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| R.W. Butler, G.B. Finelli, "The Infeasibility of Quantifying the Reliability of Life-Critical Real-Time Software," IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering, vol. 19, no. 1, pp. 3-12, January, 1993. | |||
| BibTex | x | ||
| @article{ 10.1109/32.210303, author = {R.W. Butler and G.B. Finelli}, title = {The Infeasibility of Quantifying the Reliability of Life-Critical Real-Time Software}, journal ={IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering}, volume = {19}, number = {1}, issn = {0098-5589}, year = {1993}, pages = {3-12}, doi = {http://doi.ieeecomputersociety.org/10.1109/32.210303}, publisher = {IEEE Computer Society}, address = {Los Alamitos, CA, USA}, } | |||
| RefWorks Procite/RefMan/Endnote | x | ||
| TY - JOUR JO - IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering TI - The Infeasibility of Quantifying the Reliability of Life-Critical Real-Time Software IS - 1 SN - 0098-5589 SP3 EP12 EPD - 3-12 A1 - R.W. Butler, A1 - G.B. Finelli, PY - 1993 KW - reliability; life-critical real-time software; statistical methods; fault-tolerant software; growth models; software fault tolerance; multiversion software experiments; fault tolerant computing; real-time systems; safety; software reliability VL - 19 JA - IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering ER - | |||
This work affirms that the quantification of life-critical software reliability is infeasible using statistical methods, whether these methods are applied to standard software or fault-tolerant software. The classical methods of estimating reliability are shown to lead to exorbitant amounts of testing when applied to life-critical software. Reliability growth models are examined and also shown to be incapable of overcoming the need for excessive amounts of testing. The key assumption of software fault tolerance-separately programmed versions fail independently-is shown to be problematic. This assumption cannot be justified by experimentation in the ultrareliability region, and subjective arguments in its favor are not sufficiently strong to justify it as an axiom. Also, the implications of the recent multiversion software experiments support this affirmation.
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