The guide to the Software Engineering Body of Knowledge

The authors-who represent the project's editorial team-discuss the three-phase plan to characterize a body of knowledge, a vital step toward developing software engineering as a profession.

Abstract

fession. OBJECTIVES AND AUDIENCE The SWEBOK project team established the project with five objectives: 1. Characterize the contents of the software engineering discipline. 2. Provide topical access to the software engineering body of knowledge. 3. Promote a consistent view of software engineering worldwide. 4. Clarify the place---and set the boundary---of software engineering with respect to other disciplines such as computer science, project management, computer engineering, and mathematics. 5. Provide a foundation for curriculum development and individual certification material. The product of the SWEBOK project will not be the body of knowledge itself, but rather a guide to it. The knowledge already exists; our goal is to gain consensus on the core subset of knowledge characterizing the software engineering discipline. To achieve these goals, we oriented the project toward a variety of audiences. It aims to serve public and private organizations in need of a consistent view