A new research agenda for tool integration

This article highlights tool integration within software engineering environments. Tool integration concerns the techniques used to form coalitions of tools that provide an environment supporting some, or all, activities within a software engineering process. These techniques have been used to create environments that attempt to address aspects of software development, with varying success. This article provides a timely analysis and review of many of the significant projects in the field and, combined with evidence collected from industry, concludes by proposing an empirical manifesto for future research, where we see the need for work to justify tool integration efforts in terms of relevant socio-economic indicators.