Quality Concepts

In a software world for FAA software, so DO-178B lots of this is assumed, but restated every time:

1. Tools
2. Techniques
3. Methodologies
4. Philosophies
5. Approaches

Philosophy - Software can be exhaustively tested without finding every failure mode. Software specifics vary between projects. The constant in the equation is the company. This does not mean the individual software should not be tested.

Approach - The company being my constant, I will measure that which doesn't vary between projects. The process the firm uses to produce software should not vary. I will develop standards to measure this tool they use for production (process). I will also test the software.

Methodology - I will take the statements of process policy within the firm (as they are updated to the specific project) and I will audit how well the firm complies with these. In the specific software - I will not measure how well it works, I will measure how well it complies with the requirements it is supposed to fulfill.

Techniques - Process will be measured with a combination of ad hoc inspection for compliance, and project specific inspections of work product against the process designed to produce these work products, in a series of Phases. Exit from one phase of production will be determined by compliance with the requirements of the previous phase. Software will be measured at multiple levels. The integrated system on the target software - against the requirements for that level. The hardware independent software requirements can be tested on or off the target hardware, but will be measured against the specific requirements for that level - a requirement at this level will be designed to tell the developer "what" the code shall do, not how the code shall do it. Beneath this shall be a level of requirements called the Design, the design shall be the product of analysis of the previous level, and will delineate "how" the requirement is to be fullfilled.

Tools - Specific tools shall be described in the top level documents //////////

Hard to make myself stop once I get started - I crank this stuff all day.

Note in the example - it IS hard to tell method from technique, approach from philosophy - up to you to decide where.

Good luck!

You have rec'd good advice from all that have posted so far.

May I take a stab at it? Rather than answers, I will illustrate with examples...

They are:

Tools (this one's easy) X bar r chart using average and standard Deviation (species)

Techniques (starts getting a bit hazy) Using Statistical process controls (genus) (as opposed to sacrificing virgins like we did in the old days)

Methodologies (er...) How we choose to implement these (families)

Philosophies Continuous improvement through use of Statistical Methods (order)

Quality mission is a (class)

Management is a (Phylum)

And Work would be the Kingdom ...

What you were given was a partial taxonomy of quality discipline; Why not use what we know biological taxonomy to illuminate this assignment?

Hope this helps. Its a quick take, I'll be travelling a few days. Feel free to adjust. I'd love to get a copy of your finished report,

milo

Hi,Any Philosophy is the foundation guide line; does not tell you how to achieve what you specifically need;not offers you ready solutions, But highly essential for you to be on your right journey.This journey is the approach to problem solving.(You must define the problem before solving it.). You then solve the problem using right tools. This Process of problem solving with effective use of tools is the methodology you adopt to get the desired results. sanjay