A QFD-Based Framework for Test Software Assessment

[[abstract]]Nowadays, software has been applied and become indispensable in every area of people's daily life. However, software inevitably contains defects which may vary in scale of their influences. No matter what the effects are, they can reduce the customer loyalty and sales amount of products. In order to reduce the influences due to software defects and maintain good software quality, it is necessary to start performing software testing when software development life cycle begins. Since improving software quality is a labor-intensive and time-consuming task, many automated software testing tools are developed to accelerate the process of software testing. Although it is important using software testing tool to accelerate the testing process, how to evaluate and select the proper tools for the work is also a mandatory issue. A poorly chosen tool not only wastes much labor but also delays the whole schedule of the project. This research proposed a framework for software testing tools assessment based on Quality Function Deployment (QFD). Proper software testing tool can be selected objectively through the assessment of QFD. In the process of assessment, characteristics of the software being developed, functionalities of software testing tools, and the relationships between them are developed with the aid of Delphi Method. Having selected the proper software testing tool for the software project, the efficiency of software testing can be promoted and thus enhance the software quality. The proposed framework also takes advantage of reusing the data generated in previous software projects. By accumulating formerly analyzed data and the testing results, effects can be saved from pursuing known results