Testing Complex and Embedded Systems What set of conditions could cause this event to occur? When we have elicited all we can from the customer about fault information, it is time to proceed further in our analysis. This next step requires investigation of the design to understand how the symptom of failure described could happen […]

Testing and Repeat-ability  Repeat-ability of testing results is important to establishing cause and corrective actions. If it is not possible to repeat the sequence of events leading to a failure, it is not possible to replicate and therefore difficult solve the cause of the fault or failure.  The steps that evoked the problem are necessary […]

Not a Verification Problem I recently had a flash of a project from the past. The project had a fixed delivery date.  The project was to deliver a system through iterative and incremental deliveries. Sounds pretty good right? An iterative and incremental delivery of sub systems and components to the verification group in a way […]

Below is an excerpt of our book Testing of Complex and Embedded Systems Pries, K., & Quigley, J. (2011). Chapter 4. In Testing Complex and Embedded Systems (pp. 33-35). Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press.   Basic Principle of Testing The verification and test group is there to provide some critical and unbiased review of the […]

Qualitative Testing Qualitative tests look for a change in a quality; for example, a color might change. Qualitative tests always involve the use of attributes rather than variables values (e.g., temperature). Consider the Kastle-Meyer test for the presence of blood–an archetype for qualitative forensic testing. The test is impressively quick and functions as a decision […]

Manufacturing Project The project whose scope includes delivery through manufacturing will include some quality assurance steps from the previous blog post to ensure we are able to produce the designed product to the quality expected by the sponsor. Trial Production Run and Problem Discovery The manufacturing team reviews the development of the manufacturing line with […]

In our last blog post, we referred to the APQP  (Advanced Product Quality Planning) activity of DFMEA.  The post was about the attempt to perform late in a project.  The point to the DFMEA in that instance was lost; at best, if we found a serious problem, would be to abort the launch.  The post […]

Quality Project Deliveries No matter the expected delivery, objective or product from the project, to deliver a high quality outcome is the result of intention.  It comes from the understanding of the scope, the planning and execution of appropriate quality securing actions and consistent monitoring and adjustment to lessons learned along the way Quality and […]