GQM, the

initialism An acronym is a word or name formed from the initial components of a longer name or phrase. Acronyms are usually formed from the initial letters of words, as in ''NATO'' (''North Atlantic Treaty Organization''), but sometimes use syllables, as ...

for "goal, question, metric", is an established

goal-oriented Goal orientation, or achievement orientation, is an "individual disposition towards developing or validating one's ability in achievement settings". In general, an individual can be said to be ''mastery'' or ''performance'' oriented, based on whethe ...

approach to

software metric In software engineering and development, a software metric is a standard of measure of a degree to which a software system or process possesses some property. Even if a metric is not a measurement (metrics are functions, while measurements are t ...

s to improve and measure software quality.

History

GQM has been promoted by

Victor Basili Victor R. Basili (born April 13, 1940 in Brooklyn, New York), is an emeritus professor at the Department of Computer Science, which is part of the University of Maryland College of Computer, Mathematical, and Natural Sciences, and the Institute fo ...

of the

University of Maryland, College Park The University of Maryland, College Park (University of Maryland, UMD, or simply Maryland) is a public land-grant research university in College Park, Maryland. Founded in 1856, UMD is the flagship institution of the University System of Mary ...

and the Software Engineering Laboratory at the

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil space program, aeronautics research, and space research. NASA was established in 1958, succeeding t ...

Goddard Space Flight Center The Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) is a major NASA space research laboratory located approximately northeast of Washington, D.C. in Greenbelt, Maryland, United States. Established on May 1, 1959 as NASA's first space flight center, GSFC empl ...

after supervising a Ph.D. thesis by Dr. David M. Weiss. Dr. Weiss' work was inspired by the work of Albert Endres at IBM Germany.

Method

GQM defines a

measurement Measurement is the quantification of attributes of an object or event, which can be used to compare with other objects or events. In other words, measurement is a process of determining how large or small a physical quantity is as compared ...

model on three levels: ; 1. Conceptual level (Goal): A

goal A goal is an idea of the future or desired result that a person or a group of people envision, plan and commit to achieve. People endeavour to reach goals within a finite time by setting deadlines. A goal is roughly similar to a purpose or ai ...

is defined for an object, for a variety of reasons, with respect to various models of quality, from various points of view and relative to a particular environment. ; 2. Operational level (Question): A set of questions is used to define models of the object of study and then focuses on that object to characterize the assessment or achievement of a specific goal. ; 3. Quantitative level (Metric): A set of metrics, based on the models, is associated with every question in order to answer it in a measurable way.

GQM stepwise

Another interpretation of the procedure is: # Planning # Definition # Data Collection # Interpretation

Sub-steps

Sub-steps are needed for each phases. To complete the definition phase, an eleven-step procedure is proposed: # Define measurement goals # Review or produce software process models # Conduct GQM interviews # Define questions and hypotheses # Review questions and hypotheses # Define metrics # Check metrics on consistency and completeness # Produce GQM plan # Produce measurement plan # Produce analysis plan # Review plans

Recent developments

The GQM+Strategies approach was developed by

and a group of researchers from the

Fraunhofer Society The Fraunhofer Society (german: Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft zur Förderung der angewandten Forschung e.V., lit=Fraunhofer Society for the Advancement of Applied Research) is a German research organization with 76institutes spread throughout Germany ...

. It is based on the Goal Question Metric paradigm and adds the capability to create measurement programs that ensure alignment between business goals and strategies, software-specific goals, and measurement goals. Novel application of GQM towards business data are described. Specifically in the software engineering areas of Quality assurance and Testing, GQM is used.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Gqm Software metrics Software quality