Institute Name: Politecnico di Milano, Department of Electronics and Information
Description: The Politecnico di Milano is a large State University in Northern Italy offering engineering and architecture undergraduate and postgraduate degrees(includings doctorates). The Politecnico di Milano has approximately 1600 persons as staff, including about 900 professors and 700 administrative and technical persons. It has approximately 27,000 engineering students and a total of 45,000 students.
The Department of Electronics and Information has approximately a staff of 100 professors, assistants, and researchers, in addition to technical support persons. Activities mainly concern the areas of electronics, communications, systems theory and control, and computer science. Results of the research work in the department are widely published and well-know at international level. The Politecnico di Milano will participate this project with the Database and Information Systems group of the Computer Engineering section of the Department of Electronics and Information.
The Database and Information Systems group has been working on information systems design and design support tools, conceptual modeling and reuse, office modeling, distributed database design, active database technology, temporal databases, for several years. It has participated in several national and international projects, including the following ESPRIT Projects: - TODOS (Automatic TOls for Designing Office Systems), ESPRIT I, 1986-88, responsible Prof. G. Bracchi - EQUATOR (An environment for Qualitative and Temporal Reasoning), ESPRIT II, 1989-90, responsible Prof. B. Pernici - ITHACA (An integrated environment to highly advanced computer Applications), ESPRIT II, 1989-92, responsibles Prof. B. Pernici (1989-90) and Prof. G. Bracchi (1991-92); in 1991-92 Prof. B. Pernici lead the ITHACA group at University of Udine - F3 (From Fuzzy To Formal), ESPRIT 3, 1992-94, lead by Prof. De Antonellis - IDEA (Intelligent Database Environment for Advanced Applications), ESPRIT 3, 1992-now, lead by Prof. S. Ceri.
The roots of the software engineering group are in the field of programming languages and compiler construction, where the founding membersof the group performed their research activity in the early 70s. Later, a number of typical emerging fields of software engineering became the object of investigation, although the original topics remained active. Initial work focused on the construction of advanced environments for software design. The crucial role of the early phases of software development was soon realized and attention shifted towards formal methods for requirement specification. In this field, particular attention was paid to the case of real-time systems. The group became also involved in the areas of software processes (i.e., modeling, analysis, and execution support for the process of software development) and software metrics (i.e., the quantitative measuring of software qualities). More recently, the group decided to become strategically involved in the area of network computing. Network applications are presently exploding, but there is a complete lack of adequate development tools and methodologies. As a result, the applications that are being developed are often unreliable and their future maintenance is likely to be very difficult and costly. The research areas addressed by the group cover web development tools and methodologies, languages and design support for mobile code applications, with special attention to agent technology. The software engineering group has well established international connections, both within Europe and with North and South America. It has been involved in many European projects such as: IPTES (ESPRIT project), IDERS (ESPRIT project), Goodstep (ESPRIT project), CEMP (ESSI project ELSA), Promoter (ESPRIT Working Group), ASMICS (ESPRIT Basic Research Working Group). Moreover the group is involved in several international cooperations with other academic institutions such as: Purdue University, University of California Santa Barbara, University of Maryland, and Universidad Nacional de La Plata (Argentina).
Researchers associated with the project:
Prof. C. Ghezzi, Prof. B. Pernici, Prof. Fabio A. Schreiber, full professor Prof. Mariagrazia Fugini, full professor Prof V. De Antonellis, associate professor Prof. A. Fuggetta, associate professor Dr. Silvana Castano, research associate Ms. Chiara Francalanci, PhD student
Brief CVs of Key Researchers:
Name: Prof. C. Ghezzi
Nationality: Italian
Academic Quaifications: Carlo Ghezzi received his Dr.Eng. degree in Electrical Engineering from Politecnico di Milano, where he is now a Professor of Software Engineering. Prior to that, he taught at the Universities of Padova (Italy) and North Carolina at Chapel Hill (USA). He also spent sabbatical periods in the USA at UCLA and UCSB and in Argentina at ESLAI.
