Abstract
The UK Defence Standard for developing safety-related software, [16], requires that a safety analysis be performed on the process used to develop safety-related software. This paper describes the experience of performing such a safety analysis, and reflects upon the lessons learnt. It discusses the issues involved in defining the process at the appropriate level of abstraction, and it evaluates the difficulties and benefits of performing Function Failure Analysis and Fault-Tree Analysis on a development process. It concludes that the benefits of performing safety-analysis of a software development process are limited, but if such an analysis must be performed, it is best done to develop a qualitative understanding of the ways the process may fail, rather than to develop a quantitative understanding of the likelihood of the process failing.
It is noted that the appendices of [16] provide some guidance.
Adopting a SIL assignment procedure based on risk and severity in accordance with [15], and not only severity, as assumed by [16f].
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Mike Ainsworth, Katherine Eastaughffe, and Alan Simpson. Safety-Cases for Software Intensive Systems. In Redmill and Anderson [20], pages 1–12.
J. Barnes. High Integrity Ada: The SPARK Approach. Addison-Wesley, 1997.
Jack Crawford. Some Ways of Improving Our Methods of Qualitative Analysis and Why We Need Them. In Redmill and Anderson [20], pages 89–99.
W. J. Cullyer and N. Storey. Tools and Techniques for the Testing of Safety-Critical Software. IEE Computing and Control Engineering Journal, 5(5):239–244, October 1994.
Stewart Gardiner, editor. Testing Safety-Related Software: A Practical Handbook. Springer, 1999.
J. Griffyth. Human Issues in the Software Development Process — Modelling their Influence on Productivity and Integrity. In Redmill and Anderson [19], pages 105–123.
D. C. Ince. Software Testing, chapter 19. In McDermid [13], 1991.
Denis Jackson. New Developments in Quality Management as a Pre-requisite to Safety. In Redmill and Anderson [18], pages 257–269.
Nancy G. Leveson. Safeware: System Safety and Computers. Addison Wesley, 1995.
Bev Littlewood. Software Reliability Modelling, chapter 31. In McDermid [13], 1991.
Bev Littlewood. The Need for Evidence from Disparate Sources to Evaluate Software Safety. In Redmill and Anderson [18], pages 217–231.
R. Malcolm, S. Clarke, S. Hatton, and R. May. Who can you Trust?: Assessing Professional Competence. In Felix Redmill and Tom Anderson, editors, Towards System Safety — Proceedings of the 7 th Safety-Critical Systems Symposium, pages 239–255. Springer, 1999.
J.A. McDermid, editor. Software Engineering Reference Book. Butterworth-Heinemann, 1991.
Andrew McGettrick and Ray Ward. Towards Meaningful Uptake of Competency Descriptors. In Redmill and Anderson [20], pages 197–205.
Ministry of Defence. Safety Management Requirements for Defence Systems, December 1996. Defence Standard 00-56.
Ministry of Defence. The Procurement of Safety-Critical Software in Defence Equipment, August 1997. Defence Standard 00-55-Issue 2.
Martin Neil, Bev Littlewood, and Norman Fenton. Applying Bayseian Belief Networks to System Dependability Assessment. In Redmill and Anderson [19], pages 71–94.
Felix Redmill and Tom Anderson, editors. Directions in Safety-Critical Systems — Proceedings of the 1 st Safety-Critical Systems Symposium. Springer-Verlag, 1993.
Felix Redmill and Tom Anderson, editors. Safety-Critical Systems: The Convergence of High-Tech and Human Factors — Proceedings of the 4 th Safety-Critical Systems Symposium. Springer, 1996.
Felix Redmill and Tom Anderson, editors. Aspects of Safety Management — Proceedings of the 9 th Safety-Critical Systems Symposium. Springer, 2001.
H. R. Simpson. The MASCOT Method. Software Engineering Journal, 1(3):103–120, 1986.
H. R. Simpson. Layered Architecture(s): Principles and Practice in Concurrent and Distributed Systems. In Proceedings of the 8 th IEEE Symposium on Parallel and Distributed Processing, 1996.
G. Woodward. Rapier 2000 Software Development Programme. Software Engineering Journal, 11(2):82–87, 1996.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2002 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
About this paper
Cite this paper
Paynter, S.E., Born, B.W. (2002). Analysing the Safety of a Software Development Process. In: Anderson, S., Felici, M., Bologna, S. (eds) Computer Safety, Reliability and Security. SAFECOMP 2002. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 2434. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-45732-1_19
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-45732-1_19
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Print ISBN: 978-3-540-44157-1
Online ISBN: 978-3-540-45732-9
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive