibility to use these files as a cover. In the last part of this study, we suggest a further direction to improve the capacity and security aspects.
Abstract: Developing correct requirements for any application is vital for the success of the application in any field. Computer-supported collaborative learning (CSCL) has becoming an important tool for enabling collaborative learning (CL) in education. In Malaysia for instance CSCL has been chosen to be a technology enabler to support Smart School project whereby CL has been identified as one of its learning strategies (MOE, 1997). However, the project will not come true if the lacking of CSCL application is not overcome. The situation is more acute as the existing applications are not only general in nature but yet to exhibit collaborative characteristics. This problem is due to many reasons. From the software engineering point of view, first and foremost, the problem is introduced during the elicitation of users needs. A survey carried out by the author had been identified that users are not the first people consulted by courseware developers in eliciting requirements. Furthermore, the courseware developers have no support in carrying out requirements elicitation activity. In conjunction to this, a review was also carried out in requirements elicitation techniques and process. Many methods have been identified and implemented to support requirements elicitation activity. Most of them are group-based, which support the cooperativeness of the requirements elicitation activity. However, the existent of these tools are not recognized in the Malaysian context. Due to this, a new requirements elicitation tool using Focus Group Discussion (FGD) technique is developed based on the survey done and the literature survey carried out. The tool is called FGD-RElicit stands for Focus Group Discussion technique in Requirements Elicitation. This paper focuses on the development of FGD-RElicit from its technique used in supporting elicitation, analysis model, design and architecture. Results of evaluation by the users are also included the paper is wrapped up. xD;
Abstract: Reviewing on computer-supported collaborative learning (CSCL) tools revealed that CSCL is xD;important to support collaborative learning (CL) strategy in school. Existing CSCL applications are xD;mostly research-based and are not available for use. Through a survey on the needs for CSCL in xD;Malaysia, it is confirmed that CSCL application is needed but the available one could not support CL xD;activities. This paper discusses CSCL study in Malaysia, especially the relationship between user xD;involvement and type of CSCL application needed. In particular, the CSCL application that could xD;associate existing knowledge among students to build new knowledge for their better understanding and xD;problem solving skills. We examine this need and assess its impact by developing Collaborative xD;Environment for Teaching and Learning System (CETLs).
Abstract: An unresolved problem faced by software developers is the failure to identify and modularize certain artefacts that compose the software. It is difficult to modularize these artefacts because they are dispersed among other artefacts in the software properties. Aspects Oriented Requirements Engineering is showing encouraging results in improving identification, modularization and composition of crosscutting concerns. Identifying and documenting crosscutting concerns at the requirements-level is crucial. It avoids coupling between requirements, improves traceability among requirements, eases function modularization, reduces software complexity, enhances the correctness of the software design and most importantly it saves the cost. Although the research area is still in its infancy, several techniques for crosscutting concern identification have already been developed. However, all of the techniques reviewed are based on semi-automated way whereby human intervention is required to achieve the desired results. Therefore, in this paper, a fully automated technique based on Natural Language Processing (NLP) is proposed to identify crosscutting concern at the requirements level.
Abstract: Software development methodology involves many activities and processes that are carried out when building a software system. There are a lot of available methodologies; one should be suitable for a software project. However, deciding which methodology to be applied requires some assessments on the project nature and characteristics at the early project cycle. This research focuses on finding the relationship between software project factors and methodologies, and further developing a tool that can help software practitioners in choosing the most suitable methodology. Before the tool is developed, a review on several lifecycle models has been carried out in order to examine the relevant software factors. Factors like project size, complexity, requirement stability, duration, performance requirement, modularization, project team, and criticality have the main impact on some methodologies. The relationship between methodologies and software factors is formulated using rule-based approach, and managed properly by a sequence of steps; identifying the initial selection of input variables, counterexamples of bad sub rules, pruning the variables, merging categories, and identifying hypothetical examples. RETE algorithm has been chosen as the problem solving technique in managing the rules. The tool is able to help software practitioners in early decision making process to use appropriate methodology in their software project.
Abstract: Requirements elicitation in any application development has many important benefits. Due to this, it should be xD;practiced in alignment to its objectives. This paper is based on the findings of a survey conducted among Malaysian xD;courseware developers community. The paper starts with a definition of requirements elicitation and a description xD;on how the survey was conducted. This is followed by the requirements elicitation practice as perceived by the xD;respondents. Finally, a conclusion is drawn on the requirements elicitation practices and how to improve them.
Abstract: The evolution of courseware in schools with its various attributes, strengths and limitations are increasing. The situation in Malaysian context is not widely known. Particularly with the government effort in implementing the smart school project, the readiness among school teachers would play important role. This paper focuses on the evolution of courseware in schools in general and discusses its attributes, strengths and limitations. Then, the paper presents the details of the survey on collaborative learning carried out among school teachers. The important issues that will be investigated include. the awareness of CL activities, the awareness of using CSCL applications, the teachers involvement in CSCL application development, the CL main and CL success factors.
Abstract: Requirements elicitation has been studied in Software Engineering field to acquire as many requirements as possible for the development of an application including Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL). These requirements are gathered using many requirements elicitation techniques such as discussions, interviews and meetings. These user requirements are recorded in a documentation called draft of user requirements document (URD). The paper suggests that development of an application should be based on complete draft of URD. The complete of URD depends on several requirements elicitation factors. The paper investigates requirements elicitation factors from several aspects namely tools, time, techniques, people, communications, processes and documents. The study discusses these factors which provides insights for devising group requirements elicitation tool, which allows the user involvement to support requirements elicitation activity. We hoped that the tool can be an effective aid of requirements elicitation activity that will produce complete draft of URD.
Abstract: Software industry is currently facing numerous problems. xD;As such, continuing emphasis has been given in finding xD;ways to solve the problems with main focus on improving xD;software development quality and productivity. Quality xD;and productivity are weapons that have to be utilized by xD;any enterprising organizations to win dominance in the xD;global market as well as in the competitive market of the xD;information age. xD;One of the solutions to these problems is an implementation xD;of software engineering tools and techniques, such as xD;Computer Aided Software Engineering (CASE) Technology xD;and CASE tools. But up-to-date with the tools only, the xD;software industry is unable to solve these problems xD;completely. This paper presents and proposes a xD;compliance model on the quality system for software xD;development by ISO 9000-3 as a conceptual combination of xD;the Total Quality Management, Software Engineering xD;concept and application of the quality system standard ISO xD;9000-3.
