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9841_18 | Speed Racer and Captain Future proving to be problematic. It was only during the rise of cable television during the '90s that Japanese series such as Queen Millennia, and Rose of Versailles went on air. A strong affinity for unique Japanese productions was developed among a generation of German children during this period. |
9841_19 | Fan Communities in Malaysia |
9841_20 | Studies of fan behavior focused more on big fan activities or conventions in the past and transitioned toward from fan communities to individual fans. There are four conventions in urban areas of Malaysia: Kota Kinabalu, Sabah; Kuching, Sarawak; Sunway, Petaling Jaya, Selangor and Kuala Lumpur. They are held four times annually between December 2012 and August 2013. According to the survey, there are about 585 people who regularly attend these conventions. Half of the respondents were aged 18–22 as of 2013 with equal numbers of both genders. More than half of the respondents were student and all respondents were consumers of Japanese media object. Although those four conventions did not officially announce that their event is mainly Japanese popular culture, majority of people were fans of Japanese popular culture. Their main purpose of attending these conventions were to meet new/old friends, to have fun, and to cosplay. They regularly attend these conventions to keep their fan |
9841_21 | communities active. |
9841_22 | Demographics
Age
In a nationwide survey held in 2018 by Dentsu, 64.3% of Japanese individuals among the 20-29 age group responded that they are highly interested in anime, while the corresponding figure for those aged 15–19 was 72.4%, 56% aged 30–39, 48.4% aged 40–49, 38.7% aged 50–59.
Gender
In the early days of the fandom it was predominantly male.
An analitical survey held by Forbes in 2014 revealed that half of North American anime convention attendees are female. |
9841_23 | Appeal of anime and manga |
9841_24 | One major appeal of anime is its artwork; some fans claim that its visual quality is superior to that found in most animated series made in the United States and many ignore all non-Japanese animation. One fan described enjoying anime because "there is no dividing line between special effects and what is real...it's just the way somebody imagined it". The content editor of Anime Fringe, Holly Kolodziejczak, described being amazed by anime's depth that was unlike the cartoons she had seen before: "the characters had real personalities, their own feelings and motivations for their actions, strengths and flaws that enhanced their characters. They were more like real people, and thus people could much more readily identify with them." Larry Green of Nausicaa.net agreed and added that anime discusses subjects for both adults and children whereas in the United States animation is traditionally for children. He also stated that any viewer would be able to find something to their liking due |
9841_25 | to anime's large scale of production. |
9841_26 | Susan J. Napier, a Professor of Japanese Language and Literature, stated that anime fans "find refuge in a culture that diverges from the typical American way of life." She pointed out that fascination with Japanese culture is not a new concept and has existed since the mid-19th century. For example, an 1876 painting by Claude Monet entitled La Japonaise depicts Monet's wife wearing a kimono, with Japanese hand fans shown in the background. Napier described this interest in Japan as an "escape from the Industrial Revolution ... a pastoral utopia" for many Europeans.
Fan service |
9841_27 | Fan service is material in a series which is intentionally added to please the audience. Although fan service usually refers to sexually provocative scenes, it also refers more generally to events of little plot value designed to excite viewers or simply make them take notice, such as big explosions and battle scenes. When anime and manga are translated into English by U.S. companies, the original work is often edited to remove some of the fan service to make it more appropriate for U.S. audiences. Mike Tatsugawa explained this change as a result of a difference between cultural values of Japan and the U.S. In fact, some anime seem to feature little else other than fan service as their selling point. Some believe that the prevalence of fan service indicates a lack of maturity within the fandom; an editor of Del Rey Manga joked that manga Negima!, which contained fan service, should be rated as "for immature readers 16+" rather than for "mature readers 16+".
Fan labor |
9841_28 | Dōjin
Dōjin are fan-made creation that are oftentimes bought and sold through dōjin events. Dōjin consists of doujinshi (doujin magazine, could be manga, novel, or essay), doujinsoft (doujin games and software), doujin music, and doujin anime. Dōjin events aim to help creators distribute manga commercially without the need for a publisher. The oldest and largest dōjin event worldwide is Comic Market, more commonly known as Comiket. The Comiket 97 fair (December 2019) in Tokyo, Japan totaled approximately 750,000 visitors.
