Quality Assurance

Introduction
Quality Assurance (QA) consists of those procedures, techniques and a tool used to ensure that Icreon’s Solutions meets or exceeds pre-specified standards during its development cycle. Software Quality Assurance is closely related to the verification and validation (V&V) activities carried out at each stage of the software life cycle. Quality planning begins at an early stage in the software process. A quality plan sets out the desired product qualities and defines how these are assessed.

The quality plan also clearly states which quality attributes are most significant for the solution being developed. It should also states which standards are appropriate to the product and to the process, and defines the plan for developing these standards.

Icreon’s QA Team
Within Icreon, QA is carried out by an independent software quality assurance team that reports directly to management above the project manager level. The QA team is not associated with any particular development group but is responsible for QA across Icreon.

At Icreon the QA team has a stable interface with management and is also stable & experienced enough to hold and transfer knowledge and experience. Icreon’s team members, therefore, have a longer-term commitment. QA personnel enter the team because it aligns with their activities within a project, but from then on they are QA team members with different responsibilities.




Icreon's QA Activities

I. Process Quality Assurance
A well planned and managed process is more likely to lead to high quality products. Therefore, the QA team in the first place, ensures the quality of the software process. The QA team:

• Defines process standards such as how reviews should be conducted, and when reviews should be held
• Monitors the development process to ensure that the standards are being followed
• Reports the software process to project management and to the customer

These activities are ultimately controlled by the "Software Director". The QA team is asked for advice by Project teams or individual developers, but is only responsible to the Software Director. More specifically, the Software Director is responsible for the software standards. The QA team only proposes changes and implements changes approved by the Software Director.


II. Software standards
One of the most important tasks of Icreon’s QA team is the development and maintenance of product and process standards. Product standards define characteristics which all product components exhibit; process standards define how the software process are conducted. Standards at Icreon fulfill the under-mentioned obligation:

• Provide an encapsulation of best and most appropriate practices
• Provide a framework around which a QA process is implemented
• Assist in continuity where work carried out by one person is taken up and continued by another

Our QA team bases its organizational standards on national and international standards.


III. Acceptance of Standards
To resolve acceptance issues between Software Engineers & QA Specialists, in defining standards for a particular project, Icreon’s QA team:

• Involves software engineers in the development of product standards
• Reviews and modifies standards regularly to reflect changing technologies
• Provides software tools to support the standards where possible
• Decides with the project manager at the beginning of a project on which standards to use without change, which should be modified, which should be ignored and which new standards must be developed

IV Knowledge Database
The "standards" activities are seen as a specialization and formalization of a more fundamental task of the QA team: to become the local database of knowledge and experience about software engineering. The QA team:

• Follows the software technology developments - by monitoring the local projects, by reading the literature, and by maintaining external contacts
• Stores the information gained and makes it locally available - by keeping sorted and annotated lists of books, articles, reports, and other relevant bodies of information
• Responds to queries by the Software Director, Project Teams and Individual Developers - by pointing them to the proper place.