Project: IEEE/ ACM Software Engineering Body of Knowledge

Statement: In many engineering disciplines, the accreditation of university curricula and the licensing and certification of practicing professionals are taken very seriously. These activities are seen as critical to the constant upgrading of professionals and, hence, the improvement of the level of professional practice. Recognition of a core body of knowledge is pivotal to the development and accreditation of university curricula and the licensing and certification of professionals. Because software engineering has not yet achieved this recognition, the ACM and the IEEE Computer Society are actively promoting the recognition of software engineering, through developing a software engineering body of knowledge (SWEBOK) for university curricula and licensing of software engineering professionals.

Objective: The SWEBOK will contain a description of each principal software engineering area and identify key references for each area. The SWEBOK will also identify key topics for disciplines related to software engineering. The content will represent knowledge of a person with a bachelor's degree in software engineering and four years experience. The SWEBOK will be available on the Internet. Acceptable mechanisms for accessibility of copyrighted references are being considered by the IEEE and ACM; public domain references will be available.

Audience:

• organizations wishing to promote a consistent view of software engineering;
• practicing software engineers
• makers of public policy defining software engineering licensing policies
• professional societies defining university software engineering program accreditation guidelines
• software engineering students
• educators and trainers

Project Participation:

Champion: Leonard Tripp, The Boeing Corporation, President of the IEEE Computer Society;

Executive Editors: Alain Abran, University of Quebec at Montreal, and James Moore, The MITRE Corporation, Chair of the USTAG, ISO SC7 Software Engineering;

Editors: Robert DuPuis and Pierre Bourque, University of Quebec at Montreal

Industrial Advisory Board: A board composed of industry, government, and professional organizations who identified the knowledge areas and has oversight on the project. Members: NIST; IEEE Computer Society; IEC /ISO JTC1 SC7; Computing Curricula 2001; National Research Council of Canada; the Boeing Company; ACM SigSoft; Raytheon Systems Company; Comerica, Inc.; SAP Labs (Canada)

Panel of experts: TBD; to review the entire document for consistency and completeness

Knowledge area specialists: Champions who define a knowledge area

Reviewers: solicited from technical experts, professional societies, and perspectives (Academic, regulator, licensing, researcher, etc).

Progress:

An outline of each area and related disciplines for software engineering has been prepared; the complete first version will be submitted, reviewed and published on the internet by end of 1999.

ITL Role: Member of IAB; knowledge area specialist for Quality Analysis. We also developed the concept paper for two of the knowledge areas.

ITL Staff: Dolores Wallace, Larry Reeker