Learning about Japan |
9841_29 | Language |
9841_30 | Anime and manga have stimulated many young people to learn the Japanese language. In the 1970s, Naoka Takaya's Saskatoon Japanese Language School was founded with a student body consisting of primarily Japanese-Canadians interested in polishing their language skills for their return to Japan. However, popularity for the language began to rise; the Japanese Language Proficiency Test was first held in 1984 in response to growing demand for standardized Japanese language certification. Yuki Sasaki, who works for the Japanese language program at the University of Georgia, noted that when she first started in the program in 1994, most students were interested in Japanese for internal business majors; however, in 2004, students are more interested in "translating Japanese pop-song lyrics and talk excitedly about the Japanese anime character Sakura Kinomoto from Cardcaptor Sakura." Echoing this sentiment, Takaya also stated that about 60% of her students are studying Japanese because of |
9841_31 | anime. |
9841_32 | Despite some fansubbers declaring (due to fansubbing's illegality) that they will stop distribution once a series is licensed, many fansubbed versions of anime are produced because of the stiff localization process in official translations. According to one survey only 9% of fans prefer dubbing over subs; some fans believe that the localization process degrades the quality of anime and thus look to fansubs for the purer form of Japanese culture, feeling that something is lost in translation. Most hardcore fans are motivated by the desire not to miss the jokes and puns present in Japanese anime and manga. In fact, most people interested in anime express at least a passing desire to learn Japanese, but usually choose not to, due to either time constraints or rumours about the difficulty involved in learning Japanese. Japanese terms are so well integrated into the anime and manga fan culture that during a Fanime convention, a newcomer expressed confusion at some of the announcements |
9841_33 | because she was unable to understand the Japanese words used. As fans become more proficient at Japanese; they often also become more critical toward the quality of various translations; some critique the different translations of a single series by different fansub groups. |
9841_34 | Some fans even decide to translate professionally. In fact, fluent English speakers who know sufficient Japanese are often preferred for translating over fluent Japanese speakers who know sufficient English, as the syntax of the latter group tends to be stiff. Del Rey Manga's editor finds much of their talent through conventions. |
9841_35 | Japanese Language in Australia Research about Japanese language in Northwood and Thomson 2012, The Japan Foundation 2011 and 2013 tells us that many people are motivated to learn the Japanese language due to interest in Japanese popular culture. People who are not formally studying Japanese but identify themselves as Japanese popular culture are ignored. However, the report in East Asian Journal of Popular Culture by Sumiko lida and William S. Armour suggest the opposite. Their 2016 study results show that people's interest and motivation to consume Japanese popular culture products does not lead them to get formal Japanese language education. Their goal was to discover the correlation of Australian fans of anime and manga with the Japanese popular culture products. The results were 47.7 (n=118) percent of the people who had some sort of Japanese education indicated that they got the motivation to learn through anime and manga. But 66.3 (132 out of 199) percent of people who said |
9841_36 | they had no prior education in Japanese also showed motivation to learn Japanese in the future. While there are still optimism about Japanese popular culture fans' would increase the number of people who wants to learn Japanese language, the actual data seems to contradict. |
9841_37 | Manga and anime in the Secondary English classroom Teaching anime text in an English classroom setting is something to be experimented to see how it shapes the relationship between teachers and students. Manga and anime texts are new in Western education. Australian state of New South Wales implemented manga and anime texts in their secondary English class and the results were different depending on how much students are interested in manga and anime. Students who were interested in manga and anime and called themselves 'big fans" showed very very high level of enthusiasm in class. Students showed significant and emotive level of engagement in class. Students were able to share their thoughts in manga and anime texts in their English classroom. Difference arose when a student was not interested in manga and anime texts. Frank in the experiment argued that it did not capture the majority of students to be interest in manga and anime texts. Having few students who are interested in |
9841_38 | manga and anime out of 30 students which is the average class sizes is not a majority. This results shows that implementing manga and anime texts would be different depending on the student. |
9841_39 | Culture
Anime and manga have also inspired many young people to learn about Japanese culture, and the anime fan community in fact encourages people to do so. Fans often learn about Japanese honorifics from anime and manga. Companies such as Del Rey Manga and GoComi add explanatory notes describing honorifics and other words and concepts that do not translate well between languages.
