This paper addresses the issue how the total life cycle cost may be minimized and how the cost should be allocated to the acquirer and developer. This paper differentiates post life cycle change (PLCC) endeavors from PLCC activities, rigorously classifies PLCC endeavors according to the result of PLCC endeavors, and rigorously defines the life cycle cost of a software product. This paper reviews classical definitions of software ‘maintenance’ types and proposes a new typology of PLCC activities too. The proposed classification schemes are exhaustive and mutually exclusive, and provide a new paradigm to review existing literatures regarding software cost estimation, software ‘maintenance,’ software evolution, and software architecture from a new perspective.
This paper argues that the long-term interest of the acquirer is not protected properly because warranty period is typically too short and because the main concern of warranty service is given to removing the defects detected easily. Based on the observation that defects are caused solely by errors the developer has committed for software while defects are often induced by using for hardware (so, this paper cautiously proposes not to use the term ‘maintenance’ at all for software), this paper argues that the cost to remove defects should not be borne by the acquirer for software.