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Software Quality Audit

An audit of a software testing process involves independently examining and evaluating whether the testing activities complied with established standards, guidelines, specifications, and criteria. The objectives of a software audit are to provide an independent assessment of whether the software products and processes adhered to applicable quality standards. A software audit can examine documentation, activities, deliverables, and interview testing staff to analyze compliance and identify potential issues or areas for improvement.

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246 views4 pages

Software Quality Audit

An audit of a software testing process involves independently examining and evaluating whether the testing activities complied with established standards, guidelines, specifications, and criteria. The objectives of a software audit are to provide an independent assessment of whether the software products and processes adhered to applicable quality standards. A software audit can examine documentation, activities, deliverables, and interview testing staff to analyze compliance and identify potential issues or areas for improvement.

Uploaded by

Ritika Paul
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Software Quality Audit

Delivering a software product of maximum quality is the utmost priority of an


organization and complete care is being taken while developing and testing a
software product. However, still some of the them lacks to comply with the
standards, guidelines, specifications and other such specific & established
criteria. This needs a complete audit of the software development process,
including testing phase. Here, we are going to discuss about the audit process
with respect to software testing, only. So, first, let's go through the terminology
'Audit'.

What is Meant by the Software Audit?


In the field of software testing, audit may be defined as the process, to evaluate a
software product, against the specified and established standards and
specification, to ensure that the developed product, adheres to these standards.
The basic purpose, to carry out the audit of a software testing phase, is to examine,
that if the process, being used and implemented, in the testing process, is of
defined and desired standard or not.
In short
An independent and systematic examination for determining the quality of
activities.

-Quality Audit is related to the results which comply the planned arrangements.

-It allows to cross check the planned arrangements are properly implemented or
not to achieve quality testing objectives.

Audit means an independent examination of a software product or processes to


assess compliance with specifications, standards, contractual agreements, or
other criteria.
The terminology, Audit in the field of software can relate to any of the following:
• A software Quality Assurance, where the software is audited for quality
• A software licensing audit, where a user of software is audited for licence
compliance
• A Physical Configuration Audit (PCA) is the formal examination to verify
the configuration item's product baseline
Objectives of Audit:
The aim of a conducting software audit is to provide an independent evaluation
of the software products and processes to applicable standards, guidelines, plans,
and procedures against compliance.
Roles and Responsibilities of Formal Audit:
• Manager: The manager decides on what needs to be reviewed and ensures
that there is enough time allocated in the project plan for all of the required
review activities. Managers do not usually get involved in the actual
review process.
• Moderator: The Moderator, also known as lead reviewer, reviews the set
of documents. The moderator will make the final decision as whether to
release an updated document.
• Author: The author is the writer, who develops the document(s) to be
reviewed. The author also takes responsibility for fixing any agreed
defects.
• Scribe/Recorder: The scribe attends the review meeting and documents
all the issues/defect/problems and open points that were identified during
the meeting.

Types of Software Audit


The different types of audit that may be performed on the software testing
process, includes following kinds:

1. Audit to Verify Compliance: This type of audit, involves the inspection


of actual testing activities executed, against what was planned and
documented. Further, it is also done to verify, whether the procedures
followed for the testing purposes, complies with the specific or desired
standard and guidelines, such as ISO, CMMI.

2. Audit for process improvement: It is carried out, to enhance or improve


the testing process (if possible), by looking and in-depth analysing every
step or approach, being taken, including facts and figures associated with
each step or approach.
3. Audit for Root Cause Analysis It's a kind of backtracking type inspection
of the testing process, which retraces the path of the testing activities, being
performed, to identify and locate the root cause of a problem.

4. Internal Audits: These are the audits, performed by the personnel within
the organization.

5. External Audits: Audit, which involves the outsourcing agency, could be


the external audits.

How to perform Audit for a Software Testing Process?


Audit is just the inspection process, used to verify and validate something.
Therefore, there are multiple ways, to perform the audit operation, over the
software testing process. Below given, are some of them:

• Examining the testing processes, being carried out, against the planned &
defined procedures and guidelines, which was documented in the form of
a testing or a quality manual, prior to testing phase, for the purpose of
directing the testing phase.

• Reviewing and analysing, each and every documented artifacts or


deliverables, used or produced, at each phase of the testing lifecycle, which
may include following items:

▪ Test Suite.
▪ Test Cases.
▪ Test Logs.
▪ Defect Report.
▪ Status.
▪ Test Coverage.
▪ Traceability Matrix.
• Interviewing the various testing professionals, engaged at each different
level of the testing phase, to gain access to each one's prevailing thoughts
with respect to the testing process.
What could be covered under Audit process?
Depending upon the needs and thorough inspection, many things could be
brought under the radar of the audit process, such as

• Deliverables: At each step or at different level of testing, various


deliverables or artifacts are being produced. However, the authenticity of
these deliverables, needs to be verified, as if they exist or not.

• Test Cases: It is examined, to check whether the test cases, have the
enough coverage of complete specified requirements, functionalities and
features.

• Sometimes, some of the bugs are not resolved or fixed, keeping in account
their severity, and the product is released or delivered with those bugs, with
the view to fix them later. Therefore, it may be inspected that if any known
or identified bug, is still prevailing in the delivered product.

• Different Levels of testing, to ensure that a bug does not gets filtered
through, without getting noticed or detected.

Conclusion:
In light of the above, it may be concluded that auditing is a must process, to
maintain the reliability and integrity of the testing process, along with the
adherence to the certain specified criteria and standards, to ensure the
effectiveness and efficiency of the testing phase, along with the detection of gaps
and loopholes, which may help in preventing the bugs and defects in the software
application.

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