ABSTRACT
In many industries, building large products is not the same as building small products. Consider the differences in specialization and methods required to build a rowboat versus building an 80,000 ton cruise ship. But a large modern cruise ship requires more than 350 workers including many specialists such as pipe fitters, electricians, steel workers, painters, and even interior decorators and a few fine artists. A small project of 100 function points might have three occupation groups and perform eight activities: that results in 24 combinations that need to be predicted or measured. A large system of 10,000 function points might have 20 occupation groups and perform 25 activities. This results in a total of 500 combinations that need to be predicted or measured. Even worse, some activities require many occupation groups, whereas others require only a few or even one. The total permutations can run into the billions of potential combinations.
