Groupware support tools for collaborative software engineering

This paper describes a software engineering support environment to facilitate software development and testing using globally distributed teams. The construction of this support environment, known as the GWSE (Global Working in Software Engineering) system, has been based upon Lotus Notes, which has provided a flexible and extensible data repository. Software configuration management and project management facilities are incorporated into the GWSE system by integrating existing tools with the Notes repository. The architecture and design of the GWSE system is presented, and a brief account of its use in a project is given.