Practical knowledge and its importance for software product quality

To achieve software product quality professional skill and knowledge is important. The way to reach software product quality is often structured approaches for software quality such as SPI and CMM which have been criticized for lack of a knowledge perspective. The view taken in this study is that software product quality is related to interpretations and understanding in practice, and thus on practical knowledge. Based on a qualitative study of practising software developers’ understanding of the concept of quality and quality assessment, it is shown why quality resists definition and why experience-based, practical knowledge is important.