Quality
Quality
Quality
RTMs
In-Process Reviews
In-Process reviews are used to examine a product during a specific
time period of its life cycle,
such as during the design activity. They are usually limited to a
segment of a project, with the goal
of identifying defects as work progresses, rather than at the close of a
phase or even later, when
they are more costly to correct. These reviews may use an informal,
semiformal or formal review
format.
Checkpoint Reviews
These are facilitated reviews held at predetermined points in the
development process. The
objective is to evaluate a system as it is being specified, designed,
implemented, and tested.
Checkpoint reviews focus on ensuring that critical success factors are
being adequately addressed
during system development. The participants are subject matter
experts on the specific factors to be
reviewed against, and could include customer representatives,
analysts, programmers, vendors,
auditors, etc. For example, if system performance was identified as a
critical requirement, three
checkpoint reviews might be set up at the end of the requirements,
design, and coding phases to
ensure there were no performance issues before proceeding to the
next phase. Instead of walking
team members through a general checklist (as would be done in a
phase-end review), a designated
performance expert would look specifically at whether performance
requirements were being met.
Phase-End Reviews
Phase-end reviews (also called Decision-Point or Gate reviews) look at
the product for the main
purpose of determining whether to continue with planned activities. In
contrast to the checkpoint
reviews, which focus on critical success factors, phase-end reviews are
more general in nature.
Phase-end reviews are held at the end of each phase, in a formal
review format. Defects found are
tracked through resolution, usually through a defect-tracking system.
Although there may be more,
Guide to the 2006 CSQA CBOK
7-12
the most common phase-end reviews are listed below. Project status,
risks, and non-technical
issues are also reviewed.
Software Requirements Review
Post-Implementation Reviews
Post-implementation reviews (also known as "postmortems") are
conducted in a formal format up
to six months after implementation is complete, in order to audit the
process based on actual results.
They are held to assess the success of the overall process after
release, and to identify any
opportunities for process improvement.
These reviews focus on questions such as: “Is the quality what was
expected?” “Did the process
work?” “Would buying a tool have improved the process?” or “Would
automation have sped up
the process?” Post-implementation reviews are of value only if some
use is made of the findings.
The quality assurance practitioner draws significant insight into the
processes used and their
behaviors.
In order to achieve maximum efficiency in software product QA, the center of attention should be on
reusability and maintainability of QA artifacts and resources.