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÷
 
  ÷  is defined as a planned and systematic approach to the
evaluation of the quality of and adherence to software product standards, processes, and
procedures.

SQA includes the process of assuring that standards and procedures are established and are
followed throughout the software acquisition life cycle. Compliance with agreed-upon
standards and procedures is evaluated through process monitoring, product evaluation, and
audits. Software development and control processes should include quality assurance
approval points, where an SQA evaluation of the product may be done in relation to the
applicable standards.

÷
 
  is an umbrella of activities that is applied throughout the
software process. SQA encompasses the following:

1. A quality management approach

2. Effective software engineering technology (methods and tools)
3. Formal technical reviews that are applied throughout the software process
4. A multi-tiered testing strategy
5. Control of software documentation and the changes made to it.
6. A procedures to assure compliance with the software development standards
7. Measurements and reporting mechanisms
 
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2t¶s not enough to say that software quality is important, you have to:

1. Explicitly define what is meant when you say µsoftware quality¶

2. Create a set of activities that will help insure that every software engineering work
product exhibits high quality.
3. Perform quality assurance activities on every software project.
4. Use metrics to develop strategies for improving your software process, and as a
consequence, improving the quality of the end product.



Probably everyone has an idea about the meaning of K
Yowever, when it comes to
quality in the real world, 2.e. in conjunction with a software development projects,
disagreements between the persons involved often lead further problems. Especially in the
case of costumers complaints about faults in a software product, it seems to be unclear not
only what the requirements are, but also if the software has the right ³characteristics´ with
regard to these requirements.

The discipline of software quality is a planned and systematic set of activities to ensure
quality is built into the software. 2t consists of software quality assurance, software quality
control, and software quality engineering.
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Pertains to the series of inspections, reviews and tests used throughout the development
cycle in ensuring that each work product meets proper requirements placed upon it and a
feedback loop to the process that created the work product.




Covers all activities from design, development, production, installation, servicing and
documentation, this introduced the rule ³fit for purpose´ and ³do it right first time´. 2t
includes the regulation of the quality of row materials, assemblies products and components;
services related to production; and management, production, and inspection processes.

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includes all costs incurred in the pursuit of quality or in performing quality
related activities. Cost of quality studies are conducted to provide a baseline for the current
cost quality, to identify opportunities for reducing the cost of quality, and to provide a
normalized basis of comparison. Quality costs may be divided into costs associated with
internal and external failure, appraisal and prevention.

| Failure costs that arise before your company supplies its
product to the customers. Along with costs of finding and fixing bugs are many
internal failure costs borne by groups outside of Product Development. 2f a bug
blocks someone in your company from doing his/her job, the costs of the wasted
time, the missed milestones, and the overtime to get back onto schedule are all
internal failure costs.

 
|Failure costs that arise after your company supplies the
product to the costumer, such as costumer service costs, or the cost of patching a
released product and distributing the patch. External failure costs are huge. 2t is
much cheaper to fix problems before shipping the defective product to costumers.

!!| Costs of activities designed to find quality problems, such as

code inspections and any type of testing. Design reviews are part prevention and
part appraisal. To the degree that you¶re looking for errors in the proposed design
itself when you do the review, you¶re doing an appraisal. To the degree that you
are looking for ways to strengthen the design, you are doing prevention.

"| Costs of activities that ate specially designed to prevent poor

quality. Examples of ³poor quality´ include coding errors, design errors, mistakes
in the user manuals, as badly documented or unmaintainable complex code.
#"$

V 
 
V Although there have been hundreds of
definitions of term, it all boils down to a simple idea: a company must be
committed to producing a quality product. This commitment must begin at the
top and permeate every level of the company. The commitment must never be
violated, even when other business issues seem to hold sway.

TQM works in the manufacturing and service sector, and there appears to be no
reason why it shouldn¶t help to improve the quality and timeliness of computer
software.

Many TQM programs stress ³zero defects.´ Over the past 30 years, the Japanese
have developed a systematic approach that leads to the elimination of root causes
of product defects.

Although terminology differs across different companies and among different

authors, a basic four-step progression is normally encountered and forms the
foundation of any good TQM program.

1. â

is the first step that refers to a system of continuous process
improvement. 2t¶s goal is to develop a process (in this case, the software
engineering process) that is visible, repeatable and measurable.
±


 is the second step, invoked only after kaizen has been
achieved. 2t¶s step examines intangibles that inadvertently affect the process that
works to optimize the impact of the process.

3. The 

and



 focus on the process, while the next step,
software). By analyzing the way user applies the product, Kansei often leads to
improvement in the product itself, and probably, to the process that created it.

4. The last step is called    

  it broadens management concern
beyond the immediate product. The business-oriented step that seeks for
opportunity in related areas where in it can be identified in observing the use of
the products. 2n the world of software, miryokuteki hinshitsu can be considered
as an attempt in uncovering new and profitable products or applications that were
considered as an outgrowth from an existing computer-based system.
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The ?  
÷
 

  is to provide management with appropriate
visibility into the process being used by the software project and of the products being built.

Software Quality Assurance involves reviewing and auditing the software products and
activities to verify that they comply with applicable procedures and standards and providing
the software project and other appropriate managers with the results of these reviews and
audits.





 
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()*"is an SQA activity that assures standards are being followed. 2deally,
the first products monitored by SQA should be the project¶s standards and procedures. SQA
assures that clear and achievable standards exist band then evaluates compliance of the
software product to the established standards. Product evaluation assures that the software
product reflects the requirements of the applicable standard(s) as identified in the
Management Plan.

+)$,is an SQA activity that ensures that appropriate steps to carry out the
process are being followed. SQA monitors processes by comparing the actual steps carried
out with those in the documented procedures. The Assurance section of the Management
Plan specifies the methods to be used by the SQA process monitoring activity.
%&"&

Software reviews inspections are industry-proven technique for improving software quality,
decreasing costs, and accelerating project cycle time. This is designed to provide an
understanding of the process for conducting software reviews. Software developers would
learn how peer review inspections can be incorporated into the software life cycle to
improve quality, decrease costs, and improve delivery time.

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Organizations face many problems that impede rapid development of software systems
critical to their operations and growth. The challenge in any software product development
lies in minimizing the number of defects. Occurrence of defects is the greatest contributor to
significant increases in product costs due to correction and rework time. Most defects are
caused by process failures rather than human failures. 2dentifying and correcting process
defects will prevent many product defects from recurring.

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Software products are built using a software process, and errors get introduced during the
process for various reasons. The errors that are not detected and fixed during the software
process reach customers and are called µdefects¶. Defects are often costlier to fix than errors
and also damage the developer¶s reputation. Therefore, it is necessary to reduce the errors in
the end products. One of the techniques used for filtering out errors is formal technique
reviews (FTRs).
Formal technical review (FTR) is an essential component of all modern software quality
assessment, assurance, and improvement techniques, and is acknowledged to be the most
cost-effective form of quality improvement when practiced effectively.

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÷
 
  ÷ is a group of related activities employed throughout the
software life cycle to positively influence and quantify the quality of the delivered software.

2t provides an overview of SQA, outlining process and product assurance and the methods
and technologies typically employed to accomplish them. These methods include audits,
assessment activities (e.g., 2SO 9000 ), analysis functions such as reliability prediction, and
embedded defects detection methods such as formal inspection. The overview is intended to
help the reader identify specific SQA activities for more in-depth study.



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