Simulation-based FDP & FCP analysis with queueing models

Abstract

Continuous efforts have been devoted to software reliability modeling evolution over the past decades in order to adapt to the practical complex software testing environments. Many models have been proposed to describe the software fault related process. These software reliability growth models (SRGMs) have evolved from describing one fault detection process (FDP) into incorporating fault correction process (FCP) as well, in order to provide higher accuracy with more information. To provide mathematical tractability, models need to have closed form, with restrictive assumptions in a narrow sense. This in turn confines their capability for general applications. Alternatively, in this paper a general simulation based queueing modeling framework is proposed to describe FDP and FCP, with resource factors from practical software testing incorporated. Good simulation performance is observed with a numerical example. Furthermore, release time and debugger staffing issues are investigated with a revised cost model. The analysis is conducted through a simulation optimization approach.