Skip to main content

Value-Based Management of Software Testing

  • Chapter
Value-Based Software Engineering

Abstract:

Testing is one of the most resource-intensive activities in software development and consumes between 30 and 50% of total development costs according to many studies. Testing is however often not organized to maximize business value and not aligned with a project’s mission. Path, branch, instruction, mutation, scenario, or requirement testing usually treat all aspects of software as equally important, while in practice 80% of the value often comes from 20% of the software. In order to maximize the return of investment gained from software testing, the management of testing needs to maximize its value contribution. In this chapter we motivate the need for value-based testing, describe practices supporting the management of value-based testing, outline a framework for value-based test management, and illustrate the framework with an example.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 129.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 169.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book
USD 169.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Preview

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

References

  1. Amland, S.: Risk Based Testing and Metrics. In: EuroSTAR’99: 5 th European International Conference on Software Testing Analysis and Review, Barcelona, Spain, November 1999

    Google Scholar 

  2. Bach, J.: Risk and Requirements-Based Testing. IEEE Computer, 32(6), pp 113–114 (June 1999)

    Google Scholar 

  3. Beizer, B.: Software Testing Techniques, 2nd ed (Van Nostrand Reinhold, New York 1990)

    Google Scholar 

  4. Biffl, S., Freimut, B., and Laitenberger, O.: Investigating the Cost-Effectiveness of Reinspections in Software Development. In: ACM/IEEE International Conference on Software Engineering, Toronto, Canada, IEEE Comp. Soc. Press, May 2001

    Google Scholar 

  5. Black, R.: Managing the Testing Process: Practical Tools and Techniques for Managing Hardware and Software Testing (Wiley, New York 2002)

    Google Scholar 

  6. Boehm, B. W.: A Spiral Model of Software Development and Enhancement. IEEE Computer, 21(5), pp 61–72 (May 1988)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  7. Boehm, B. W.: Spiral Development: Experience, Principles, and Refinements, CMU/SEI-2000-SR-008. Spiral Development Workshop, July 2000

    Google Scholar 

  8. Boehm, B. W.: The Art of Expectations Management. IEEE Computer, 33(1), pp 122–124 (January 2000)

    Article  MATH  Google Scholar 

  9. Boehm, B. W.: Value-Based Software Engineering. Software Engineering Notes, 28(2), (March 2003)

    Google Scholar 

  10. Boehm, B. W., and Basili, V.R.: Software Defect Reduction Top 10 List. IEEE Computer, 34(1), pp 135–137 (January 2001)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  11. Boehm, B. W., and Huang, L.G.: Value-Based Software Engineering: A Case Study. IEEE Computer, 36(3), pp 33–41 (March 2003)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  12. Boehm, B. W., Grünbacher, P., and Briggs, R.O.: Developing Groupware for Requirements Negotiation: Lessons Learned. IEEE Software, 18(3), pp 46–55 (May/June 2001)

    Article  MATH  Google Scholar 

  13. Bullock, J.: Calculating the Value of Testing. Software Testing and Quality Engineering, 2(3), pp 56–61 (May/June 2000)

    MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  14. Burnstein, I: Practical Software Testing: A Process-oriented Approach (Springer, Berlin Heidelberg New York 2002)

    MATH  Google Scholar 

  15. Cohen, C.F., Birkin, S.J., Garfield, M.J., and Webb, H.W.: Managing Conflict in Software Testing. CACM, 47(1), pp 76–81 (January 2004)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  16. Crosby, P.B.: Quality Is Free: The Art of Making Quality Certain (McGraw-Hill, 1979)

    Google Scholar 

  17. Ferscha, A., Mattern, F. (eds.): PERVASIVE 2004: Pervasive Computing, Second International Conference, Vienna, Austria, Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 3001 (Springer, Berlin Heidelberg New York 2004)

