A Covariate Software Reliability Model and Optimal Test Activity Allocation  
Author Vidhyashree Nagaraju

 

Co-Author(s) Chathuri Jayasinghe; Lance Fiondella

 

Abstract Traditional software reliability growth models enable quantitative assessment of the software testing process by characterizing fault detection in terms of testing time or effort. However, the majority of these models do not identify specific testing activities underlying fault discovery and thus can only provide limited guidance on how to incrementally allocate effort. Although there are several novel studies focused on covariate software reliability growth models, they are limited to model development, application, and assessment. This paper presents a non-homogeneous Poisson process software reliability growth model incorporating covariates based on the discrete Cox proportional hazards model. An efficient and stable expectation conditional maximization algorithm is applied to identify the model parameters. An optimal test activity allocation problem is formulated to maximize fault discovery. The proposed method is illustrated through numerical examples on a data set from the literature.

 

Keywords software reliability growth model, nonhomogeneous Poisson process, proportional hazards model, covariates, test activity allocation
   
    Article #:  RQD26-139
 

Proceedings of 26th ISSAT International Conference on Reliability & Quality in Design
Virtual Event

August 5-7, 2021