News

Last update: 06-Aug-2004
Newsletter Editor: Simon Porro
e-mail: porro@spipartners.nl

Schedule of SPI Partners Public Training Courses

For the overview of our public courses Click here
  

Tim Kasse's New book Published

Our partner Tim Kasse published his new book "Practical Insight into CMMI" in May 2004.

Click here to read more about the book

Where to Meet us in the Coming Months

• February 2004, SEPG Conference, Tim Kasse
• June 2004, ESEPG Conference, London
• November 2004, Tom Gilb (industrial programme committee), EuroSPI Trondheim
  

New Partners in the SPI Partners Network (January 2004)

We are very happy to announce that in Q4 2003 we welcomed five new (and old) partners in the SPI Partners Network:

• Giuseppe Magnani, based in Italy - Milano. Giuseppe is CBA-IPI Lead Assessor, SCAMPI Lead Appraiser and authorized instructor of the SEI Introduction to CMMI class
• Malte Foegen of Wibas GmbH in Darmstadt - Germany. Wibas GmbH will run the German office of SPI Partners bv. Malte Foegen of Wibas is candidate instructor of the SEI introduction to CMMI class
• Arno Korpershoek, based in Antwerp - Belgium
• Peter Leeson of Q-Pit, based in Milton Keynes - UK. Peter is CBA-IPI Lead Assessor
• John Yu, based in Beijing - China. John is CBA-IPI Lead Assessor and SCAMPI Lead Appraiser

This extends our local support capability in Belgium, China, Germany, Italy and the UK. Would you like to represent SPI Partners in your own country? Please contact us.
 

Simon Porro qualified as SCAMPI Lead Apprasier (November 2003)

Simon Porro of SPI Partners received his authorization as SEI authorized SCAMPI Lead Appraiser on November 21^st, 2003. This brings the number of authorized SCAMPI Lead appraisers to 3 and the number of authorized SEI Introduction to CMMI instructors within SPI Partners to 2.
  

SPI Partners close Transition Partner Licence Agreement with the Software Engineering Institute (October 2003)

SPI Partners and the SEI closed a Transition Partner Licence Agreement for delevering SEI Introduction to CMMI courses and for delivering SCAMPI appraisal services.
  

  Edgser Dijkstra died August 2002 (20 August 2002)

Professor Edsger Dijkstra (The "First programmer", "Goto statement considered harmful" etc.) died this August in his home town Nuenen in Holland. He suffered from cancer. He was professor of Informatics as early as 1962. With his many scientific publications he taught the entire software industry how correctness of programs can be proved.

"Progress is possible only if we train ourselves to think about programs without thinking of them as pieces of executable code". "The competent programmer is fully aware of the limited size of his skull; therefore he approaches the programming task in full humility ..."

He once gave an inspring metapohor when asked whether computers can think or not: "There is an analogy between this question and the question whether a submarine can swim or not".

Many of his publications can be found at: http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD

Workshop Communicating More Creatively, 10 October 2002

--- One day inspiring workshop in Dutch, Delft - Holland ---
Our partner Frank van Elsdingen is organizing an inspiration day around all aspects of effective and creative communication. You will be challenged to explore different ways of communicating with your colleagues. Check out the web-site:
htpp://www.creacomm.nl
  

!!! NEW !!! Workshop CMM(I) Experience (3 September 2002)
This unique one-day workshop will establish an unforgettable, intensive, deep learning experience for your organization what it is like to migrate the development organization from maturity level-1 to maturity level-2. No lenghty boring lectures, but action and inspiration! click here for details.
  

CMMI Model v1.1 SW-Only Representation Released (20 August 2002)

The Software Engineering just released the CMMI v1.1 SW: The Only software representation of the CMMI. It is expected that the resistance from the Software community against the CMMI will be reduced.

