Enhanced Process Model and Analysis of Risk Integration in Software effort estimation

The development of software within the estimated effort is remaining as a challenging task. The process of effort estimation is a critical activity in a software project, where effort estimates are utilized to arrive at the schedule, resources, and cost. Though many software effort estimation techniques exist, effort overrun occurs in a project. Identification of risks and their consideration in software lifecycle activities play a significant role in the successful execution of a software project. It would be required to account for uncertainty and the key factors that contribute to it. This study focuses on the need to include project risk score in the software effort estimation process to arrive at better effort estimates. This paper depicts the standard and enhanced process frameworks for estimation of software development efforts. A multi-layer perceptron model was built and the results indicated the relevance of considering project risk score in the effort estimation process. The usage of an enhanced gradient boosting technique for predictive modelling revealed a decrease in standard deviation of the residuals, thus indicating a better fit for the effort estimation model through integration of risks.