> I used to write software for a living. Now I manage > people who do. Even with the use of automated test > tools, a dedicated test team, and knowledgeable beta > testers, we can't simulate everything that happens > once the software is released "into the wild."
Whether it is "mission critical" has a lot to do with the completeness of software testing too, Space Shuttle and flight computer software where people can actually die if there was a fault gets far more testing than say, digital camera software. Even then software bugs can still be found on these supposedly fully tested software, example include the Grippen fighter and F-22 fighter crash when some software parameter had the wrong sign and the aircraft got into oscillation during flight testing. I found through managing a number of software projects that even with "approved test procedure" and "regression testing" and "free play testing" by our developers, that it really only matters when the real users started using the software, I am amazed how quickly sometimes they manage to break a software that has passed all the above mentioned tests when it is really exercised by the real users. And in the case of cameras, those "real users" are us ! Ken -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . * **** ******* *********************************************************** * For list instructions, including unsubscribe, see: * http://www.a1.nl/phomepag/markerink/eos_list.htm ***********************************************************
