Quantification of the quality characteristics for the calculation of software reliability

:This paper presents a method to describe and increase the software quality of automation systems by a quantitative determination of the software reliability. Therefore, the software development process has been analyzed to identify the essential factors influencing the software reliability. These are the usage of a procedure model, the test factor and the human factor of the software developers themselves. These factors have been considered to create a neuro-fuzzy-based concept, which characterizes and consolidates them to realize an estimation of the software quality. The possibility to estimate the software quality, especially dynamically already during the software development process, will entail a huge benefit to programmers and manufacturers. Effects, methods or circumstances influencing the software quality in a negative or positive way can be numerically described and rated. On basis of that, necessary optimizations in the development process can be performed in time to guarantee a high quality of the software.