Demonstrating software reliability using possibly correlated tests: Insights from a conservative Bayesian approach
-
Published:2023-10-27
Issue:
Volume:
Page:
-
ISSN:0748-8017
-
Container-title:Quality and Reliability Engineering International
-
language:en
-
Short-container-title:Quality & Reliability Eng
Author:
Salako Kizito1ORCID,
Zhao Xingyu23ORCID
Affiliation:
1. Centre for Software Reliability, City University of London London UK
2. Department of Computer Science University of Liverpool Liverpool UK
3. Warwick Manufacturing Group University of Warwick Coventry UK
Abstract
AbstractThis paper presents Bayesian techniques for conservative claims about software reliability, particularly when evidence suggests the software's executions are not statistically independent. We formalise informal notions of “doubting” that the executions are independent, and incorporate such doubts into reliability assessments. We develop techniques that reveal the extent to which independence assumptions can undermine conservatism in assessments, and identify conditions under which this impact is not significant. These techniques – novel extensions of conservative Bayesian inference (CBI) approaches – give conservative confidence bounds on the software's failure probability per execution. With illustrations in two application areas – nuclear power‐plant safety and autonomous vehicle (AV) safety – our analyses reveals: (1) the confidence an assessor should possess before subjecting a system to operational testing. Otherwise, such testing is futile – favourable operational testing evidence will eventually decrease one's confidence in the system being sufficiently reliable; (2) the independence assumption supports conservative claims sometimes; (3) in some scenarios, observing a system operate without failure gives less confidence in the system than if some failures had been observed; (4) building confidence in a system is very sensitive to failures – each additional failure means significantly more operational testing is required, in order to support a reliability claim.
Funder
Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council
Horizon 2020 Framework Programme
Subject
Management Science and Operations Research,Safety, Risk, Reliability and Quality
Reference62 articles.
1. WiermanTE BeckST CalleyMB EideSA GentillonCD KohnWE.Reliability study: combustion engineering reactor protection system.Technical Report NUREG/CR‐5500. Vol10.Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission;2001:1984‐1998.
2. Two-stage Bayesian models—application to ZEDB project
3. The two-stage Bayesian method used for the T-Book application
4. StriginiL LittlewoodB.Guidelines for statistical testing.Technical Report (PASCON/WO6‐CCN2/TN12) ESA/ESTEC. Project PASCON;1997.