A Product Line is a set of products with common elements and variable features.
Including Product Lines in an overall development strategy tailored to the commercial and/or
industrial context delivers significant benefits: products that are more suitable, reduction in
cost, shorter development timescales, quality improvement, etc.
This work, Systems Product Line Engineering, brings together a summary of the state-of-the-art
with lessons learnt from industrial experience in implementing Product Lines of
various kinds, in terms of marketplace, number of applications, degree of variability, etc. It
is resolutely practical, and is intended to complement existing Systems Engineering manuals;
indeed, it adopts the same process structures. It includes:
- Definitions and examples: Product Line, Product Lines organizations, Product Line
Engineering,
- Processes, from needs analysis through to disposal,
- Systems Engineering methods, particularly Model-Based Product Line Systems Engineering,
- Organization: development in silos, development in platforms,
- Implementation strategies and management processes.
This work is intended for practitioners: engineers, project managers, instructors, researchers,
students and developments of systems that fit into this approach.