Courtesy: ISO/IEC TR 29110-2-2:2016
The core characteristic of the entities targeted by ISO/IEC 29110 is size, however there are other aspects and characteristics of VSEs that may affect profile preparation or selection, such as: Business Models (commercial, contracting, in-house development, etc.); Situational factors (such as criticality, uncertainty environment, etc.); and Risk Levels. Creating one profile for each possible combination of values of the various dimensions introduced above would result in an unmanageable set of profiles. Accordingly, VSE’s profiles are grouped in such a way as to be applicable to more than one category. Profile Groups are a collection of profiles which are related either by composition of processes (i.e. activities, tasks), or by capability level, or both.
Generic Profile Group
The Generic Profile Group has been defined as applicable to a vast majority of VSEs that do not develop critical systems and/or software and have typical situational factors. The Generic Profile Group is a collection of four profiles (Entry, Basic, Intermediate, Advanced), providing a progressive approach to satisfying a vast majority of VSEs. The four-stage roadmap provides a progressive approach to satisfying a vast majority of VSEs. VSEs targeted by the Entry Profile are VSEs working on small projects (e.g. at most six person-months effort) and start-ups. The Basic Profile targets VSEs developing a single application by a single work team. The Intermediate Profile is targeted at VSEs developing more than one project in parallel with more than one work team. The Advanced Profile is target to VSEs that want to sustain and grow as an independent competitive system and/or software development business.
The Software Engineering Generic Profile Group is mainly based on the ISO/IEC/IEEE 12207 Software Life Cycle Processes standard. The ISO working group mandated to develop ISO/IEC 29110 used the Mexican software process model MoProSoft to help the development of ISO/IEC 29110.
A process is composed of a set of activities, and an activity is composed of a set of tasks. The figure below illustrates the 2 processes and the activities of the software engineering Basic profile. The 2 processes are described at the task level in the ISO/IEC 29110 Software engineering Management and Engineering Guide of the Basic profile.
ISO/IEC 29110 series is a set of five different Parts. Part 1, ISO/IEC TR 29110-1, defines the business terms common to the VSE Profile Set of Documents. It introduces processes, lifecycle and standardization concepts, and the ISO/IEC 29110 series. It also introduces the characteristics and requirements of a VSE, and clarifies the rationale for VSE-specific profiles, documents, standards and guides. introduces the concepts for software engineering standardized profiles for VSEs, and defines the terms common to the VSE Profile Set of Documents. It establishes the logic behind the definition and application of standardized profiles. It specifies the elements common to all standardized profiles (structure, conformance, assessment) and introduces the taxonomy (catalogue) of ISO/IEC 29110 profiles.
Part 3, ISO/IEC TR 29110-3-1, defines the process assessment guidelines and compliance requirements needed to meet the purpose of the defined VSE Profiles. ISO/IEC TR 29110-3-1 also contains information that can be useful to developers of assessment methods and assessment tools. ISO/IEC TR 29110-3-1 is addressed to people who have direct relation with the assessment process, e.g. the assessor and the sponsor of the assessment, who need guidance on ensuring that the requirements for performing an assessment have been met.
Part 4, ISO/IEC 29110-4-1, provides the specification for all the profiles of the Generic Profile Group. The Generic Profile Group is applicable to VSEs that do not develop critical software products. The profiles are based on subsets of appropriate standards elements. VSE Profiles apply and are targeted at authors/providers of guides and authors/providers of tools and other support material.
Part 5, ISO/IEC 29110-5-m-n, provides systems engineering or software engineering project management and engineering guides and service delivery guidelines for the VSE Profile described in ISO/IEC 29110-4-m.
The figure below illustrates the components of the ISO/IEC 29110 series. The boxes in light blue are documents in development.