1. Why Quality is important and why business should be concerned with quality?

What necessary measures should be taken for assurance of quality prior to start Software
Project?
What are software quality attributes?
How these quality attributes can be injected into the software product? 4

In General:
o Quality is critical for survival and success.
o Customers demand quality.
o Everybody seems to understand quality.
o Everybody wants quality
o Everybody has a different perception of quality.
o Essentially quality means satisfying customer.

In Business context
o Quality is competitive issue now
o Quality is a must for survival
o Quality gives you the global reach
o Quality is cost effective
o Quality helps retain customers and increase profits
o Quality is the hallmarks of world-class business

What necessary measures should be taken for assurance of quality prior to start
Software Project?
Prior to the start of the software project, it is important that necessary standards and
procedures
are in place which can allow for the creation of a good requirement specifications. Without
the
development of a proper requirements specification document, it is not possible to move
to the
next phase which is the design phase.
Prior to the start of the project the following measures should be taken:
1. A proper schedule and plan should be made of all the deliverables of the project along
with the quality assurance and control activities.
2. The processes and procedures should be well defined so that human dependency can be
minimized.
3. The appropriate methodology needs to be adopted.
4. The Software Quality Assurance Plan needs to be developed which provides the proper
layout and road map for all the required SQA activities.
5. The goals, tasks, standards, and the organizational structure should be appropriately
 Defined

Software Quality Attributes

o Correctness
o Reliability
o Efficiency
o Integrity
o Usability
o Maintainability
o Flexibility
o Testability
o Portability
o Reusability
o Interoperability

How these quality attributes can be injected into software products?

o Specifying these attributes in Software Specification Document
o Quality attributes need to be measured
o These attributes need to be considered in the design of software products.
o For each attribute, multiple test cases should be defined.
o Formal testing of these quality attributes should be conducted.

2. What are the major impediments to be faced during Quality Assurance and Quality Control
activities?
How these impediments can be minimized? 1

The major impediments to the quality assurance activities are as follows:

1. The management does not emphasize of the compliance of the standards and is lenient
when it comes to quality.
2. The processes and standards are not well defined which makes their compliance difficult.
3. The processes cannot be measured or tracked which makes it hard to evaluate the
efficiency of the processes.
4. The employees are not properly trained and lack the skills to properly implement the
defined processes.
5. Measurement and tracking of processes can cause the employees to be questioned
regarding their performance which makes them fear the process.
6. Proper documentation is not produced throughout the development.
6
The major impediments in the quality control activities are as follows:
 1. People consider quality control to be a police action taken against them because they
believe that it means their skills and competence is being put into question and they are
being blamed for the shortcomings of the product.
2. The employees and staff are not properly trained which makes it hard for proper quality
control to take place.
3. The standards which have been defined for the quality control are inadequate which
mitigates their usefulness and makes the quality control activities in effectivem.

How to Minimize the Impediments

The impediments can be minimized by taking the following measures:

1. The management should make sure that standards and procedures established by the
SQA
people should be followed and that they should be properly established.
2. The employees should be trained, made aware of their responsibilities, and considered
as
important as the tools and practices.
3. The employees should be dealt with in an effective manner by conducting meetings,
performance appraisals and independent reviews of their work.
4. The Organization should commit to making quality their priority and establish a Quality
management system which assists the organization in accomplishing its quality related
tasks.4
t
3. Differentiate between the role of Quality Assurance and Quality Control in software
industry.
What are the main QA challenges encountered during software development cycle and how
are these challenges to be addressed? 2

Difference
Quality Assurance Quality Control

Quality Assurance (QA) is the set of Quality Control (QC) is defined as the
activities (including facilitation, training, processes and methods used to compare
measurement and analysis) needed to product quality to requirements and
provide adequate confidence that processes applicable standards, and the action taken
are established and continuously improved when a nonconformance is detected.
in order to produce products or services
that conform to requirements and are fit for
use.
QA is an activity that establishes and QC is an activity that verifies whether or
evaluates the processes that produce the not the product produced meets standards
 products. If there is no process, there is no
role for QA.
QA helps establish processes QC relates to a specific product or service
QA sets up measurement programs to QC verified whether particular attributes
evaluate processes exist, or do not exist, in a specific product
or service
QA identifies weakness in processes and QC identifies defect for the primary
improves them purpose of correcting defects.
QA is a management responsibility, QC is the responsibility of the worker
frequently performed by a staff function
Defining Processes Walkthrough
Quality Audit Inspection
Selection of Tools Inspection
Training Checkpoint review

Challenges:
– Complex Software requires different monitoring procedures than trivial applications.
– Quality criteria vary dramatically depending on the phase of the project at which the
evaluation takes place
– The measures of the quality must be specific to the project being evaluated and must
assess the effectiveness of the entire development process, not just individual segments.
– Quality cannot be directly checked in the product; it must be planned right from the
beginning.
– Quality goals must be clearly defined, effectively monitored, and rigorously enforced.
– The project must focus on the quality issues of the project from the beginning, ensuring
that quality criteria are consistent with defined requirements.
– Quality must be planed into the project structure, constantly evaluated, and corrections
applied when deficiencies are identified.

