Software maintenance: analysis of estimates based on requirement specification in the context of new technologies, a case study

Making estimations in areas for which there is no previous experience is a difficult task, and even more so if its performance requires a historical data base (which does not yet exist). The problems involved in making estimates of developments for which very limited historical data are available (as is the case of new technologies) were taken into account in the present study of estimation inaccuracy. This study focuses on the crucial question of the specification of requirements, with regard to their application in the field of new technologies. Our estimation is based on the metrics of function points, which enable us to carry out a study without requiring prior information and which is perfectly compatible with the field of the measuring point, as mentioned in the new version of the COCOMO model.