Don, It is very dangerous to assume that COTS software is correct. IMHO, it should not be treated any differently than in-house software when it comes to validation, but unfortunately that is not how auditors view it. I have seen MAJOR problems with some of the commercial software for EMC, even to the point that tests are not run per the standards. It helps when someone from the software/equipment vendor comes in to do full integration, but don't even assume they know what they are doing. One problem with COTS software are the many instrument drivers they may brag about having. Do you think they have every one of these instruments on hand where they write the code? I doubt it. They probably wrote most of the drivers while at a various client's sites, or with rented equipment. The driver may work well with a particular instrument with specific options installed. I ran into a case where a spec-an was making measurements with almost 10dB of error due to the fact it has a narrow band-width option installed and the software driver was not written to take that into account. That is one advantage to in-house software, it is written for and tested with the specific hardware being used. I could talk for a long time about the many ways I have seen commercial software not perform correctly..... :-) Cheers, Bob Richards, NCT. [email protected] wrote:
In a message dated 8/19/2005 3:12:03 PM GMT Daylight Time, [email protected] writes: professional software you can just about put money on it's correct. Apart from it's professionally written, when you have a significant install base, that gets rolled into the software. One of the things that in-house software just can't compete with. ---------------------------------------------------------------- This message is from the IEEE Product Safety Engineering Society emc-pstc discussion list. Website: http://www.ieee-pses.org/ To post a message to the list, send your e-mail to [email protected] Instructions: http://listserv.ieee.org/listserv/request/user-guide.html List rules: http://www.ieee-pses.org/listrules.html For help, send mail to the list administrators: Scott Douglas [email protected] Mike Cantwell [email protected] For policy questions, send mail to: Richard Nute: [email protected] Jim Bacher: [email protected] All emc-pstc postings are archived and searchable on the web at: http://www.ieeecommunities.org/emc-pstc