Ghezzi's research interests are in software engineering-requirements specification, support environments, real-time systems, formal process modeling, software architectures, human-centered systems-and programming languages. He has co-authored over than100 scientific papers and 8 books. He has been the Program Chair of the 2nd European Software Engineering Conference (ESEC-2), Program Co-Chair of the 6th IEEE Workshop on Software Specification and Design, Program Co-chair of the 14th Int.l Conference on Software Engineering (ICSE-14), and Program Chair of the 9th Int.l Software Process Workshop (ISPW-9). He is a member of the editorial board of IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering, Trends in Software, Software Process Improvement and Practice, Theory and Practice of Object Systems.
Name: Prof. Barbara Pernici
Nationality: Italian
Academic Qualifications & Experience: Barbara Pernici is full professor of Computer Science at the Politecnico di Milano
Selected publications:
S. Castano, V. De Antonellis, M.G.Fugini, B. Pernici, ``Conceptual Schema Analysis: Techniques and Applications'', accepted for publication on ACM Transactions on Database Systems, 1997
C. Batini, S. Castano, V. De Antonellis, M.G.Fugini, B. Pernici, ``Analysis of an Inventory of Information Systems in the Public Administration'', Requirements Engineering Journal, Springer Verlag Publ., vol.1, n. 1, 1996
R. Bellinzona, M.G. Fugini, B. Pernici, ``Reusing Specifications in O-O Applications'', IEEE Software, Vol. 12, N. 2, March 1995, Special Issue on Development Tools
V. Brusoni, L, Console, B. Pernici, P. Terenziani, "LaTeR: An efficient, general purpose manager of temporal information", accepted for publication on IEEE Software, 1997
Casati F., Ceri S., Pernici B., Pozzi G., ``Workflow Evolution'', accepted for publication on Data and Knowledge Engineering Journal, 1997.
V. De Antonellis, B. Pernici, Reusing specifications through refinement levels, Data and Knowledge Engineering, vol. 15, 1995, pp. 109-133
C.S. Jensen et al. (incl. B. Pernici), A consensus glossary of temporal database concepts, SIGMOD Record, March 1994, pp. 52-64
N. Pissinou, R. Snodgrass, R. Elmasri, I. Mumick, M. T. Oszu, B. Pernici, A. Segev, B. Theodoulidis, Towards an infrastructure for temporal databases - A workshop report, SIGMOD Record, March 1994, pp. 35-52
A. Montanari, E. Peressi, B. Pernici, Object migration in temporal object-oriented databases, Informatica, Vol. 18, 1994, pp. 467-484
Casati F., Ceri S., Pernici B., Pozzi G., Conceptual WorkFlow Modeling, in Proc. of OOER'95, Int. Conf. on Object-Oriented and Entity-Relationship, Goldcoast, Australia, 1995
Casati F., Ceri S., Pernici B., Pozzi G., Semantic WorkFlow Interoperability, in Proc. of EDBT96, Int. Conf. on Extending DataBase Technology, Avignon, France, 1996
Casati F., Ceri S., Pernici B., Pozzi G., Deriving Active Rules for WorkFlow Enactment., in Proc. of DEXA96 Int. Conf., Zurich, Switzerland, 1996
Casati F., Ceri S., Pernici B., Pozzi G., WorkFlow Evolution, in Proc. of ER96 - 15th International Conference on Conceptual Modeling, Cottbus, Germany, October 1996.
