A Generic Software Development Process Refined from Best Practices for Cloud Computing

Cloud computing has emerged as more than just a piece of technology, it is rather a new IT paradigm. The philosophy behind cloud computing shares its view with green computing where computing environments and resources are not as subjects to own but as subjects of sustained use. However, converting currently used IT services to Software as a Service (SaaS) cloud computing environments introduces several new risks. To mitigate such risks, existing software development processes must undergo significant remodeling. This study analyzes actual cases of SaaS cloud computing environment adoption as a way to derive four new best practices for software development and incorporates the identified best practices for currently-in-use processes. Furthermore, this study presents a design for generic software development processes that implement the proposed best practices. The design for the generic process has been applied to reinforce the weak points found in SaaS cloud service development practices used by eight enterprises currently developing or operating actual SaaS cloud computing services. Lastly, this study evaluates the applicability of the proposed <i>SaaS cloud oriented development process</i> through analyzing the feedback data collected from actual application to the development of a SaaS cloud service <i>Astation</i>.