Technology and the Internet |
9841_40 | Developments on the Internet have had profound effects on the anime fan community and the way in which anime is consumed. Additionally, fan interest in anime has inspired many developments in technology. Roughly 68% of fans obtain anime through downloading from the Internet or through their friends, a much larger proportion than in any other medium. As a result, fans have made some of the most sophisticated advances in peer-to-peer software in order to make searching for and downloading anime online faster. Other fans have created websites that uses a custom server to search the Internet for video mirrors and new episodes, similar to search engines on how they crawl each website and saves the information gathered to the database. The search engine keeps every episodes up to date. VirtualDub, a video capture and processing utility, was first created for use on an anime film adaptation of Sailor Moon. The desire to simulate all forms of media that anime and manga comes in has caused |
9841_41 | PyTom to create Ren'Py, an open-source software engine that allows for the creation of visual novels without the need for a programming background. Anime fans have also developed image upscaling tools, some using Artificial intelligence. Examples of such tools are waifu2x, Bigjpg and Anime4K. The Combined Community Codec Pack (CCCP, a play on the initials of the former Soviet Union) was originally created for the playback of anime fansubs. |
9841_42 | Several online communities have been formed where fans can come together to share and interact. Sites that offer file sharing services are popular and influential where people can gain easy access to anime and manga. Fandom has also resulted in the creation of anime and manga fan communities on sites where people can share fan art, one of the most common ways for fans to express their love of anime. These communities tend to do more than just share files. Like most forums on the Internet, they discuss topics that they are interested in and want to know more about. These anime forums are becoming places for people to discuss the plot, characters, and styles of anime and manga. Since the 2010s, many anime fans have begun widely using social media platforms like YouTube, Facebook, Reddit and Twitter (which has added an entire "anime and manga" category of topics) to discuss and follow the latest news of their favorite anime and manga series.
Sightseeing in Japan |
9841_43 | Many anime fans dream of one day visiting Japan. A large number of well-known travel agencies from Japan have begun offering anime tours. In 2003, the company Pop Japan Travel was founded to help customers experience Japan's content industry (including anime, games, food, and fashion) by allowing them to visit studios and meet artists, among other activities. Many different museums dedicated to the industry exist throughout Japan, such as the Suginami Animation Museum in Tokyo and the Tezuka Osamu Manga Museum in the Hyogo Prefecture. Other popular locations include places where people can enjoy anime-related activities, such as shopping for related merchandise or singing anime theme songs. Additionally, fans enjoy visiting real-life locations that serve as settings for some anime, and locations where live-action movies were filmed. For example, the popularity of Lucky Star brought many of its fans to the real-life settings of the anime, beginning in April 2007.Places to Visit for |
9841_44 | Anime and Manga Fans' |
9841_45 | Akihabara: A popular location for anime fans to visit is Akihabara, located in Tokyo. Known as the Electric Town, it is a major shopping area where people can buy manga, anime, and other assorted otaku merchandise. The Tokyo Anime Center is one of the most popular spots in Akihabara, where a diverse set of events take place, such as the display of new anime films, related exhibitions, talk shows featuring voice actors, and public recordings of radio programs.
The Gundam Base Tokyo: A store themes after the Gundam franchise. It opened on August 19, 2017, replacing Gundam Front Tokyo at Diver City Tokyo Plaza in Odaiba. There is Life-Sized Unicorn Gundam Statue(RX-0) which transforms every hour from Unicorn Mode to Destroy Mode
Notable anime and manga fans
Elon Musk
Ariana Grande
Megan Fox
Brennan Williams
Evgenia Medvedeva
Jungkook
V
Kirsten Dunst
John Boyega
Pharrell Williams
Kanye West
John Cena |
9841_46 | See also
Anime club
Anime convention
Cosplay
Science fiction fandom
Editing of anime in American distribution
Japanese pop culture in the United States
Japanophilia
ACG (subculture)
References
External links
An online forum dedicated to anime and manga in general
Daily anime recommendations, quotes and life lessons
Nerd culture |
9842_0 | In the context of software engineering, software quality refers to two related but distinct notions:
Software functional quality reflects how well it complies with or conforms to a given design, based on functional requirements or specifications. That attribute can also be described as the fitness for purpose of a piece of software or how it compares to competitors in the marketplace as a worthwhile product. It is the degree to which the correct software was produced.
