Software Quality

Software Quaity - Part and Parcel of ROI

With all the software companies, from start-ups to the big fishes, vying for some or the other kind of quality standards certifications, software quality has certainly become the buzzword in the global IT industry and it is emerging as an in vogue stream. Jargons like ISO 9000:2000, CMM, PCMM, and Six Sigma are being sought after like never before.

But just refresh your memories and peek at the previous years of the software industry. You will observe that software quality has traditionally been viewed as a non-technical field and has mostly been shunned by the IT professionals. Then, why this change?

As you must believe, “change” is the only constant in this world and this shift in focus to software quality has been chiefly due to the stiff competition in the software market.

Gone are the days when software and automation was a craze. Automation has now become a necessity and consumers now want maximum returns on their IT investment. In a market where every other software company boasts of providing the “right” software at the “right” price, quality is the only the factor that distinguishes the original from the replica.

Going deeper in this context, I must say that quality of the purchased software is not a concern for the customized products only. Even off-the shelf products from major vendors are not exempted from the assault of this daemon.

For example, if you continue adding files to a new project in Microsoft SourceSafe, the software will present you a dialog box informing you that it is not permissible to add more than 150 files to a single project. This dialog box will ask you whether you wish to continue and will display three buttons: Yes, No, and Help. Now, if you click the Help button you will be shocked with the message “TOPIC NOT FOUND”. ( http://www.robfisher.net/blog/archive/2003/06/)

Can you believe it? If the God of all software, Microsoft, can make mistakes, why can’t others? And this is the reason why software quality has gained paramount importance.

Unfortunately enough, software quality assurance doesn’t always get its due attention and whenever a software project is late, which almost always happens, software testing is the first thing that gets curbed or removed from the project task list. And this is the reason why more and more organizations are opting for an effective management system for quality process implementation that can direct a unit and control the organization with regard to software quality.

But the biggest dilemma with software quality is that there can be no single, universally accepted definition of quality. Another hindrance is the assumption that the “process improvement” mantra will lead to a successful product.

Therefore, it is important for any software company to formalize its own definition of software quality so that consumers or clients can relate that definition of quality to their own. The software companies should also consider product assessment along with process improvement to ensure appropriate quality of the final product.

Assessing software quality may be extremely intricate and the state of practice might fall short of expectations, but with the ongoing global research on next generation techniques for software quality assessment, all is not lost. The only need of the hour is procure professionals with complete knowledge of software engineering practices and methods who can focus on the quality factor right from the beginning of the software projects.
With software systems being increasingly deployed in areas affecting our daily lives, the implications of failure of such critical systems can range from annoying inconveniences to life-threatening consequences. Add to it, the desirable software qualities of maximized ROI, customer satisfaction, and cost-effective pricing. Under these circumstances, the bets fitting statement could possibly be - quality is no longer an option, rather the option is to ensure quality or consign your organization to failure.

posted by navneet biet @ 4:37 AM