Toward collaborative software processes

"Integration" takes on many meanings in a software engineering context. Much progress has been made in the integration of tools available to a software engineer. Now the integration also encompasses the integration of software engineering teams. This paper presents an evolutionary view of software integration that includes the tool integration and the collaboration aspects of a fully integrated software engineering team. An example of a tool set integrated with a collaborative software process is presented. This example can serve as a starting point in the discussion of how process-centered software development environments can best be integrated with the collaborative tools that are emerging from computer-supported cooperative work research.