Software structural quality refers to how it meets non-functional requirements that support the delivery of the functional requirements, such as robustness or maintainability. It has a lot more to do with the degree to which the software works as needed. |
9842_1 | Many aspects of structural quality can be evaluated only statically through the analysis of the software inner structure, its source code (see Software metrics), at the unit level, system level (sometimes referred to as end-to-end testing), which is in effect how its architecture adheres to sound principles of software architecture outlined in a paper on the topic by Object Management Group (OMG).
However some structural qualities, such as usability, can be assessed only dynamically (users or others acting in their behalf interact with the software or, at least, some prototype or partial implementation; even the interaction with a mock version made in cardboard represents a dynamic test because such version can be considered a prototype). Other aspects, such as reliability, might involve not only the software but also the underlying hardware, therefore, it can be assessed both statically and dynamically (stress test). |
9842_2 | Functional quality is typically assessed dynamically but it is also possible to use static tests (such as software reviews).
Historically, the structure, classification and terminology of attributes and metrics applicable to software quality management have been derived or extracted from the ISO 9126 and the subsequent ISO/IEC 25000 standard. Based on these models (see Models), the Consortium for IT Software Quality (CISQ) has defined five major desirable structural characteristics needed for a piece of software to provide business value: Reliability, Efficiency, Security, Maintainability and (adequate) Size. |
9842_3 | Software quality measurement quantifies to what extent a software program or system rates along each of these five dimensions. An aggregated measure of software quality can be computed through a qualitative or a quantitative scoring scheme or a mix of both and then a weighting system reflecting the priorities. This view of software quality being positioned on a linear continuum is supplemented by the analysis of "critical programming errors" that under specific circumstances can lead to catastrophic outages or performance degradations that make a given system unsuitable for use regardless of rating based on aggregated measurements. Such programming errors found at the system level represent up to 90 percent of production issues, whilst at the unit-level, even if far more numerous, programming errors account for less than 10 percent of production issues (see also Ninety-ninety rule). As a consequence, code quality without the context of the whole system, as W. Edwards Deming described |
9842_4 | it, has limited value. |
9842_5 | To view, explore, analyze, and communicate software quality measurements, concepts and techniques of information visualization provide visual, interactive means useful, in particular, if several software quality measures have to be related to each other or to components of a software or system. For example, software maps represent a specialized approach that "can express and combine information about software development, software quality, and system dynamics".
Software quality also plays a role in the release phase of a software project. Specifically, the quality and establishment of the release processes (also patch processes), configuration management are important parts of a overall software engineering process.
Motivation
Software quality is motivated by at least two main perspectives: |
9842_6 | Risk management: Software failure has caused more than inconvenience. Software errors can cause human fatalities (see for example: List of software bugs). The causes have ranged from poorly designed user interfaces to direct programming errors, see for example Boeing 737 case or Unintended acceleration cases or Therac-25 cases. This resulted in requirements for the development of some types of software, particularly and historically for software embedded in medical and other devices that regulate critical infrastructures: "[Engineers who write embedded software] see Java programs stalling for one third of a second to perform garbage collection and update the user interface, and they envision airplanes falling out of the sky.". In the United States, within the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), the FAA Aircraft Certification Service provides software programs, policy, guidance and training, focus on software and Complex Electronic Hardware that has an effect on the airborne |
9842_7 | product (a "product" is an aircraft, an engine, or a propeller). Certification standards such as DO-178C, ISO 26262, IEC 62304, etc. provide guidance. |
9842_8 | Cost management: As in any other fields of engineering, a software product or service governed by good software quality costs less to maintain, is easier to understand and can change more cost-effective in response to pressing business needs. Industry data demonstrate that poor application structural quality in core business applications (such as enterprise resource planning (ERP), customer relationship management (CRM) or large transaction processing systems in financial services) results in cost, schedule overruns and creates waste in the form of rework (see Muda (Japanese term)). Moreover, poor structural quality is strongly correlated with high-impact business disruptions due to corrupted data, application outages, security breaches, and performance problems.
CISQ reports on the cost of poor quality estimates an impact of:
$2.08 trillion in 2020
$2.84 trillion in 2018
IBM's Cost of a Data Breach Report 2020 estimates that the average global costs of a data breach:
$3.86 million |
9842_9 | Definitions
ISO
Software quality is "capability of a software product to conform to requirements." while for others it can be synonymous with customer- or value-creation or even defect level.