These challenges can be addressed if we have a QA function which will establish a QA

program in the organization.

4. Discuss principles of Quality Assurance and how these principles can be implemented on
Software Project? 3

General Principles of Quality Assurance:

o Know what you are doing
o Know what you should be doing
o Know how to measure the difference

How these Principles of Quality Assurance can be implemented?

 Know what you are doing
o Understand what is being built, how it is being built and what it currently does.
o Suppose a software development process with
– management structure (milestones, scheduling)
– reporting policies
– tracking

Know what you should be doing

o Having explicit requirements and specifications

o Suppose a software development process with
– requirements analysis,
– acceptance tests,
– frequent user feedback

Know how to measure the difference

o having explicit measures comparing what is being done from what should be done
o four complementary methods:
– formal methods – verify mathematically specified properties
– testing – explicit input to exercise software and check for expected output
– inspections – human examination of requirements, design, code, ... based on checklists
– metrics – measures a known set of properties related to quality.

5. How to establish a quality program in software organization? What should be included in

the QA function and why QA function is important in the contest of Software Quality? 3

Establishment of Quality Program: The following must be ensured:

– An appropriate development methodology is in place.

– The projects use standards and procedures in their work
– Independent review and audits are conducted
– Documentation is produced to support maintenance and enhancement
– The documentation produced during and not after development
– Mechanisms are in place and used to control changes
– Testing emphasizes all the high-risk product areas
– Each software task is satisfactorily completed before the succeeding one is begun.
(Phase end inspection)
 – Deviations from standards and procedures are exposed as soon as possible (Waivers and
Deviations)
– The quality control work is itself performed against establishment standards
– The SQA plan and the software development plan are compatible.

What should be included in QA Function and Why?

– It includes:
– Knowledge of statistical methods
– Quality control principles
– The software process and
– An ability to deal effectively with people

Why?

– To improve software quality by appropriate monitoring both the software and the
development process that produces it.
– To ensure full compliance with the established standards
– To ensure that any inadequacies in the product, the process, of the standards are brought
to management attentions so these inadequacies can be fixed

6. What are the objectives of Software Quality Assurance while developing and maintaining
software product? How these objectives will be achieved? 1

Establish a quality program in the organization

The following must be ensured:

– An appropriate development methodology is in place.

– The projects use standards and procedures in their work
– Independent review and audits are conducted
– Documentation is produced to support maintenance and enhancement
– The documentation produced during and not after development
– Mechanisms are in place and used to control changes
– Testing emphasizes all the high-risk product areas
– Each software task is satisfactorily completed before the succeeding one is begun. (Phase
end inspection)
– Deviations from standards and procedures are exposed as soon as possible (Waivers and
Deviations)
– The quality control work is itself performed against establishment standards
 – The SQA plan and the software development plan are compatible.

Things included in the QA function

o It includes:
– Knowledge of statistical methods
– Quality control principles
– The software process and
– An ability to deal effectively with people

Why QA function is important?

SQA function is found increasingly advantageous, from both product quality and cost-
effectiveness standpoints.

7. What are the quality challenges? Differentiate between Past and Present View Point of
Quality Assurance.

What are the quality challenges?

– Complex Software requires different monitoring procedures than trivial applications.
– Quality criteria vary dramatically depending on the phase of the project at which the
evaluation takes place
– The measures of the quality must be specific to the project being evaluated and must
assess the effectiveness of the entire development process, not just individual segments.
– Quality cannot be directly checked in the product; it must be planned right from the
beginning.
– Quality goals must be clearly defined, effectively monitored, and rigorously enforced.
– The project must focus on the quality issues of the project from the beginning, ensuring
that quality criteria are consistent with defined requirements.
– Quality must be planed into the project structure, constantly evaluated, and corrections
applied when deficiencies are identified.

Differentiate between Past and Present View Point of Quality Assurance.

Past Present
Quality is the responsibility of blue-collar Quality is everyone’s responsibility,
workers and direct labor employees including, white-collar workers, the
working on the product indirect labor force and the overhead staff
Quality defects should be hidden from the Defects should be highlighted and brought
customers and management to the surface for corrective actions
Quality problems lead to blame, faulty Quality problems lead to cooperative
justification and excuses solutions
Corrections-to-quality problems should be Documentation is essential for “lessons
accompanied with minimum learnt” so the mistakes are not repeated.
documentation
Increased quality will increase project Documentation is essential for “lessons
costs learnt” so the mistakes are not repeated.
Increased quality will increase project Improved quality saves money and
costs increase business
Quality is internally focused Quality is customer focused
Quality will not occur without close People want to produce quality products
supervision of people
Quality occurs during project execution Quality occurs at project initiation and
must be planned for within the project