Talk:Software factory

The original article was clearly structured to emphasize Microsoft's .net "Software Factory" marketing program and approach. Although Microsoft does, in fact, have such an effort, the true definition of Software Factory is much broader in scope, application and definition than that provided by Microsoft. I will attempt to provide a more detailed summary of what that broader definition is, once I have completed my documentation of the broader scope and application. I have already applied some limited editing in an effort to to broaden this definition. ...mark 15:22, 21 March 2007 (UTC)mark[reply]

I split this article into two, See Software Factory (Microsoft .NET) for the disambiguation. TechMan5 (talk) 22:17, 25 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Nonsense[edit]

It's a little difficult to tell what the "software factory" people are going on about, because they have a high ratio of hype to delivered product, they like to invent neologisms that mean the same thing as well-established terms, and you have to buy their book to get the whole story. But looking at things like http://www.softwarefactories.com/index.html it appears that a "software factory" is a set of libraries and domain-specific languages that are useful in a particular application domain, or possibly a customized setup for your IDE that makes it easy to access stuff useful in a particular application domain. See for example http://blogs.msdn.com/somasegar/archive/2007/01/26/software-factories-100-000-served.aspx or patterns & practices: Software Factories --- removing some hype from the last, you get:

A "software factory" is a bunch of related code and docs. When installed in a development environment, it helps programmers create instances of specific types of applications. Each software factory tries to help build a certain type of applications that do the same thing in the same way. Examples of such application types include mobile client applications, occasionally connected smart client applications, and transactional Web service applications.

A "software factory" contains tools, libraries, documentation, and reference implementations. Tools include wizards, code generators, and visual designers. Usually it provides templates and other assets to help a development team quickly start development of new applications, and tries to guide and automate the prescribed development activities in some unspecified way until the software gets junked.

Part of the definition is that programmers can tweak a "software factory" when it doesn't fit them. Typically, an "architect" does the tweaking and then gives the tweaked version to the other programmers.

So what's the big deal? Apparently Ruby on Rails is a "software factory" by this definition.

Kragen Sitaker 03:18, 24 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Suggest Split / Disambiguation[edit]

What I can see here is that we are dealing with two very different subjects: one, a broad model for industrial production of software, implying certain administrative approaches and processes, and two, a framework for the production of applications for a very specific platform, implying a set of components and usage guidelines for the same. I would suggest splitting the article along those lines (I'm not qualified to do it), and create a disambiugation page. JARivera2000 20:11, 24 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Broading the Software Factory concept[edit]

Agreeing with Mark, I want to reccomend the paper Concepto y Evolución de las Fábricas de Software (Software Factories concept and evolution), from Garzás y Piattini, in order to focus correctly the Software Factories concept. Even though it is a spanish paper, it have structured concepts about history and clasiffication of software factories. The paper can be read at [1] Jorge Ubeda

Complete Fiction[edit]

This article is complete fiction. Nobody outside of sales people uses this expression in this way. I suggest it should be wrapped up somehow to indicate that it is all "hype" and "bizspeak". This is NOT a software engineering article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 61.14.27.42 (talk) 02:29, 9 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Agreement on need for Disambiguation[edit]

I agree with Mark and some of these other users but disagree with the idea that this is complete fiction. While there is some ambiguity in how the term is sometimes used (it is used improperly as biz-speak on many of the external links), that does not invalidate the term. A disambiguation should separate the Microsoft Software Factory campaign from the "Software Factory" concept. The concept of a software factory is not related to libraries within any IDE, or even the factory design pattern; but rather the organizational implementation of composite application building software engineering concepts. A software factory is a business operations concept of developing software applications through assembling components per specification. It utilizes assemblers, like any factory, who specialize and repeat their assigned tasks. This means that software is made primarily by unskilled labor, rather than engineers. It's more closely related to WYSIWYG web-pages built in DreamWeaver than anything that requires an understanding of code. Unlike that example, however, it implies a a job-floor filled with unskilled labor performing specialized tasks using tools that are designed to facilitate their jobs. You don't need the conveyor-belt maker, the torch engineer, or even a master welder, to repeat a single specific weld all day on cars moving through a factory. Likewise, not everyone involved in the software development process needs to be a software engineer. All they need are an understanding of their job, and useful tools. The requirements gathering, component/tool engineering, and similar jobs are handled elsewhere. The reason I know this is because I worked at a company with a software factory that quickly churned out fully functional applications. They used serious assembly tools and a set of components that meant no one had to even know how to read code.72.94.165.122 (talk) 19:06, 25 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

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