ScopeThis part of ISO/IEC 14598 provides requirements and recommendations for the practical implementation of software product evaluation when the evaluation is conducted in parallel with the development and carried out by the developer. In particular, it may be used to apply the concepts described in ISO/IEC 9126-1, 2, 3 and ISO/IEC 14598-1, 2, 6.
The process described in this part of ISO/IEC 14598 defines the activities needed to analyse evaluation requirements, to specify, design, and perform evaluation actions and to conclude the evaluation of any kind of software product.
The evaluation process is designed to be used concurrently with the development. The evaluation process needs to be synchronised with the software development process and the entities be evaluated as they are delivered.
This part of ISO/IEC 14598 may be used by
- a project manager to clarify quality requirements, to monitor and control the quality of the software during development and to make decisions to assure that the required quality is built in,
- a software designer to identify specific features that should be built into the software or changed in order to meet the quality requirements,
- a quality assurance / control / audit responsible to evaluate whether the quality requirements are met,
- a maintainer to make decisions for the implementation of changes and redesign/reengineering,
- a software acquirer as part of an agreement with a developer when acquiring software (e.g. in the case of outsourcing software development) when an independent evaluation is not required.
Acquirers may be personnel in a purchasing role, developers outsourcing a part of the software product, or end-users. The role of the acquirer depends on the agreement between the acquirer and the developer. ISO/IEC 14598-4 describes evaluation from the acquirers point of view.
This part of ISO/IEC 14598 is intended for application at the project level. In order to obtain full benefit from this standard the organization should be involved. This aspect is covered in ISO/IEC 14598-2.
This part of ISO/IEC 14598 does not prescribe specific indicators or metrics nor does it prescribe any particular development method.