ASQ
ASQ uses the following definition: Software quality describes the desirable attributes of software products. There are two main approaches exist: defect management and quality attributes.
NIST
Software Assurance (SA) covers both the property and the process to achieve it:
[Justifiable] confidence that software is free from vulnerabilities, either intentionally designed into the software or accidentally inserted at any time during its life cycle and that the software functions in the intended manner
The planned and systematic set of activities that ensure that software life cycle processes and products conform to requirements, standards, and procedures |
9842_10 | PMI
The Project Management Institute's PMBOK Guide "Software Extension" defines not "Software quality" itself, but Software Quality Assurance (SQA) as "a continuous process that audits other software processes to ensure that those processes are being followed (includes for example a software quality management plan)." whereas Software Quality Control (SCQ) means "taking care of applying methods, tools, techniques to ensure satisfaction of the work products towards quality requirements for a software under development or modification."
Other general and historic
The first definition of quality history remembers is from Shewhart in the beginning of 20th century: "There are two common aspects of quality: one of them has to do with the consideration of the quality of a thing as an objective reality independent of the existence of man. The other has to do with what we think, feel or sense as a result of the objective reality. In other words, there is a subjective side of quality." |
9842_11 | Kitchenham and Pfleeger, further reporting the teachings of David Garvin, identify five different perspectives on quality:
The transcendental perspective deals with the metaphysical aspect of quality. In this view of quality, it is "something toward which we strive as an ideal, but may never implement completely". It can hardly be defined, but is similar to what a federal judge once commented about obscenity: "I know it when I see it".
The user perspective is concerned with the appropriateness of the product for a given context of use. Whereas the transcendental view is ethereal, the user view is more concrete, grounded in the product characteristics that meet user's needs.
The manufacturing perspective represents quality as conformance to requirements. This aspect of quality is stressed by standards such as ISO 9001, which defines quality as "the degree to which a set of inherent characteristics fulfills requirements" (ISO/IEC 9001). |
9842_12 | The product perspective implies that quality can be appreciated by measuring the inherent characteristics of the product.
The final perspective of quality is value-based. This perspective recognizes that the different perspectives of quality may have different importance, or value, to various stakeholders. |
9842_13 | Tom DeMarco has proposed that "a product's quality is a function of how much it changes the world for the better." This can be interpreted as meaning that functional quality and user satisfaction are more important than structural quality in determining software quality.
Another definition, coined by Gerald Weinberg in Quality Software Management: Systems Thinking, is "Quality is value to some person." This definition stresses that quality is inherently subjective—different people will experience the quality of the same software differently. One strength of this definition is the questions it invites software teams to consider, such as "Who are the people we want to value our software?" and "What will be valuable to them?".
Other meanings and controversies
One of the challenges in defining quality is that "everyone feels they understand it" and other definitions of software quality could be based on extending the various descriptions of the concept of quality used in business. |
9842_14 | Software quality also often gets mixed-up with Quality Assurance or Problem Resolution Management or Quality Control or DevOps. It does over-lap with before mentioned areas (see also PMI definitions), but is distinctive as it does not solely focus on testing but also on processes, management, improvements, assessments, etc.
Measurement
Although the concepts presented in this section are applicable to both structural and functional software quality, measurement of the latter is essentially performed through testing [see main article: Software testing]. However, testing isn't enough: According to a study, individual programmers are less than 50% efficient at finding bugs in their own software. And most forms of testing are only 35% efficient. This makes it difficult to determine [software] quality.
Introduction |
9842_15 | Software quality measurement is about quantifying to what extent a system or software possesses desirable characteristics. This can be performed through qualitative or quantitative means or a mix of both. In both cases, for each desirable characteristic, there are a set of measurable attributes the existence of which in a piece of software or system tend to be correlated and associated with this characteristic. For example, an attribute associated with portability is the number of target-dependent statements in a program. More precisely, using the Quality Function Deployment approach, these measurable attributes are the "hows" that need to be enforced to enable the "whats" in the Software Quality definition above. |
9842_16 | The structure, classification and terminology of attributes and metrics applicable to software quality management have been derived or extracted from the ISO 9126-3 and the subsequent ISO/IEC 25000:2005 quality model. The main focus is on internal structural quality. Subcategories have been created to handle specific areas like business application architecture and technical characteristics such as data access and manipulation or the notion of transactions.
