Abstract
Background: The International Software Benchmarking
Standards Group (ISBSG) dataset makes it possible to estimate a
projects size, effort, duration, and cost.
Aim: The aim was to analyze the ISBSG variables that have been
used by researchers for software effort estimation from 2000,
when the first papers were published, until the end of 2013.
Method: A systematic mapping review was applied to over 167
papers obtained after the filtering process. From these, it was
found that 133 papers produce effort estimation and only 107 list
the independent variables used in the effort estimation models.
Results: Seventy-one out of 118 ISBSG variables have been used
at least once. There is a group of 20 variables that appear in more
than 50% of the papers and include Functional Size (62%),
Development Type (58%), Language Type (53%), and
Development Platform (52%) following ISBSG
recommendations. Sizing and Size attributes altogether represent
the most relevant group along with Project attributes that includes
24 technical features of the project and the development platform.
All in all, variables that have more missing values are used less
frequently.
Conclusions: This work presents a snapshot of the existing usage
of ISBSG variables in software development estimation.
Moreover, some insights are provided to guide future studies.