    Google Scholar 

  18. Gause, D.C., Weinberg, G.M.: Exploring Requirements: Quality before Design (Dorset House Publishing, New York 1989)

    Google Scholar 

  19. Gryna, F.M.: Quality and Costs. In: Juran’s Quality Handbook, 5th edition, ed by Juran, J.M., Godfrey, A.B. (McGraw-Hill, New York 1998), pp 8.1–8.26

    Google Scholar 

  20. Harrold, M.J.: Testing: A Roadmap. In: The Future of Software Engineering, ed by Finkelstein, A., 22th International Conference on Software Engineering, Limerick, Ireland, June 2000, pp 63–72

    Google Scholar 

  21. Hauston, D.: Cost of Software Quality: Justifying Software Process Improvement to Managers. In: Daughtrey, T.: Fundamental Concepts for the Software Quality Engineer (ASQ Quality Press, Milwaukee 2001), pp 85–94

    Google Scholar 

  22. IEEE Standard Glossary of Software Engineering Terminology, IEEE Std 610.12-1990. (IEEE Computer Society, 1990)

    Google Scholar 

  23. Kaner, C., Falk, J., and Nguyen, H.Q.: Testing Computer Software, 2nd edition (Wiley, New York 1999)

    Google Scholar 

  24. Kaner, C., Bach, J., Pettichord, B.: Lessons Learned in Software Testing: A Context-Driven Approach (Wiley, New York 2002)

    Google Scholar 

  25. Kruchten, P.: The Rational Unified Process: An Introduction, 3rd edition (Addison-Wesley, Boston 2003)

    Google Scholar 

  26. McConnell, S.: Rapid Development: Taming Wild Software Schedules (Microsoft Press, Redmond 1996)

    MATH  Google Scholar 

  27. Myers, G.J.: The Art of Software Testing (Wiley, New York 1979)

    Google Scholar 

  28. Pinkster, I., Burgt, B.v.d., Janssen, D., Veenendaal, E.v.: Successful Test Management: An Integral Approach (Springer, Berlin Heidelberg New York 2004)

    Book  Google Scholar 

  29. SA Board for Software Standardisation and Control (BSSC): ESA Software Engineering Standards PSS-05-0 (European Space Agency (ESA), ESTEC, Noordwijk, The Netherlands, February 1991)

    Google Scholar 

  30. Redmill, F.: Exploring risk-based testing and its implications. Software Testing, Verification and Reliability. 14, pp 3–15 (2004)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  31. Reifer D.: Making the Software Business Case: Improvement by the Numbers. (Addison Wesley, New York 2002)

    Google Scholar 

  32. Rosenberg, L.H.: Lessons Learned in Software Quality Assurance. In: Managing Software Engineering Knowledge. ed by Aurum, A., Jeffery, R., Wohlin, C., Handzic, M. (Springer, Berlin Heidelberg New York 2003), pp 251–268

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  33. Ruhe, G., Ngo-The, A.: Hybrid Intelligence in Software Release Planning. International Journal of Hybrid Intelligent Systems. 1(2), pp 99–110 (2004)

    MATH  Google Scholar 

  34. Slaughter, S.A., Harter, D.E., Krishnan, M.S.: Evaluating the Cost of Software Quality. CACM, 41(8), pp 67–73 (August 1998)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  35. Wallace, D.R., Fujii, R.U.: Software Verification and Validation: An Overview. IEEE Software, 6(3), pp 10–17 (May 1989)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  36. Weinberg, G.M.: Destroying Communication and Control in Software Development. CrossTalk, pp 4–8 (April 2003)

    Google Scholar 

  37. Wells, D.: An Introduction to Testing, XP-Style. In: Marchesi, M., Succi, G., Wells, D., Williams, L.: Extreme Programming Perspectives. (Addison Wesley, 2002)

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2006 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

About this chapter

Cite this chapter

Ramler, R., Biffl, S., Grünbacher, P. (2006). Value-Based Management of Software Testing. In: Biffl, S., Aurum, A., Boehm, B., Erdogmus, H., Grünbacher, P. (eds) Value-Based Software Engineering. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-29263-2_11

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-29263-2_11

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-540-25993-0

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-540-29263-0

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics