The theory of software quality makes my head hurt; the reality makes me want to cry.
There is a great deal of material written about software quality. It's a HUGE subject. It's also a diverse subject with lots of experts and lots to study. There is one simple reason for this: Software quality is a horrible %^*%^* mess, and it's not getting better!!!
Software Quality Theory Makes My Head Hurt
Just scan through the Wikipedia article on the subject and your head will probably hurt too.
I particularly like this alert at the top of the Software Quality Factors section:
This section needs attention from an expert on the subject. See the talk page for details. WikiProject Software or the Software Portal may be able to help recruit an expert. (September 2008)
Note that they've been seeking this expert for nearly three years!
Big government agencies have whole organizations devoted to the subject. For example, there's DACS, the Department of Defense (DoD) Information Analysis Center (IAC). What does DACS do? Read this (warning: reading this may make your head hurt):
Designated as the DoD Software InformationClearinghouse, specifically aimed to serve as an authoritative source for state-of-the-art software information providing technical support for the software community, the DACS offers a wide variety of technical services and supports the development, testing, validation, and transitioning of software engineering technology to the defense community, industry, and academia. DACS subject areas encompass the entire software life cycle and include software engineering methods, practices, tools, standards, and acquisition management. Also included are programming environments and language techniques, software failures, test methodologies, software quality metrics and measurements, software reliability, software safety, cost estimation and modeling, standards and guides for software development and maintenance, and software technology for research, development, and training.
I could go on and on, but my head hurts, so I'll stop.
Software Quality Reality Makes Me Want to Cry
With all these impressive-sounding things, books, conferences, experts, criteria, methods and certifications, software quality should be totally nailed, right? To the contrary: something is nailed when ... people stop talking about it! Take the disease smallpox, for example. It's nailed! There aren't theories, experts, or much of anything beyond historical references and scare-talk about potential re-emergence.
This is one the better summaries of the reality of software quality that I've seen; ironically, it's from a zombie website for obsolete software written for a long-obsolete machine, that is/had been(?) run by a couple people from some little island in the Carribean.
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