When to stop testing multi upgradations of software based on cost criteria

Abstract

Software testing is an important phase of the software development life cycle to achieve highly reliable software. Due to the time and resource limitation during the testing phase, firms do not attempt to deliver a complete and perfect product in one development cycle. They plan multi upgradations of software by adding new functionalities. Many models have been developed in the past which discuss about when to stop testing and when to release the software to the users. But they have been limited to the study of single version only. In the present framework, we describe a unified approach to address an important issue of when to stop testing the multi-upgradation of software, which is a complex process. The total debugging cost for each upgradation includes the cost of debugging in the warranty period along with the testing cost. It is assumed that the software is supported till the warranty period is over. In the proposed cost model for each upgradation, we consider that some of the remaining faults of previous release are reported and removed partly during the testing period and partly during the warranty period of new upgradation. An algorithm for finding the optimal release time for each version is developed. We estimate the parameters of the model using Statistical Package for Social Sciences on the real data set, and obtain optimum stopping time for each version of the software using Maple software.

Keywords:

• software reliability modelling
• software upgradation
• cost modelling
• warranty

Additional information

Notes on contributors

P.K. Kapur

P.K. Kapur is a professor at Amity International Business School, Amity University, Noida. He is the former head of the Department of Operational Research and former dean of the Faculty of Mathematical Sciences, University of Delhi. He has supervised 32 Ph.D. and 25 M.Phil. dissertations in the area of software reliability, reliability-based optimisation, and innovation diffusion in marketing. He has executed various research projects from UGC and DRDO in the field of mathematical modelling in software reliability and marketing. He had been the president of the Society for Reliability Engineering, Quality and Operations Management (Regd.) since 2000 and the former president of the Operational Research Society of India. He is the editor-in-chief of the International Journal of Systems Assurance Engineering and Management (IJSAEM) published by Springer. He obtained his Ph.D. degree in reliability theory (operational research) from the University of Delhi in 1977. He has published extensively in Indian journals and abroad in the areas of marketing, hardware reliability, optimisation, queuing theory and maintenance, and software reliability (more than 200 papers). He has recently published a book on ‘Software Reliability Assessment with OR Applications’ (Springer, UK, 2011).

H. Pham

Hoang Pham is a distinguished professor and the former chairman of the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering at Rutgers University. He is the author or coauthor of five books and ha published 130 journal articles, and edited 10 books, including Springer Handbook in Engineering Statistics and Handbook in Reliability Engineering. He has served as editor-in-chief, editor, associate editor, guest editor, and board member of many journals. He is the editor of the Springer Book Series in Reliability Engineering, editor of World Scientific Book Series on Industrial and Systems Engineering, and has served as conference chair and program chair of over 30 international conferences and workshops. His numerous awards include the 2009 IEEE Reliability Society Engineer of the Year Award. He is a Fellow of the IEEE and IIE.

Jyotish N.P. Singh

Jyotish N.P. Singh has submitted his doctoral thesis in the Department of Operational Research, University of Delhi. He obtained his master's degree in operational research from the University of Delhi. He has also done his masters in mathematics from Banaras Hindu University. His research interests include mathematical modelling in software reliability, software upgradation, and software release. He has published papers in international and national journals of repute.

Nitin Sachdeva

Nitin Sachdeva is a research scholar in the Department of Operational Research, University of Delhi. He obtained his master's degree in operational research from the University of Delhi. With over 2 years of academic and 7 years of corporate experience, his research interests lie in mathematical modelling in the field of marketing and software reliability, including multi-generational products and warranty analysis in marketing, software upgradation, and software release in software reliability.