Users' involvement may help respect social and ethical values and improve software quality

摘要

Global informatization brings potential threats. It is possible to reduce them if software developers are aware of those threats and if customers insist on eliminating them. The survey described in the paper shows that future programmers are aware of numerous threats associated with global informatization. Many threats may be reduced by users' involvement in the software process. Software developers should learn and develop cooperation with users, as emphasized in agile methodologies. It is a task for academic teachers to promote collaboration between software authors and users, to show how to organize it, and to convince programmers that it is valuable. Users' involvement requires changes in the software life cycle and in the set of established processes. Such changes, in the form of additionally established processes and phases in the software development cycle, are identified in the paper. One recommended process is the software product assessment intended to elicit feedback from users. Users' involvement may help to respect ethical and social values and to produce software adapted to user expectations.