V. Brusoni, L. Console, B. Pernici, P. Terenziani, Extending temporal relational databases to deal with imprecise and qualitative temporal information, Intl. Workshop on Temporal Databases, Zurich, Sept. 1995, in Recent Advances in Temporal Databases, J. Clifford and A. Tuzhilin (eds.), Springer, 1995
N. Edelweiss, J. Palazzo de Oliveira, J. Volkmer de Castilho, E. Peressi, A. Montanari, B. Pernici, T-ORM: Temporal aspects in objects and roles, ORM-1 Intl. Conference, Magnetic Islands, Australia, July 1994
V. Brusoni, L. Console, P. Terenziani, B. Pernici, Answering queries efficiently in heterogeneous temporal knowledge bases, ECAI Workshop "Algorithms, complexity, and common-sense reasoning", Amsterdam,Aug. 1994
N. Edelweiss, J. Palazzo de Oliveira, B. Pernici, An object-oriented approach to a temporal query language, Int. Conf. DEXA'94, Lecture Notes in Computer Science, Springer-Verlag, Atene, Sept. 1994
S. Castano, V. De Antonellis, C. Francalanci, B. Pernici, A reusability-based comparison of requirement specification methodologies, IFIP WG 8.1 CRIS T94 Conference on Methods and Associated Tools for the Information System Life-Cycle, Maastricht, Sept. 1994
E. Peressi, A. Montanari, B. Pernici, T-ORM: evolving objects and roles, 4th Intl. Working Conf. on Dynamic Modeling and Information Systems, Noordwijkerhout, The Netherlands, Sept. 1994
B. Pernici, Requirements: how to organize them for reuse, position paper, Dagstuhl Seminar on System Requirements Analysis: Management and Exploitation, Dagstuhl, ott. 1994
R. Bellinzona, S. Castano, V. De Antonellis, M.G.Fugini, B Pernici, ``Requirements Reuse in the F3 Project'', Information Systems Engineering AFCET/HERMESPubl. vol.2, pp.699-717, (Invited Paper)
C. Francalanci, M.G. Fugini, B. Pernici.``Structuring requirements: existing approaches and automatic support'' Proc. IEEE Conf. on Systems, Man and Cybernetics, San Antonio, Texas, October 1994
C. Batini, S. Castano, B. Pernici, ``Reuse at the Conceptual Design Level: Models, Methods, and Tools'', documentation of the tutorial presentated at the ER'96 - 15th International Conference on Conceptual Modeling, Cottbus, Germany, October 1996.
S. Castano, V. De Antonellis, B. Pernici, ``Building Reusable Components in the Public Administration Domain'', in Proc. SSR'95 ACM-SIGSOFT Symposium on Software Reusability}, in conjunction with International Conference on Software Engineering ICSE-17, M. Samadzadeh, M. Zand (Eds.), Seattle, USA, April 1995.
C. Ghezzi, M. Jazayeri, Programming Language Concepts, 3rd Edition, J. Wiley and Sons, 1997
G. Cugola, C. Ghezzi, G.P. Picco, G. Vigna "Analyzing Mobile Code Languages", in Mobile Object Systems: Towards the Programmable Internet, Jan Vitek and Christian Tschudin, eds., Lecture Notes on Computer Science, Springer Verlag, April 1997.
A. Coen-Porisini, C. Ghezzi, R.A. Kemmerer, "Specification of Realtime Systems Using ASTRAL", IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering, September 1997.
G. Cugola, C. Ghezzi, G.P. Picco, G. Vigna, "A Characterization of Mobility and State Distribution in Mobile Code Languages", in Proceedings pf the 2nd ECOOP Workshop on Mobile Object Systems, July 1996.
C. Ghezzi and G. Vigna, "Mobile Code Paradigms and Technologies: A Case Study", Proceedings of the First International Workshop on Mobile Agents 97 (MA'97), Berlin, Germany, 7-8 April 1997.
G. Cugola and C. Ghezzi, "CJava: Introducing Concurrent Objects in Java", Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Object-Oriented Information Systems (OOIS'97), Brisbane, Australia, 10-12 November 1997.
C. Francalanci and A. Fuggetta. Integrating conflicting requirement in process modeling: a survey and research directions'', Information & Software Technology, Volume 39(3), 1997
V. Ambriola, R. Conradi, and A. Fuggetta, ``Assessing Process-Centered Software Engineering Environments'', ACM Transactions on Software Engineering Methodology, July 1997.
G. Cugola, P. Fusaro, A. Fuggetta, L. Lavazza, S. Manca, M.R. Pagone, G. Ruhe, and R. Soro, ``An application of Goal-Oriented Measurement to the Evaluation of the Impact of Configuration Management'', in Proceedings of the Fourth International Symposium on Software Metrics, Albuquerque, New Mexico (USA), November 1997.
A. Fuggetta, ``Functionality and architecture of PSEEs'' Information & Software Technology ,Volume 38 No. 4, April 1996.
G. Cugola, E. Di Nitto, A. Fuggetta, C. Ghezzi, ``A framework for formalizing inconsistencies and deviations in human-centered systems'', ACM Transactions on Software Engineering Methodology, July 1996.
S. Bandinelli, E. Di Nitto, and A. Fuggetta, ``Supporting Cooperation in the SPADE-1 Environment'', IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering , Vol.22, No. 12, December 1996.
A. Fuggetta and A. Wolf, eds, Trends in software process. J. Wiley, 1996.
E. Di Nitto and A. Fuggetta, ``Product families: what are the issues?'', in Proceedings of the 10th International Software Process Workshop, France, June 1996.
C. Basile, S. Calanna, E. Di Nitto, A. Fuggetta and C. Gemo, ``Mechanisms and policies for Federated PSEEs: an initial experience'', in Proceedings of Fifth European Workshop on Software Process Technology, Nancy (France), October 1996.
G. Cugola, C. Ghezzi, G.P. Picco, G. Vigna, "A Characterization of Mobility and State Distribution in Mobile Code Languages", in Proceedings of the 2nd ECOOP Workshop on Mobile Object Systems, July 1996.
F. Cattaneo, A. Fuggetta, and L. Lavazza, ``An experience in process assessment'', In Proceedings of the 17th International Conference on Software Engineering-ICSE 17, Seattle (USA), May 1995.
G. Cugola, E. Di Nitto, C. Ghezzi, M. Mantione, "How To Deal With Deviations During Process Model Enactment", Proceedings 17th International Conference on Software Engineering, Seattle, WA, May 1995.
E. Di Nitto and A. Fuggetta, ``Integrating process technology and CSCW'', In Proceedings of Fourth European Workshop on Software Process Technology, Leiden (the Netherlands), April 1995.
E. Di Nitto and A. Fuggetta, ``In quest of the perfect metrics'', in Proceedings of the International Workshop on Evaluation Criteria for Multimedia Applications, San Francisco, November 1995.
A. Fuggetta and G.P. Picco, ``An annotated bibliography on software process improvement'', in ACM SIGSOFT Software Engineering Notes , July 1994.
S. Bandinelli, A. Fuggetta, L. Lavazza, M. Loi, and G.P. Picco, ``Modelling and improving an industrial software process'', IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering , May 1995.
S. Bandinelli, L. Baresi, A. Fuggetta, and L. Lavazza, ``Experiences in building the SPADE repository using OO technology'', Theory and Applications of Object-oriented Systems , J. Wiley, June 1995.
A. Fuggetta and C. Ghezzi, ``State of the art and open issues in PSEEs'', Journal of Systems and Software , Vol. 26, No. 1, July 1994.
