Ian Sommerville was a lecturer in Computer Science at
Heriot-Watt University in
Edinburgh,
Scotland from 1975 to 1978 and at
Strathclyde University, Glasgow from 1978 to 1986. From 1986 to 2006, he was Professor of Software Engineering in the Computing Department at the
University of Lancaster, and in April 2006 he joined the School of Computer Science at St Andrews University, where he taught courses in advanced software engineering and critical
systems engineering. He retired in January 2014 and since continues to do software-related things that he finds interesting. Ian Sommerville's research work, partly funded by the
EPSRC has included systems
requirements engineering and system evolution. He defined the process of
Construction by configuration (CbC). A major focus has been
system dependability, including the use of
social analysis techniques such as
ethnography to better understand how people and computers deliver dependability. He was a partner in the DIRC (Interdisciplinary Research Collaboration in Dependability) consortium, which focused on dependable systems design and is now (2006) working on the related INDEED (Interdisciplinary Design and Evaluation of Dependability) project. He has also been a member of the board of advisors to the IEEE SWEBOK project. He has worked on a number of European projects involving collaboration between academia and commercial enterprises, such as the
ESPRIT project REAIMS (Requirements Engineering adaptation and improvement for safety and dependability). ==Public activities==