CMM Level 4 Quantitative Analysis and Defect Prevention with Project Examples

Abstract

The Software Engineering Institutes (SEI) Software (SW) Capability Maturity Model (CMM) Level 4 Quantitative Analysis leads into SW-CMM Level 5 activities. Level 4 Software Quality Management (SQM) Key Process Area (KPA) analysis, which focuses on product quality, feeds the activities required to comply with Defect Prevention (DP) at Level 5.[1] Quantitative Process Management (QPM) at Level 4 focuses on the process which leads to Technology Change Management (TCM) and Process Change Management (PCM) at Level 5. At Level 3,metrics are collected, analyzed and used to status development and to make corrections to development efforts, as necessary. At Level 4, measurements are quantitatively analyzed to control process performance of the project and to develop a quantitative understanding of the quality of products to achieve specific quality goals. This paper presents the application of Statistical Process Control (SPC) in accomplishing the intent of SQM and QPM and applying the results to DP. Real project results are used to demonstrate the use of SPC as applied to software development. The main quantitative tool used was Statistical Process Control utilizing control charts. The project analyzed life cycle data collected during development for requirements, design, coding, integration, and during testing. Defects were collected during these life cycle phases and were quantitatively analyzed using statistical methods. The intent was to use this analysis to support the project in developing and delivering high quality products and at the same time using the information to make improvements, as required, to the development process.

Open PDF

Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Jan 01, 1999
Accession Number
AD1108245

Entities

People

  • A.l. Florence

Organizations

  • MITRE Corporation

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Materials and Manufacturing Processes

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Availability
  • Computer Programming
  • Computers
  • Computing-Related Activities
  • Data Science
  • Databases
  • Defect Detection
  • Engineering
  • Human Machine Interface
  • Human-Machine Interfaces
  • Information Science
  • Interdisciplinary Science
  • Knowledge Management
  • Lessons Learned
  • Life Cycles
  • Mathematics
  • Measurement
  • Project Management
  • Quality Control
  • Software Design
  • Software Development
  • Standards
  • Statistical Inference
  • Statistical Processes
  • Statistics
  • Systems Science

Fields of Study

  • Computer science
  • Engineering

Readers

  • Organizational Process Management (OPM).
  • Software Engineering.