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This module emphasizes software quality engineering as an integral facet of development, from requirements through delivery and maintenance. We will understand how to choose appropriate quality goals and select, plan, and execute quality assurance activities throughout development and evolution to predictably meet quality and schedule goals. We introduce also how quality assurance can be incorporated into process improvement feedback loops that amplify the ability of an organization to cost-effectively prevent and detect faults.

Introduction

What is software quality, and why is it so important that it is pervasive in the Software Engineering Body of Knowledge? Within an information system, software is a tool, and tools have to be selected for quality and for appropriateness. That is the role of equirements. But software is more than a tool. It dictates the performance of the system, and it is therefore important to the system quality.

The notion of “quality” is not as simple as it may seem. For any engineered product, there are many desired qualities relevant to a particular project, to be discussed and determined at the time that the product requirements are determined. Qualities may be present or absent, or may be matters of degree, with tradeoffs among them, with practicality and cost as major considerations. The software engineer has a responsibility to elicit the system’s quality requirements that may not be explicit at the outset and to discuss their importance and the difficulty of attaining them. All processes associated with software quality (e.g. building, checking, improving quality) will be designed with these in mind

and carry costs based on the design. Thus, it is important to have in mind some of the possible attributes of quality.

Various researchers have produced models (usually taxonomic) of software quality characteristics or attributes that can be useful for discussing, planning, and rating the quality of software products. The models often include metrics to “measure” the degree of each quality attribute the product attains.

Usually these metrics may be applied at any of the product levels. They are not always direct measures of the quality characteristics of the finished product, but may be relevant to the achievement of overall quality. Each model may have a different set of attributes at the highest level of the taxonomy, and selection of and definitions for the attributes at all levels may differ. The important point is that the system software requirements define the quality requirements and the definitions of the attributes for them.

Software quality fundamentals

Agreement on quality requirements, as well as clear communication to the software engineer on what constitutes quality, require that the many aspects of quality be formally defined and discussed.

A software engineer should understand the underlying meanings of quality concepts and characteristics and their value to the software under development or to maintenance.

The important concept is that the software requirements define the required quality characteristics of the software and influence the measurement methods and acceptance criteria for assessing these characteristics.

Questions & Answers

A golfer on a fairway is 70 m away from the green, which sits below the level of the fairway by 20 m. If the golfer hits the ball at an angle of 40° with an initial speed of 20 m/s, how close to the green does she come?
Aislinn Reply
cm
tijani
what is titration
John Reply
what is physics
Siyaka Reply
A mouse of mass 200 g falls 100 m down a vertical mine shaft and lands at the bottom with a speed of 8.0 m/s. During its fall, how much work is done on the mouse by air resistance
Jude Reply
Can you compute that for me. Ty
Jude
what is the dimension formula of energy?
David Reply
what is viscosity?
David
what is inorganic
emma Reply
what is chemistry
Youesf Reply
what is inorganic
emma
Chemistry is a branch of science that deals with the study of matter,it composition,it structure and the changes it undergoes
Adjei
please, I'm a physics student and I need help in physics
Adjanou
chemistry could also be understood like the sexual attraction/repulsion of the male and female elements. the reaction varies depending on the energy differences of each given gender. + masculine -female.
Pedro
A ball is thrown straight up.it passes a 2.0m high window 7.50 m off the ground on it path up and takes 1.30 s to go past the window.what was the ball initial velocity
Krampah Reply
2. A sled plus passenger with total mass 50 kg is pulled 20 m across the snow (0.20) at constant velocity by a force directed 25° above the horizontal. Calculate (a) the work of the applied force, (b) the work of friction, and (c) the total work.
Sahid Reply
you have been hired as an espert witness in a court case involving an automobile accident. the accident involved car A of mass 1500kg which crashed into stationary car B of mass 1100kg. the driver of car A applied his brakes 15 m before he skidded and crashed into car B. after the collision, car A s
Samuel Reply
can someone explain to me, an ignorant high school student, why the trend of the graph doesn't follow the fact that the higher frequency a sound wave is, the more power it is, hence, making me think the phons output would follow this general trend?
Joseph Reply
Nevermind i just realied that the graph is the phons output for a person with normal hearing and not just the phons output of the sound waves power, I should read the entire thing next time
Joseph
Follow up question, does anyone know where I can find a graph that accuretly depicts the actual relative "power" output of sound over its frequency instead of just humans hearing
Joseph
"Generation of electrical energy from sound energy | IEEE Conference Publication | IEEE Xplore" ***ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/7150687?reload=true
Ryan
what's motion
Maurice Reply
what are the types of wave
Maurice
answer
Magreth
progressive wave
Magreth
hello friend how are you
Muhammad Reply
fine, how about you?
Mohammed
hi
Mujahid
A string is 3.00 m long with a mass of 5.00 g. The string is held taut with a tension of 500.00 N applied to the string. A pulse is sent down the string. How long does it take the pulse to travel the 3.00 m of the string?
yasuo Reply
Who can show me the full solution in this problem?
Reofrir Reply
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Source:  OpenStax, Software engineering. OpenStax CNX. Jul 29, 2009 Download for free at http://cnx.org/content/col10790/1.1
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