Using multimedia to support cooperative software development
Abstract
The aim of this paper is to propose a global solution to support Cooperative Software Development (CSD) through a multimedia environment. CSD systems have as main goal to enable several users connected over a network to wirk together in order to develop software products. They have to solve problems such as: cherence maintenance of the software project through the distributed system by managing possible convlicts between local versions of each group member and, above all, promote the necessary mechanisms for the inter-group awareness and integrity. We introduce here the strategies of our own CSD prototype: a computer-supported cooperative work architecture for software development. It enables a group of developers (2 to 4), possibly located at remote places and connected over network, to develop software together. A cooperative multimedia editing environment is available for the whole Development Cycle, enclosing mechanisms of computer-conferencing (text, audio and video communications ).
