Software Project Planning involves developing estimates for the work to be performed, establishing the necessary commitments, and defining the plan to perform the work.
The software planning begins with a statement of the work to be performed and other constraints and goals that define and bound the software project (those established by the practices of the Requirements Management key process area). The software planning process includes steps to estimate the size of the software work products and the resources needed, produce a schedule, identify and assess software risks, and negotiate commitments. Iterating through these steps may be necessary to establish the plan for the software project (i.e., the software development plan).
This plan provides the basis for performing and managing the software project's activities and addresses the commitments to the software project's customer according to the resources, constraints, and capabilities of the software project.
The corresponding key practices are described below.
This material has been taken from Paulk et al. [1993a].