Software Quality Assurance

Software quality assurance, or SQA, is the process of ensuring that software is developed in line with customer expectations, requirements and mandates, any government or industry regulations, and with user expectations in mind. It includes everything from bug testing to feature and functionality testing, and more.

What Should You Know about Software Quality Assurance?

The software development life cycle (SDLC) includes multiple steps. One of those, located just before deployment, is testing. Software quality assurance plays a role in this step, but it is also prevalent in every other step within the SDLC.

Software quality assurance is responsible for several things, including the following:

• Ensuring Standards Are Met: All software, whether web-based, cloud-based, installed on a PC, or app-related, must meet several specifications before it can be released to the customer to the general public. SQA is responsible for ensuring that this happens.

• Customer Requirements: Software is ordered by customers and must meet specific requirements. These can include usage requirements, security requirements, functionality requirements and more. SQA helps ensure that this is the case.

• Functionality: SQA tests for functionality within software features. Normally, this is done during each stage of development, as well as after development has been completed.

The Importance of Testing in Phases

While it would seem to make sense that software should be tested only once fully developed, akin to the testing method used with physical product manufacturing, that is not the case. Doing this often results in the discovery of serious flaws and bugs that could have been prevented had testing been done during each individual phase.

Software quality assurance should be done throughout each phase of development. This includes conceptual and analysis phases, as well. Doing so ensures that not only does the development team known the requirements of the client, but that those requirements are fully understood.

Moving on from there, each section of the software in development must be tested as it is developed. It should be tested on its own, to ensure inherent code functionality for that module specifically, but it should also be tested in conjunction with all preexisting modules that will eventually make up the completed software.

How Does Software Quality Assurance Differ from Software Quality Control?

Quality assurance and quality control sound like they are similar. However, while they do share some similarities, they are not identical. While quality assurance involves the actual testing, quality control involves the processes used to ensure that quality is up to par. So, testing would be something that a software quality control professional would verify was being implemented correctly.

Software quality assurance is just as important as quality control. In the overall development life cycle, ongoing testing must be performed within each phase to ensure operability, functionality and adherence to mandates from the customer. Failing to do so will result in a subpar product being released, in extensive rework needs, and major fixes being delivered during the maintenance phase, all of which drive up costs.