Project management and team productivity in an operating system development course

Abstract

System software development involves significant coordination problems. The coordination effort required to develop large operating systems can be more than 90% of the total effort (Unger, Walker, 1977), (Brooks, 1975), (Aron, 1969). A major factor in programming coordination is the interpersonal communciation process within a development team. This paper describes an approach to increasing team productivity through external intervention in the communication process. Experiences with four instances of an undergraduate course which involves an operating system development project are also described. Two of these development projects involved intervention in the communication process by an external facilitator. Estimates of the resulting programmer productivity are presented for all four development projects.