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April took me to Keele University, just outside Manchester, for the Evaluation and Assessment in Software Engineering conference (EASE 2010). I had two papers accepted for publication at this conference. I presented one, and one of my colleagues presented the other.

The paper I presented has been important in shaping my PhD thesis. It compared the priorities placed on aspects of software product quality by employees versus subcontracted developers. This study was not originally planned, but as we had the data from the employees and all of the instruments designed for data collection, it was relatively little work and seemed like it could be interesting. The results were more interesting than we anticipated, and now my thesis is focused at examining the differences in priorities that different groups place on aspects of software product quality.

The other paper was on configuration management of requirements and related materials. This isn’t my area of research, but part of a course I took with two fellow PhD students.

Keele University is set in the English countryside. I was told, quite aptly, to imagine to imagine the set of a BBC murder mystery telemovie.

I spent half a day in Manchester before making my way to Keele.

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Unfortunately the ease of publishing photos to Facebook has meant that I have been neglecting my blog. I am going to try to be more attentive, and decided to start with a general update of what’s going on …

Oziel and I went to Mexico for Christmas with Oziel’s family. We spent the time between Christmas and new year in Chiapas, in the south of Mexico. It was completely different to the other parts of Mexico we have been, with some very stunning nature.

After a brief return to work Oziel and I headed to Australia for Hamish and Elis’ wedding. While in Australia we went to Sydney, Newcastle, the Hunter Valley and Byron Bay. On our way back to Sweden we stopped off in Japan, spending three days around Nagano, and three days in Tokyo with Laz.

My PhD is on track to finish in early 2011. I have created a webpage to keep track of the status of the thesis, and publish what is ready.

On the topic of PhD chapters, I am going to a conference in Keele (near Manchester) in a week to present what will probably be Chapter 6 in my thesis. The conference is Evaluation and Assessment in Software Engineering (EASE).

Oziel and I are training for a half marathon from Copenhagen to Malmö across the Öresund Bridge in June 2010.

Sometime this year we are planning to go to Rome to celebrate our birthdays (which have already passed). We are thinking to avoid the summer, which will most probably mean after the European summer.

October took me to Orlando, Florida for the Empirical Software Engineering and Measurement Conference (ESEM). It is here that I presented a research paper on bringing together different components of software product value.

Prior to departure I checked the weather forecast – minimums of 24 degrees each day, and maximums in the low 30s. Coming from Sweden this could only be described as hot. Upon arrival I was happy with my decision to pack light. I had a heavy jacket to get to the airport, but everything else was summer attire.

The weather during the conference met my expectations – although I was inside windowless air-conditioned rooms all day.

After the conference (Thursday-Friday), I chose to spend the weekend in Orlando before heading back to Sweden. And this is when global warming started to fail me. Saturday I went to Disney World and was quite cool (especially after Splash Mountain), and I started shopping for a jumper after nightfall (but failed to find anything I liked in a size smaller than dooner cover). However, I awoke on Sunday to head to the Kennedy Space Centre to be told by reception that the temperature was the coldest on record in 35 years. It was 10 degrees overnight with 19 as a maximum. Armed only with summer clothes I donned on two t-shirts and headed on my way … past Floridans in scarves, gloves and beanies.

The Kennedy Space Centre was amazing. If you see any job postings for positions of astronaut, please let me know.

The photos are below. I trust you can work out which are from Disney, and which are from the Space Centre.

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Towards the end of the [European] summer I headed to Patras, Greece for the Euromicro conference. I presented a research paper on a method for determining the relative importance of features, quality, intellectual capital, time and cost in the development of software products.

This conference joins two groups – people interested in the software management issues, and people interested in technical hardware issues. I fit into the former group, but in my opinion all of the keynote speakers fitted into the latter group. However, the research paper sessions were much more enjoyable.

I got some great feedback. But as it turns out this is a tangent explored as part of my PhD studies that I will not be exploring further.

I was joined by some of my friends from Blekinge Institute of Technology, who were also at the conference. This helped make for a very nice experience. Especially as one brought her family.

It was lovely to be on the Mediterranean (as you can see from the photos). But the conference and conference related activities were inconveniently placed during the beach-worthy times of day, but I suppose that is not what work paid for. But I did manage to swim before/after the conference each day.

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I completed my licentiate on Friday, 5 June. The next day I was off to Amsterdam for RefsQ – the International Working Conference on Requirements Engineering to present a paper I coauthored with Nina (PDF).

RefsQ would be my favourite conference to date. What makes it different is the amount of time given for discussion (much more than usual). The small environment also made it easier to get to know people.