Overview

Trustworthy computing requires both trustworthy hardware and trustworthy software. Early computer hardware manufacturers supplied application software but soon retreated from such offerings for fear of contingent liability. This gave rise to the third-party software industry giving the user of enterprise software the choice of build or buy, or a combination of the two. Recently Microsoft, the dominant supplier of system and application software for desktop computers, started a trustworthy computing initiative. This initiative focuses on security, privacy, reliability, and business integrity. The development of enterprise application software has a long history of process management and improvement, and more recently has seen the use of statistical process control technology. Criteria are given for software performance measures and for measurable attributes of the development process. Consistent, measurable attributes are required to allow the process to be controlled by statistical methods. Statistical process control methods were developed for manufacturing process control, where they are used downstream in the manufacturing process to control the process by feedback. Software development has no analog to manufacturing, so statistical methods must be pushed as far upstream in the design process as possible. Current developments are pushing statistical process control methods into the architectural design stage of the development process. Software developers have a wide variety of packaged statistical tools available to support the development process.

Chapter Outline

• Trustworthy Software

• Microsoft's Trustworthy Computing Initiative

• Statistical Process Control for Software Development Processes

• Statistical Methods for Software Architects

• Key Points

• Additional Resources

• Internet Exercises

• Review Questions

• Discussion Questions and Projects

• Problems

• Endnotes