The dependence tree between software quality characteristics and their measurable attributes is represented in the diagram on the right, where each of the 5 characteristics that matter for the user (right) or owner of the business system depends on measurable attributes (left):
Application Architecture Practices
Coding Practices
Application Complexity
Documentation
Portability
Technical and Functional Volume |
9842_17 | Correlations between programming errors and production defects unveil that basic code errors account for 92 percent of the total errors in the source code. These numerous code-level issues eventually count for only 10 percent of the defects in production. Bad software engineering practices at the architecture levels account for only 8 percent of total defects, but consume over half the effort spent on fixing problems, and lead to 90 percent of the serious reliability, security, and efficiency issues in production.
Code-based analysis
Many of the existing software measures count structural elements of the application that result from parsing the source code for such individual instructions tokens control structures (Complexity), and objects. |
9842_18 | Software quality measurement is about quantifying to what extent a system or software rates along these dimensions. The analysis can be performed using a qualitative or quantitative approach or a mix of both to provide an aggregate view [using for example weighted average(s) that reflect relative importance between the factors being measured]. |
9842_19 | This view of software quality on a linear continuum has to be supplemented by the identification of discrete Critical Programming Errors. These vulnerabilities may not fail a test case, but they are the result of bad practices that under specific circumstances can lead to catastrophic outages, performance degradations, security breaches, corrupted data, and myriad other problems that make a given system de facto unsuitable for use regardless of its rating based on aggregated measurements. A well-known example of vulnerability is the Common Weakness Enumeration, a repository of vulnerabilities in the source code that make applications exposed to security breaches. |
9842_20 | The measurement of critical application characteristics involves measuring structural attributes of the application's architecture, coding, and in-line documentation, as displayed in the picture above. Thus, each characteristic is affected by attributes at numerous levels of abstraction in the application and all of which must be included calculating the characteristic's measure if it is to be a valuable predictor of quality outcomes that affect the business. The layered approach to calculating characteristic measures displayed in the figure above was first proposed by Boehm and his colleagues at TRW (Boehm, 1978) and is the approach taken in the ISO 9126 and 25000 series standards. These attributes can be measured from the parsed results of a static analysis of the application source code. Even dynamic characteristics of applications such as reliability and performance efficiency have their causal roots in the static structure of the application. |
9842_21 | Structural quality analysis and measurement is performed through the analysis of the source code, the architecture, software framework, database schema in relationship to principles and standards that together define the conceptual and logical architecture of a system. This is distinct from the basic, local, component-level code analysis typically performed by development tools which are mostly concerned with implementation considerations and are crucial during debugging and testing activities.
Reliability
The root causes of poor reliability are found in a combination of non-compliance with good architectural and coding practices. This non-compliance can be detected by measuring the static quality attributes of an application. Assessing the static attributes underlying an application's reliability provides an estimate of the level of business risk and the likelihood of potential application failures and defects the application will experience when placed in operation. |
9842_22 | Assessing reliability requires checks of at least the following software engineering best practices and technical attributes:
Application Architecture Practices
Coding Practices
Complexity of algorithms
Complexity of programming practices
Compliance with Object-Oriented and Structured Programming best practices (when applicable)
Component or pattern re-use ratio
Dirty programming
Error & Exception handling (for all layers - GUI, Logic & Data)
Multi-layer design compliance
Resource bounds management
Software avoids patterns that will lead to unexpected behaviors
Software manages data integrity and consistency
Transaction complexity level
Depending on the application architecture and the third-party components used (such as external libraries or frameworks), custom checks should be defined along the lines drawn by the above list of best practices to ensure a better assessment of the reliability of the delivered software. |
9842_23 | Efficiency
As with Reliability, the causes of performance inefficiency are often found in violations of good architectural and coding practice which can be detected by measuring the static quality attributes of an application. These static attributes predict potential operational performance bottlenecks and future scalability problems, especially for applications requiring high execution speed for handling complex algorithms or huge volumes of data.
Assessing performance efficiency requires checking at least the following software engineering best practices and technical attributes:
Application Architecture Practices
Appropriate interactions with expensive and/or remote resources
Data access performance and data management
Memory, network and disk space management
Compliance with Coding Practices (Best coding practices) |
9842_24 | Security
Software quality includes software security. Many security vulnerabilities result from poor coding and architectural practices such as SQL injection or cross-site scripting. These are well documented in lists maintained by CWE, and the SEI/Computer Emergency Center (CERT) at Carnegie Mellon University.
