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Case Study
The client has responsibility for regulatory and enforcement oversight
for a program which requires thousands of entities to report to the US
government once a year. A reengineered system has been designed to:
1)increase efficiency by using automated data capture techniques and
imaging, 2)reduce turn around time and manual processing steps,
3)increase data accuracy.
An HW&W team is responsible for the software quality assurance
process on the development contract. It includes systems integration
components. At initiation, the QA and the development teams determined
that in the best interests of providing a superior product, on time,
and within budget, the QA process would be established and administered
in a collaborative environment.
The QA team developed a complete software QA process based on the IEEE
Standards Guide, the software developer's methodology, and the client's
requirements. The QA process developed included a rigorous review
process covering standards, practices, conventions, and metrics for
each life cycle development phase and for all associated documentation.
A Quality Assurance Plan, based on this customized process, was
developed and delivered to the client. The team administered the QA
process and maintained the Requirements Traceability Matrix (RTM).
HW&W's team leader, a Certified Quality Analyst, prepared monthly
quality reports and presented formal quality assurance briefings to the
government client and to senior management of the prime contractor.
Compliance reviews conducted by the QA team consisted of walkthroughs,
technical reviews, and inspections, at each phase of the software life
cycle for both Computer Software Configuration Items (CSCI) and
associated documentation. The QA team designed and produced a series of
checklists including one for each document being reviewed. The
checklist designed for use when reviewing CSCI collects defect data for
metric analysis. Defect categories are classified by type, class and
severity. At the end of each phase, the data collected are analyzed by
the QA Team and reviewed with the program and development managers to
give them the opportunity to improve their process prior to the next
phase.
The RTM database was constructed by the QA team using the contract
Statement of Work and the Questions and Answers submitted during the
contract acquisition period. Once in place, the database was validated
by the client, the development team, and the QA team as a group. At
each phase of the life cycle, the RTM was updated with data elements
relevant to that phase and linked to specific system requirements. The
database was extremely effective in fulfilling the obligation of QA to
track and assure that all system requirements were met.
Documentation required throughout the software development life cycle
was subject to the same scrutiny as the software configuration items.
The QA team scheduled and conducted walkthroughs, technical reviews and
inspections for all documentation including, but not limited to, the
System Design Document, Configuration Management Specification, Test
Procedures and Specification documents, and Security Specification
documents.
The QA team developed a physical audit process to verify that the
software and all related documentation were internally consistent and
ready for delivery. The principle document supporting the physical
audit is a checklist that records each software product and the
associated documentation that should exist for that product. The QA
team also developed a process to audit the configuration management
process. This audit was conducted by the QA team randomly to verify
that compliance to the defined build process was maintained.
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Copyright © 2003 H W & W, Inc.
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