A. Celentano, M.G.Fugini, S. Pozzi. ``Knowledge Based Document Retrieval in Office Environments: the Kabiria System'', ACM Transactions on Information Systems, vol. 13, n.3, July 1995, pp. 237-268
S. Faustle, M.G.Fugini, E. Damiani.``Retrieval of reusable components using functional similarity'', Software Practice & Experience, Wiley & Sons Publ., 1996 vol.26, n. 5, pp.491-530
E. Damiani, M.G. Fugini, ``Design and Code Reuse Based on Fuzzy Classification of Components'' ACM SIG-APP Applied Computing Review, vol. 4, n.2, Fall 1996
S. Castano, M.G. Fugini, G. Martella, P. Samarati, Database Security, Addison-Wesley Int. Publ., 1995
E. Damiani, M.G. Fugini,``Automatic thesaurus construction supporting fuzzy retrieval of reusable components'', Proc. 10th ACM Annual Symposium on Applied Computing (SAC'95) Nashville, February 1995
E.Damiani, M.G. Fugini, ``Fuzzy techniques for software reuse'', Proc. 11th ACM Annual Symposium on Applied Computing, (SAC'96),} Nashville, February 1996 (Invited Paper)
S. Castano, M.G. Fugini, `` Deriving authorizations from process analysis in legacy information systems'', in Proc. IFIPSEC'97 Security Conference 1997, Copenhagen, May 1997
E. Damiani, M.G. Fugini, ``Fuzzy identification of distributed components'', Position Paper, 5th Intl. Conference Fuzzy Days, Dotmund, March 1997, apparira^R in LNCS
E. Damiani, M.G. Fugini, E.Fusaschi, ``A descriptor-based approach to OO code reuse", IEEE Computer, October 1997
S. Castano, S. De Capitani di Vimercati, M.G. Fugini `` Automated derivation of global authorizations for database federations'', Journal of Computer Security, Vol.5, N.4, 1997 (to appear)
E. Damiani, A. Formica,M.G. Fugini, M.Missikoff, R. Pizzicannella, ``Reusing analysis schemas in ODB applications: a chart based approach'', Proc. ACM ADBIS^R97 (Advances in Databases and Information Systems) Conf., San Pietroburgo, September 1997 (to appear in LNCS).
S. Castano, V. De Antonellis, ``Engineering a Library of Reusable Conceptual Components'', Information and Software Technology, n.39, 1997.
S. Castano, G. Martella, P. Samarati, ``Analysis, Comparison, and Design of Role-Based Security Specifications'', Data and Knowledge Engineering, n.21,1997.
S. Castano, V. De Antonellis, ``Reference Conceptual Architectures for Re-engineering Information Systems'', International Journal of Cooperative Information Systems, Vol.4, Nos.2&3, World Scientific Publishing Company, 1995.
V. De Antonellis, S. Castano, L. Vandoni, ``Building Reusable Components Through Project Evolution Analysis'', Information Systems - Special Issue on Advanced Information Systems Engineering, Vol.19, No.3, Pergamon Press, April 1994.
S. Castano, V. De Antonellis, ``The F3 Reuse Environment for Requirements Engineering'', ACM SIGSOFT Software Engineering Notes, Vol.19, No.3, July 1994.
S. Castano, V. De Antonellis, ``A Multi-Perspective Framework for the Analysis of Legacy Information Systems'', in Proc. CAiSE'97, 15th International Conference on Advanced Information Systems Engineering, Barcelona, June 1997, LNCS No.1250, A. Olive` and J.A. Pastor (Eds.), Springer Verlag.
S. Castano, V. De Antonellis, ``Semantic Dictionary Design for Database Interoperability'', in Proc. ICDE'97, 13th International Conference on Data Engineering, Birmingham, UK, April 1997.
S. Castano, V. De Antonellis, B. Pernici, ``Criteria and Metrics for Quantifying Similarity Factors'', in Proc. IPMU'96, Information Processing and Management of Uncertainty in Knowledge-Based Systems, Special Session on Software Reusability, Vol.III, Granada, Spagna, July 1996, Invited Paper.
S. Castano, ``An Approach to Deriving Global Authorizations in Federated Database Systems'', in Proc. Tenth Annual IFIP WG 11.3 Working Conference on Database Security, Como, July 1996, Chapman and Hall.
S. Castano, V. De Antonellis, ``Techniques for Process Analysis and Unification'', in Proc. CAiSE'96, 14th International Conference on Software Engineering Challenges in Modern Information Systems, Creta, Grecia, May 1996, LNCS No.1080, P. Constantopoulos, J. Mylopoulos, Y. Vassiliou (Eds.), Springer Verlag.
S. Castano, V. De Antonellis, ``Reengineering Processes in Public Administrations'',
in Proc. OO-ER'95, International Conference on
Object-Oriented and Entity-Relationship Modeling}, Gold Coast,
Australia, December1994, LNCS No.1021, M. Papazoglou (Ed.), Springer Verlag.
