An Experimental Investigation Into Software Reliability

Abstract

This report presents the results of an experiment investigating the effect of Fortran and Ada languages on program reliability. The experimental design employed was a full factorial design, i.e., a design in two variables, each at two levels. The problem used in the experiment was the Launch Interceptor Program (LIP), a simple but realistic anti-missile system. Reliability comparisons between Ada and Fortran programs were based on the total number of errors as well as on errors found during various testing phases. Some comparisons were also based on error density, the number of errors per 100 non- comment lines of code. It was found that on the average, the Ada programs had about 70 percent less errors than the Fortran ones. If errors during unit testing were excluded, the Ada program had about 78 percent less errors. Similar differences were found for data based on error causes and error types. Keywords: Software Reliability, Software measurement.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Oct 01, 1988
Accession Number
ADA206293

Entities

People

  • Amrit L. Goel

Organizations

  • Syracuse University

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • C4I
  • Sensors
  • Weapons Technologies

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Computer Programming
  • Computer Programs
  • Computers
  • Debugging
  • Engineering
  • Experimental Design
  • Factorial Design
  • Information Processing
  • Information Science
  • Programming Languages
  • Reliability
  • Software Development
  • Software Development Tools
  • Software Testing
  • Test And Evaluation
  • Test Methods
  • Test Sets

Fields of Study

  • Education
  • Engineering

Readers

  • Approximation Theory.
  • Computational Modeling and Simulation
  • Computer Science.