Quality Policies of Our Company

To introduce the quality management process and key quality management activities.

To explain the role of standards in quality management.

To explain how measurement may be used in assessing software quality and the limitations of software measurement.

• The quality of a developed product is influenced by the quality of the production process.
• This is important in software development as some product quality attributes are hard to assess.
• However, there is a very complex and poorly understood relationship between software processes and product quality.
• There is a straightforward link between process and product .

• More complex for software because:- The application of individual skills and experience is particularly important in software development;
  External factors such as the novelty of an application or the need for an accelerated development schedule may impair product quality.

• Care must be taken not to impose inappropriate process standards - these could reduce rather than improve the product quality.

Define process standards such as how reviews should be conducted, configuration management, etc.

Monitor the development process to ensure that standards are being followed.

Report on the process to project management and software procurer.

Don’t use inappropriate practices simply because standards have been established.

Standards are the key to effective quality management.

They may be international, national, organizational or project standards.

Product standards define characteristics that all components should exhibit e.g. a common programming style.

Process standards define how the software process should be enacted.

Encapsulation of best practice- avoids repetition of past mistakes.

They are a framework for quality assurance processes - they involve checking compliance to standards.

They provide continuity - new staff can understand the organisation by understanding the standards that are used.

They may not be seen as relevant and up-to-date by software engineers.

They often involve too much bureaucratic form filling.

If they are unsupported by software tools, tedious manual work is often involved to maintain the documentation    associated with the standards.

Involve practitioners in development. Engineers should understand the rationale underlying a standard.

Review standards and their usage regularly. Standards can quickly become outdated and this reduces their credibility    amongst practitioners.

Detailed standards should have associated tool support. Excessive clerical work is the most significant complaint    against standards.

Particularly important - documents are the tangible manifestation of the software.

Documentation process standards

Concerned with how documents should be developed, validated and maintained.

Document standards

Concerned with document contents, structure, and appearance.

Document interchange standards

Concerned with the compatibility of electronic documents.

Document identification standards

How documents are uniquely identified.

Document structure standards

Standard structure for project documents.

Document presentation standards

Define fonts and styles, use of logos, etc.

Document update standards

Define how changes from previous versions are reflected in a document Interchange standards allow electronic documents to be exchanged, mailed, etc.

Documents are produced using different systems and on different computers.

Even when standard tools are used, standards are needed to define conventions for their use e.g. use of style sheets and macros. Need for archiving. The lifetime of word processing systems may be much less than the lifetime of the software being documented. An archiving standard may be defined to ensure that the document can be accessed in future.