Assessing security requires at least checking the following software engineering best practices and technical attributes:
Implementation, Management of a security-aware and hardening development process, e.g. Security Development Lifecycle (Microsoft) or IBM's Secure Engineering Framework.
Secure Application Architecture Practices
Multi-layer design compliance
Security best practices (Input Validation, SQL Injection, Cross-Site Scripting, Access control etc.)
Secure and good Programming Practices
Error & Exception handling |
9842_25 | Maintainability
Maintainability includes concepts of modularity, understandability, changeability, testability, reusability, and transferability from one development team to another. These do not take the form of critical issues at the code level. Rather, poor maintainability is typically the result of thousands of minor violations with best practices in documentation, complexity avoidance strategy, and basic programming practices that make the difference between clean and easy-to-read code vs. unorganized and difficult-to-read code.
Assessing maintainability requires checking the following software engineering best practices and technical attributes: |
9842_26 | Application Architecture Practices
Architecture, Programs and Code documentation embedded in source code
Code readability
Code smells
Complexity level of transactions
Complexity of algorithms
Complexity of programming practices
Compliance with Object-Oriented and Structured Programming best practices (when applicable)
Component or pattern re-use ratio
Controlled level of dynamic coding
Coupling ratio
Dirty programming
Documentation
Hardware, OS, middleware, software components and database independence
Multi-layer design compliance
Portability
Programming Practices (code level)
Reduced duplicate code and functions
Source code file organization cleanliness |
9842_27 | Maintainability is closely related to Ward Cunningham's concept of technical debt, which is an expression of the costs resulting of a lack of maintainability. Reasons for why maintainability is low can be classified as reckless vs. prudent and deliberate vs. inadvertent, and often have their origin in developers' inability, lack of time and goals, their carelessness and discrepancies in the creation cost of and benefits from documentation and, in particular, maintainable source code.
Size
Measuring software size requires that the whole source code be correctly gathered, including database structure scripts, data manipulation source code, component headers, configuration files etc. There are essentially two types of software sizes to be measured, the technical size (footprint) and the functional size: |
9842_28 | There are several software technical sizing methods that have been widely described. The most common technical sizing method is number of Lines of Code (#LOC) per technology, number of files, functions, classes, tables, etc., from which backfiring Function Points can be computed; |
9842_29 | The most common for measuring functional size is function point analysis. Function point analysis measures the size of the software deliverable from a user's perspective. Function point sizing is done based on user requirements and provides an accurate representation of both size for the developer/estimator and value (functionality to be delivered) and reflects the business functionality being delivered to the customer. The method includes the identification and weighting of user recognizable inputs, outputs and data stores. The size value is then available for use in conjunction with numerous measures to quantify and to evaluate software delivery and performance (development cost per function point; delivered defects per function point; function points per staff month.). |
9842_30 | The function point analysis sizing standard is supported by the International Function Point Users Group (IFPUG). It can be applied early in the software development life-cycle and it is not dependent on lines of code like the somewhat inaccurate Backfiring method. The method is technology agnostic and can be used for comparative analysis across organizations and across industries.
Since the inception of Function Point Analysis, several variations have evolved and the family of functional sizing techniques has broadened to include such sizing measures as COSMIC, NESMA, Use Case Points, FP Lite, Early and Quick FPs, and most recently Story Points. However, Function Points has a history of statistical accuracy, and has been used as a common unit of work measurement in numerous application development management (ADM) or outsourcing engagements, serving as the "currency" by which services are delivered and performance is measured. |
9842_31 | One common limitation to the Function Point methodology is that it is a manual process and therefore it can be labor-intensive and costly in large scale initiatives such as application development or outsourcing engagements. This negative aspect of applying the methodology may be what motivated industry IT leaders to form the Consortium for IT Software Quality focused on introducing a computable metrics standard for automating the measuring of software size while the IFPUG keep promoting a manual approach as most of its activity rely on FP counters certifications.
