Social and Ethical Issues Rights and responsibilities of Software Developers.

Introduction  Software developers have both rights and responsibilities when developing software.  They have the right to be acknowledged and compensated for any work performed, and they have the responsibility to create a high quality product.

Rights of Software Developers

Rights  Copyright protection  Acknowledgment for work performed  Financial Compensation.

Copyright Protection  International laws apply to the copyright of created work such as software.  These laws are designed to protect the author of the work.  They try to prevent other people from illegally copying their work by issuing penalties such as fines and jail sentences.

Acknowledgment  If an author has contributed in any way to the development of software, they have the right to be acknowledged in some way for their work.  Usually financial, and name recognition.

Financial compensation  To encourage the development of new software, developers have the right to expect financial compensation for their work.

Responsibilities of Software Developers

Responsibilities  Authorship  Reliability  Quality  Response to problems  Code of conduct  Viruses.

Authorship  All contributors to the development of a piece of software need to be acknowledged.  If code has been outsourced or acquired elsewhere, the original authors need to be compensated in some way.

Reliability  Factors that may affect the reliability of a product include: –Hardware –Operating System –Other software –Run time errors

Reliability - Hardware  Software should be able to run on different hardware configurations, therefore it should be tested on different configurations.  Developers have a responsibility to perform this testing.

Reliability - Operating Systems  New software products should be compatible with various operating systems, and should not change default settings.  Again, thorough testing with different operating systems should be performed by the developer.

Reliability - Other Software  New software should not affect or be affected by other software applications.

Reliability - Run time errors  Error checking and detection modules should be a standard part of code. These prevent or recover an application from crashing.  An automatic save module should be implemented in the case of a ‘fatal error’  Thorough checking for errors is a major responsibility.

Quality  Quality Assurance departments are a major component of software development organisations.  They are used to ensure that a software product meets or exceeds user expectations.

Quality  Factors that can affect quality include: –Correctness –Reliability –Efficiency –Integrity –Useability –Maintainability –Flexibility –Testability –Portability –Re-useability –Interoperability

Response to problems  Customer service  Help Desks  Technical support  Identification and resolution of errors are all responsibilities of developers.

Code of Conduct  A Software Developers ‘Code of Conduct’ is a set of standards to which developers agree to abide by. (Example page 11 Davis).  It is the responsibility of individual developers to adhere to this code of conduct.

Viruses  It is a major responsibility of developers to ensure that viruses are not spread as a result of their product.  Policies should be in place to enforce this.

Activity  For each responsibility identified, outline a method that can be used to ensure the software developers responsibilities are maintained.