AAUP Course (1): Software Verification and Validation

Software quality assurance is composed of a variety of tasks associated with two different constituencies—the software engineers who do technical work and an SQA group that has responsibility for quality assurance planning, oversight, record keeping, analysis, and reporting.

Software engineers address quality (and perform quality control activities) by applying solid technical methods and measures, conducting technical reviews, and performing well-planned software testing.

The charter of the SQA group is to assist the software team in achieving a high-quality end product. The Software Engineering Institute recommends a set of SQA activities that address quality assurance planning, oversight, record keeping, analysis, and reporting. 

These activities are performed (or facilitated) by an independent SQA group that:

Prepares an SQA plan for a project. 
The plan is developed as part of project planning and is reviewed by all stakeholders. Quality assurance activities performed by the software engineering team and the SQA group are governed by the plan. The plan identifies evaluations to be performed, audits and reviews to be conducted, standards that are applicable to the project, procedures for error reporting and tracking, work products that are produced by the SQA group, and feedback that will be provided to the software team.

Participates in the development of the project’s software process description. 

The software team selects a process for the work to be performed. The SQA group reviews the process description for compliance with organizational policy, internal software standards, externally imposed standards (e.g., ISO-9001), and other parts of the software project plan.

Reviews software engineering activities to verify compliance with the defined software process. 

The SQA group identifies, documents, and tracks deviations from the process and verifies that corrections have been made.

Audits designated software work products to verify compliance with those defined as part of the software process. 

The SQA group reviews selected work products; identifies, documents, and tracks deviations; verifies that corrections have been made; and periodically reports the results of its work to the project manager.

Ensures that deviations in software work and work products are documented and handled according to a documented procedure. Deviations may be encountered in the project plan, process description, applicable standards, or software engineering work products.

Records any noncompliance and reports to senior management. Noncompliance items are tracked until they are resolved. In addition to these activities, the SQA group coordinates the control and management of change (Chapter 29) and helps to collect and analyze software metrics.