Software Testing

Software engineering is the only engineering discipline where product testing is a major technical and organizational concern, as well as an important cost factor. Several factors contribute to this state of affairs: • The first factor that makes software testing such a big concern is, of course, the size and complexity of software products, which make the design of software products a high-risk, error-prone proposition. • The second factor is the lack of a standardized development process for software products, which means that product quality cannot be ensured by process controls, and has to be ensured by product controls instead. • The third factor is the scarcity of practical, scalable methods that can ensure product quality through static product analysis, shifting the burden to dynamic methods. • Other factors include the absence of a general reuse discipline, the lack of scalability of correctness-preserving development methods, and the pervasiveness of specification changes through the development, maintenance, and evolution process, etc.