COSMIC Sizing is the modern engineering metric for software work.

Ideal for Agile Development

COSMIC allows you to measure incomplete requirements, and so is ideal for Agile developments where knowledge of requirements evolves and expands over time.

Any type of Software

COSMIC is based on software principles (not rules) and so it is applicable to all types of software. New applications,  applicationn enhancements, mult-tiered architecture, microservices, batch processess, business applications, embedded systems even big data applications.  They can all be sized using the COSMIC sizing methodology.

Any

Fast and free to learn

The method is one of the few ISO standards which is completely free.  

Objective and Valid

A lot of Agile software work is estimated based on the subjective opinions of architects, product owners and software developers.  The reliability of their estimates may vary.  COSMIC looks at the requirements from the user’s perspective and quantifies the data movements associated with each user requirements. This is how it is completely valid and technology independent.

Tired of lengthy debates about how much work is a story point and how many story points can be delivered.   By using CFP alongside existing metrics, you will discover that you can rely on the CFP size being more valid than most engineering estimates.

Un-gameable – ideal for vendor management

Story Points are a team-specific subjective guesses for size,  this means that they are inconsistent and can be increased or decreased to any number based on a subjective opinion.  CFP are ideal for independently assessing the size of outsourced developments.

Ideal for Benchmarking Productivity

If you want to determine the output of a dev team and perhaps compare them with another team.  Adopting CFP is your best approach.

Great for Scaled Agile

Comparing the work of one team over another is essential in (multi-team) “scaled” agile.  Story points are the most commonly used size approximation and yet they are inconsistent and highly subjective between teams.  CFP however, are valid, consistent, and objective.  Now with automation CFP sizing is faster and less time-consuming than story point estimation.

It’s not just about Size

If you know the functional size of a software endeavour you can use that to:

Manage scope with using the CFP size.

Manage resources via the CFP size (e.g. work allocation)

Manage schedule (based on productivity in CFP / month)

Manage quality (based on defects found and fixed per CFP)

Whilst you cannot directly control project risk using CFP,  knowing the CFP helps you manage the other 4 dimensions more effectively and so, you will inherently reduce internal risk of the project.

Learn more about this FREE ISO standard for measuring software size at Cosmic-sizing.org