Unicase – an Ecosystem for Unified Software Engineering Research Tools

Many research approaches aiming at control and mitigation of risks in global software development (GSD) are based on tool support. Following a rigorous research approach these tools need to be evaluated and therefore implemented. Existing tools lack support for research requirements. As a consequence researchers often have to build their own solution from scratch. This is a time consuming task associated with the risk of failure. This paper proposes a platform called unicase. The goal of unicase is to support researchers in building tools for evaluation of research approaches in GSD. Unicase is based on Eclipse technology and helps the researcher in the evaluation of tool-supported approaches to GSD including approaches to risk management.