Software Development Effort Estimation: A Review

Software development effort estimation is the process of calculating the effort required to develop or maintain software based on the input, which is partial, tentative and/or strident. Efficient project estimation is one of the most difficult and significant activities in project development. “Effort Estimation” is supposed to be fateful because of infrequency, uniqueness, underestimation bias and different goals. Effort estimates may be useful as input to software development plans, repatriation plans, finances, and asset analyses, setting a price and bidding rounds. However, the measurement of estimation effort is a very tedious task. This paper provides a general overview of software effort estimation methods including the recent advances in the field. The aim of this paper is to explain all the existing effort estimation methods and the recent estimation techniques in the area of software development. The primary conclusion is that no single technique is best for all circumstances, and that a vigilant evaluation of the outcomes of several approaches is most likely to produce realistic estimates. Keywords— COCOMO, Wideband Delphi, Function Point, Fuzzy Logic, Genetic Programming