CHALLENGES FACING THE DESIGN OF QUALITY SOFTWARE

The Challenges facing the Design of Quality Software

Abstract

Research pertaining to software quality is normally fixed in the research of goods quality factors and the usability of those goods in a context of use. During the research, it emphasis on quality assurance and value is restricted to this product perspective. Furthermore, the domain in which quality is assessed is restricted to that of Information Systems (IS). Insofar as it interacts to the IS domain, the paper first considers definitions of quality and other related issues. This paper discusses the challenges facing the design of quality software.

Index

Challenges, 4, 6, 8-10

Design, 4-8

Quality, 4,5,7,9-10

Software, 4-10

Techniques, 6-7, 9

The Challenges facing the Design of Quality Software

Introduction

Software plays an increasing crucial role in success of traditional products such as cars, home entertainment, telecommunication, intelligent buildings. The challenges for the design of embedded software systems is manifold. (Boehm 2008:15-20) I will concentrate on two main challenges and their key consequences for design, namely:

the increasing complexity of software-intensive systems;

the increasing need to adapt to a fast changing technology and environment;

Discussion

The main quality criteria for software-intensive systems is their "fit for purpose", in both functional and non-functional (better quality) terms. To design systems which fit their purpose, the successful involvement of users, customers, domain experts and other stakeholder throughout the design process is a must. Requirements Engineering plays thus an increasingly important role in the design of complex software-intensive systems. The two main challenges stated above in a bit more detail are as follows: (Boehm 2008:15-20)

Increasing complexity, cost and design time: Reasons for the increase in the complexity of software intensive systems are, among others,:

increase in functionality: As observable, e.g., in the automotive or tele-communication industry, the functionality of software increases dramatically. Each new product (or even software version) must of course provide all the "old" functionality and, in addition, in-cooperate a lot of new functions - quite often, a platform change is required in parallel, and other devises such as sensors change their behaviour so that the "old" functionality must be adjusted accordingly; (Kaoru 2005:63-78)

increase in quality needs: The time where the delivery of faulty software or software requiring a significant, not intended adaptation of its environment still satisfied the customer is over. Today, software - as all other products - must be delivered without failure and must fit in the environment. In addition, there are increasing demands for the quality of the internal software "structure ; one main reason for demanding an increase in software quality. Another main reason is the increase of quality features like security, safety or mobility (which often are used to express opaque functional features);

mass customisation of software: Customer demand an adaptation of the software-intensive product to their needs - like with other products like cars. This leads to a mass customization of software-intensive products which quite easily lead to the existence of several hundreds ore even thousands of software systems/versions. Maintaining and managing their evolution is a main reason for the increase of complexity - orthogonal to ...