A Software Factory for Education in Software Engineering

The aim of a software factory is to obtain productivity, quality, scale, and control in software development. In this paper this concept is applied in a software engineering laboratory, creating an environment with well-defined processes for software development and management. In comparison with traditional software engineering laboratories, this proposal allows learning, in practice, of project management activities following quality standards. Also, the students follow a defined and controlled process, which makes it easier for them to understand the activities to be done. It also allows the students to face many problems that are common in enterprises, allowing an interaction among them and a discussion with the teacher about the best alternatives for solution. Finally, the use of this factory allows both a quantitative and a qualitative evaluation of the students.