Comparative Analysis of AI Models for Effort Estimation in Western and Regional Environments

Abstract

Artificial Intelligence rapidly alters business operations and workflow management strategies these days in various corporate sectors. AI can be effective in calculating the effort required for a software. Figuring that how much time work and resources some project will probably take requires a fairly decent amount of effort and is also one of the most crucial activities of software project management. When an estimate is met the confidence of companies increase and funds can be allocated nicely, ultimately helping in finishing projects quickly. This work evaluates different AI models for estimating software effort accurately in two distinct areas. Western environment encompasses nations such as US and UK, and mostly all developed places including Canada alongside other similar countries. These countries typically possess sophisticated technology and proficient labor with meticulous documentation practices. Regional environment encompasses areas namely South Asia and Africa alongside Middle East which undergo development challenges. These areas often face many problems such as weak digital infrastructure in various sectors and somewhat disorganized data sets which are not very helpful for estimation. Various AI models were tested including Linear Regression, Neural Networks random forest etc. in different areas to determine which ones worked nicely. Three measures were used namely Mean Absolute Error (MAE) Root Mean Squared Error (RMSE) and R² Score to assess AI model efficiency. Better accuracy stems from lower MAE and RMSE values while higher R² scores signify deeper understanding of data patterns. Neural Networks operate more effectively in Western regions owing largely to relatively cleaner data and markedly greater regularity. Random Forests and Decision Trees perform markedly better in regional areas plagued by messy data because they handle such info pretty well. Companies ought to select an AI model suited pretty well to their specific local conditions and the kind of data they possess. Finally in both the environments, that means deploying both the datasets for the environments, it was the hybrid technique that performed the best for predicting the effort of software. The hybrid model used for prediction give the lowest MAE of 0.22 and |RMSE of 0.38 with R2 of 0.9 for the Western regions. Similary even for the regional areas give the lowest MAE and RMSE of 0.4 and 0.55 respectively and R2 of 0.79.