Special 10% discount offer on public training (April 2002)

SPI Partners offer 10 % discount on our public courses in the year 2002 to all participants of conferences where we
present a paper. Currently this offer is valid for all participants of the following conferences:
- ESEPG 2002 Conference, Amsterdam, 9 April 2002
- EUSEC 2002 Conference, Toulouse, 20 May 2002
- PHILIPS SW Conference, Veldhoven, 10 June 2002
- SPIder Congres 2002, Soestduinen, 12 June 2002
- INCOSE Symposium 2002, Las Vegas, 28 July 2002
- NATO EVO Conference, Bonn, 23 September 2002
All course details are on www.spipartners.nl
  

Meet us at the ESPG Conference in Amsterdam (8-11 April 2002)

We look forward to meeting you at our booth at the ESEPG Conference in Amsterdam!
  

CMMI Models Version 1.1 Now Available (15 January 2002)

On 11 January 2002, the Software Engineering Institute released version 1.1 of the CMMI Models. The models can be downloaded from the SEI web-site. Release notes with a global description of the differences between version 1.02 and version 1.1 are available on the SEI web-site. Direct download links are available from the SPI Partners Publications Page. The direct link to the CMMI v1.1 release document is http://www.sei.cmu.edu/cmmi/comm/v1.1-announce.html.

Tim Kasse's new book on the AFA Assessment (28-Dec-2001)
Our partner Tim Kasse recently published his first book on the Action Focused Assessment method (AFA). The AFA was evolved from the CMM-SW CBA-IPI method: Weak elements from CBA-IPI have been improved over the last 6 years. The AFA is also compatible with the new CMMI SCAMPI assessment method.

The book explains in detail all concepts and steps of carrying out process improvement assessments. The AFA method heavily focuses on how to get an organization involved into improvement action. Tim discusses many real life assessment situations and examples. The book comes with a CD with support tools for carrying out assessments, including interviews questionnaires.

The book is a must for any assessor, aspirant assessor, SPI consultant or SEPG member!

Title: Action Focused Assessment for Software Process Improvement
Author: Tim Kasse
ISBN: 1-58053-286-1
Publisher: Artech House UK
Web: http://www.artechhouse.com
Weblink directly to book description:
http://hhp.bvdep.com/artechhouse/default.asp?Frame=Book.asp&Book=1-58053-286-1

New Training "Organizing and Leading Workshops" (5-Jan-2001)

Michel Rutgers will be teaching the SPI Partners new training "Organizing and Leading Workshops" (in Dutch) on 5 and 6 April 2001. All course information can be found via the SPI Partners training page.

CMM Integrated for Software and Systems Engineering Released (15-Nov-2000)

On 11 August, 2000 CMM Integrated for Systems and Software Engineering v1.0, the successor of the CMM-SW v1.1, was formally released by the Software Engineering Institute. Mid November 2000 an updated version v1.02 was released.
The CMMI is one integrated model for both Software and Systems EWngineering. All terminology in the CMMI has been defined in a more general way that it applies to both software and systems engineering. In order to be compliant with ISO15504 (SPICE) both a continuous and a staged representation of the model have been defined. At the lowest level, the practices are equal for both representations.
The latest version of the CMMI^SM models is available for public review and comment on the CMMI Models Web page. For more information about reviewing these models, see the announcement at http://www.sei.cmu.edu/cmmi/comm/pub-review-v102.html

New book Manuscripts of Tom Gilb (5-Oct-2000)

Tom Gilb published two new book manuscripts: the first, "Competitive Engineering", introduces a number of engineering disciplines for system development. The methods include: clear specification of requirements and design, inspection, evolutionary delivery management. The book will be published in 2001.

Tom's second book manuscript is called "Prioritiy Management". He introduces a method for defining clear measurable goals, objectives, strategies and priorities for management. The method applies the principles of Balanced Scorecard and Quality Function Deployment, but Tom continues to teach you how to specify more clearly where QFD and BSC stop. Both books and many other articles are downloadable for free via Tom's web-site www.result-planning.com.

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^® CMM and CMMI are registered in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office by Carnegie Mellon University.
^SM CMM Integration, SCAMPI, SCAMPI Lead Appraiser, IDEAL, Interim Profile, SEI, SEPG, PSP, TSP are service marks of Carnegie Mellon University.