Software Quality Assurance SE 3354

Software Quality Assurance What is “quality”?

Software Quality Assurance What is “quality”? IEEE Glossary: Degree to which a system, component, or process meets (1) specified requirements, and (2) customer or user needs or expectations

Software Quality Assurance What is “quality”? IEEE Glossary: Degree to which a system, component, or process meets (1) specified requirements, and (2) customer or user needs or expectations ISO: the totality of features and characteristics of a product or service that bear on its ability to satisfy specified or implied needs

Software Quality Assurance An alternate view of Quality: –is not absolute –is multidimensional, can be difficult to quantify –has aspects that are not easy to measure –assessment is subject to constraints (e.g., cost) –is about acceptable compromises –criteria are not independent, can conflict

Software Quality Assurance Quality Criteria include: –correctness –efficiency –flexibility –integrity –interoperability –maintainability –portability –reliability –reusability –testability –usability

What is Software Quality Assurance (SQA)? “Set of systematic activities providing evidence of the ability of the software process to produce a software product that is fit to use” –G. Schulmeyer and J. McManus, Software Quality Handbook, Prentice Hall, 1998.

What is SQA? Monitoring processes and products throughout the software development lifecycle to ensure the quality of the delivered product(s) Monitoring the processes –Provides management with objective feedback regarding process compliance to approved plans, procedures, standards, and analyses Monitoring the products –Focus on the quality of product within each phase of the SDLC e.g., requirements, test plan, architecture, etc. –Objective: identify and remove defects throughout the lifecycle, as early as possible

Quality of Software developed in-house & COTS components SQA processes apply when integrating purchased or customer-supplied software products into the developed product Question. How do you determine the “quality” of COTS components? –Current research problem

Process Assessment Use of standards and process models has a positive impact on the quality of the software product –Disciplined, controlled development process Examples include: –ISO 9001 –CMM CMU SEI, 5 levels –SPICE Developing a standard for software process assessment ISO joint committee, Europe, Australia –IEEE 1074, IEEE 12207

Product Assessment Reviews, inspections, walkthroughs of Plans, reports, models, standards –Project management, quality assurance, training, test plan(s) –Requirements, analysis, architecture, detailed design model, test cases –Issue or problem reports –Metric reports –Traceability reports –Documentation, coding standards –…

Software Reviews They may include managerial reviews, acquirer-supplier reviews, technical reviews, inspections, walkthroughs, and audits. Inspection: –A formal evaluation technique in which an artifact (e.g., software requirements, design, or code) is examined in detail by a person or group other than the originator –detect faults, violations of development standards, and other problems. –review members are peers (equals) of the designer or programmer. –data is collected during inspections for later analysis and to assist in future inspections. Note –Introduced by Fagan, 1976.

Picture from “Inspections” presentation

Problem Reporting, Tracking, and Resolving Describe the practices and procedures to be followed for reporting, tracking, and resolving problems –Who can report a problem? –How is it reported? –How is is tracked? –Who determines if it is a problem that going to be resolved? –How is it assigned for resolution? –How does the person indicate it has been corrected? –Who reviews it to determine if it can be closed? Problems can be product or process related –e.g. incorrect requirement, incomplete class definition, code defect, ambiguous description in user documentation, process to review detailed design is not clearly defined, etc.

Metrics Metrics for each artifact e.g., Requirements –Number of requirements –Number of changes per requirement Called “churn” rate –Characterization of defects Not testable, ambiguous, inconsistent, incorrect, incomplete redundant, infeasible, … Major or minor defect Phase defect detected Cost to fix

Tools, techniques, training What tools? –e.g., CVS for CM, excel spreadsheet for problem reporting/tracking,... What techniques? –e.g., formal peer review for deliverables, checklists for defect detection,... What training is needed on tools, techniques?

Media Control Identify the media for each intermediate and deliverable artifact Documentation required to store the media, including the backup and restore process Protect computer program physical media from: – unauthorized access –inadvertent damage –degradation

References Fagan, M., “Design and Code Inspections to Reduce Errors in Program Development”, IBM Systems Journal, 15, 3 (1976), pp Fagan, M., “Advances in Software Inspections”, IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering, 12, 7(July 1986), pp Schulmeyer G. and McManus, J., Software Quality Handbook, Prentice Hall, IEEE Std 730™ 2002, IEEE Standard for Software Quality Assurance Plans, IEEE Computer Society, Sponsored by the Software Engineering Standards Committee Rosenberg, L.H.; Gallo, A.M., Jr., “Software quality assurance engineering at NASA”, Proceedings of the IEEE Aerospace Conference, 2002, Volume: 5, 2002, pp “Inspections”,