Software quality assurance (SQA) is a means and practice of monitoring all
software engineering
Software engineering is a branch of both computer science and engineering focused on designing, developing, testing, and maintaining Application software, software applications. It involves applying engineering design process, engineering principl ...
processes, methods, and work products to ensure compliance against defined standards. It may include ensuring conformance to standards or models, such as
ISO/IEC 9126 (now superseded by ISO 25010),
SPICE or
CMMI.
It includes standards and procedures that managers, administrators or developers may use to review and audit software products and activities to verify that the software meets quality criteria which link to standards.
SQA encompasses the entire
software development
Software development is the process of designing and Implementation, implementing a software solution to Computer user satisfaction, satisfy a User (computing), user. The process is more encompassing than Computer programming, programming, wri ...
process, including
requirements engineering,
software design
Software design is the process of conceptualizing how a software system will work before it is implemented or modified.
Software design also refers to the direct result of the design process the concepts of how the software will work which co ...
,
coding,
code reviews,
source code control,
software configuration management,
testing,
release management and
software integration. It is organized into goals, commitments, abilities, activities, measurements,
verification and validation.
Purpose
SQA involves a three-pronged approach:
* Organization-wide policies, procedures and standards
* Project-specific policies, procedures and standards
* Compliance to appropriate procedures
Guidelines for the application of ISO 9001:2015 to computer software are described in ISO/IEC/IEEE 90003:2018. External entities can be contracted as part of process assessments to verify that projects are standard-compliant. More specifically in case of software,
ISO/IEC 9126 (now superseded by ISO 25010) should be considered and applied for software quality.
Activities
Quality assurance activities take place at each phase of development. Analysts use application technology and techniques to achieve high-quality specifications and designs, such as
model-driven design. Engineers and technicians find bugs and problems with related software quality through testing activities. Standards and process deviations are identified and addressed throughout development by
project managers or quality managers, who also ensure that changes to functionality, performance, features, architecture and component (''in general:'' changes to product or service
scope) are made only after appropriate review, e.g. as part of
change control boards.
See also
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DOD-STD-2167
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Quality by Design
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Software assurance
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Software quality analyst
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Software quality management
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Software testing
Software testing is the act of checking whether software satisfies expectations.
Software testing can provide objective, independent information about the Quality (business), quality of software and the risk of its failure to a User (computin ...
References
External links
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* "Software Quality Assurance(SQA): Plan, Audit & Review." ''Meet Guru99 – Free Training Tutorials & Video for IT Courses'', www.guru99.com/software-quality-assurance-test-audit-review-makes-your-life-easy.html.
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{{IEEE standards
Quality
Quality assurance
Software quality
IEEE standards