Schreiber F.A., Baiguera M., Bortolotto G., Caglioti V., `` A Study of the Dynamic Behaviour of Some Workload Allocation Algorithms by Means of Catastrophe Theory'', Journal of System Architecture, Vol. 43, n. 9, pp. 605-624, (1997)
Schreiber F.A., Morzenti A., ``Analysis of Techniques in the Assessment of Ultra-Reliable Computerized Systems'', ACM Software Engineering Notes, Vol. 22, n. 2, pp. 87-91, (1997)
Schreiber F.A., Wolfler Calvo R., ``Use of Neural Networks to Estimate the Number of Nodes of an Edge Quadtree'', Graphic Models and Image Processing, Vol. 59, n. 2, pp. 61-72, (1997)
Schreiber F.A., ``About Electronic Libraries'' (letter), Communications of ACM Forum, Vol.38, n. 2, p. 17, (1995) (also published in InformatiK/Informatique, n. 2, 1995)
Schreiber F.A., ``Is Time a Real Time? An Overview of Time Ontology in Informatics'', in W.A. Halang, A.D. Stoyenko (Eds.) - Real Time Computing - Springer Verlag NATO-ASI Vol. F127, pp. 283-307, (1994)
Schreiber F.A., Falleni M.L. ``Analysis of Data Transmission Performance over a GSM Cellular Network'', Proceedings HICSS-30, Maui (Hawai'i) 1997, Vol. 5 pp. 99-108
C. Francalanci, P. Maggiolini, ``Measuring the financial benefits of IT investments on coordination'', accepted for publication on Information Resource Management Journal, Jan. 1997
C. Francalanci, R. Nolan, D. Stoddard, ``State Street Boston Corporation: Leading with Information Technology'', Harvard Business School Case Study n. 9-195-135, in Reengineering the organization, ed. R.L. Nolan, D. B. Stoddard, T. Davenport, S. Jarvenpaa, Harvard Business School Publishing, 1995
C. Francalanci, E. Martin, R. Nolan, D. Stoddard, ``CIGNA Porperty and Casualty Reengineering-(A)'', Harvard Business School Case Study n. N1-195-228, in Reengineering the organization, ed. R.L. Nolan, D. B. Stoddard, T. Davenport, S. Jarvenpaa, Harvard Business School Publishing, 1995
C. Francalanci, P. Maggiolini, ``Trends of IT investments in Italy'', Proc. of European Conference on Information Systems, ECIS 95, Athens, June 1995
M. Corso, C. Francalanci, P. Maggiolini, ``Information system benefits analysis: a model supporting evaluation at portfolio level'', Proc. of Information Systems Evaluation Workshop, Athens, June 1995
M. Corso, C. Francalanci, P. Maggiolini, ``A resource based approach to strategic planning of information technology'', Proc. of European Conference on Information Systems, ECIS 96, Lisbona, July 1996
G. Bracchi, C. Francalanci, ``A Framework for the Alignment of IT Architectures with Information Processing Requirements of Organizations'', Proc. of Americas Conference on Information Systems, Phoenix, Arizona, Aug. 1996
G. Bracchi, C. Francalanci, ``An information processing approach to the analysis of technical systems'', Proc. of 3rd Systems Science European Congress, Roma, Oct. 1996
G. Bracchi, C. Francalanci, ``A Formal Model for Information Processing
Capacity: Analyzing the Impact of Structural and Information System Choices
on Organizational Performance'', European Conference on Information System,
ECIS 97, Cork (Ireland), June 1997
Contact details:
Links:
Software engineering group http://www.elet.polimi.it/section/compeng/se/
Database and information systems group: http://www.elet.polimi.it/section/compeng/db/
B. Pernici http://www.elet.polimi.it/people/pernici/
Carlo Ghezzi http://www.elet.polimi.it/~ghezzi/
V. De Antonellis http://www.elet.polimi.it/people/deantone/
F. Schreiber http://www.elet.polimi.it/people/schreibe/
M.G. Fugini http://www.elet.polimi.it/people/fugini/
Alfonso Fuggetta http://www.elet.polimi.it/~ghezzi/
S. Castano http://www.elet.polimi.it/people/castano/
C. Francalanci http://www.elet.polimi.it/people/francala/
List of Members