CISQ defines Sizing as to estimate the size of software to support cost estimating, progress tracking or other related software project management activities. Two standards are used: Automated Function Points to measure the functional size of software and Automated Enhancement Points to measure the size of both functional and non-functional code in one measure. |
9842_32 | Identifying critical programming errors
Critical Programming Errors are specific architectural and/or coding bad practices that result in the highest, immediate or long term, business disruption risk.
These are quite often technology-related and depend heavily on the context, business objectives and risks. Some may consider respect for naming conventions while others – those preparing the ground for a knowledge transfer for example – will consider it as absolutely critical. |
9842_33 | Critical Programming Errors can also be classified per CISQ Characteristics. Basic example below:
Reliability
Avoid software patterns that will lead to unexpected behavior (Uninitialized variable, null pointers, etc.)
Methods, procedures and functions doing Insert, Update, Delete, Create Table or Select must include error management
Multi-thread functions should be made thread safe, for instance servlets or struts action classes must not have instance/non-final static fields
Efficiency
Ensure centralization of client requests (incoming and data) to reduce network traffic
Avoid SQL queries that don't use an index against large tables in a loop
Security
Avoid fields in servlet classes that are not final static
Avoid data access without including error management
Check control return codes and implement error handling mechanisms
Ensure input validation to avoid cross-site scripting flaws or SQL injections flaws
Maintainability |
9842_34 | Deep inheritance trees and nesting should be avoided to improve comprehensibility
Modules should be loosely coupled (fanout, intermediaries) to avoid propagation of modifications
Enforce homogeneous naming conventions |
9842_35 | Operationalized quality models
Newer proposals for quality models such as Squale and Quamoco propagate a direct integration of the definition of quality attributes and measurement. By breaking down quality attributes or even defining additional layers, the complex, abstract quality attributes (such as reliability or maintainability) become more manageable and measurable. Those quality models have been applied in industrial contexts but have not received widespread adoption.
Trivia
"A science is as mature as its measurement tools."
"I know it when I see it."
"You cannot control what you cannot measure." (Tom DeMarco)
"You cannot inspect quality into a product." (W. Edwards Deming)
"The bitterness of poor quality remains long after the sweetness of meeting the schedule has been forgotten." (Anonymous)
"If you don't start with a spec, every piece of code you write is a patch." (Leslie Lamport)
See also |
9842_36 | Anomaly in software
Accessibility
Availability
Best coding practices
Cohesion and Coupling
Cyclomatic complexity
Coding conventions
Computer bug
Dependability
GQM
ISO/IEC 9126
Software Process Improvement and Capability Determination - ISO/IEC 15504
Programming style
Quality: quality control, total quality management.
Requirements management
Scope (project management)
Security
Security engineering
Software quality assurance
Software architecture
Software quality control
Software metrics
Software reusability
Software standard
Software testing
Testability
Static program analysis |
9842_37 | Further reading
Android OS Quality Guidelines including checklists for UI, Security, etc. July 2021
Association of Maritime Managers in Information Technology & Communications (AMMITEC). Maritime Software Quality Guidelines. September 2017
Capers Jones and Olivier Bonsignour, "The Economics of Software Quality", Addison-Wesley Professional, 1st edition, December 31, 2011,
CAT Lab - CNES Code Analysis Tools Laboratory (on GitHub)
Girish Suryanarayana, Software Process versus Design Quality: Tug of War?
Ho-Won Jung, Seung-Gweon Kim, and Chang-Sin Chung. Measuring software product quality: A survey of ISO/IEC 9126. IEEE Software, 21(5):10–13, September/October 2004.
International Organization for Standardization. Software Engineering—Product Quality—Part 1: Quality Model. ISO, Geneva, Switzerland, 2001. ISO/IEC 9126-1:2001(E).
Measuring Software Product Quality: the ISO 25000 Series and CMMI (SEI site)
MSQF - A measurement based software quality framework Cornell University Library |
9842_38 | Omar Alshathry, Helge Janicke, "Optimizing Software Quality Assurance," compsacw, pp. 87–92, 2010 IEEE 34th Annual Computer Software and Applications Conference Workshops, 2010.
Robert L. Glass. Building Quality Software. Prentice Hall, Upper Saddle River, NJ, 1992.
Roland Petrasch, "The Definition of 'Software Quality': A Practical Approach", ISSRE, 1999
Software Quality Professional, American Society for Quality (ASQ)
Software Quality Journal by Springer Nature |
9842_39 | Stephen H. Kan. Metrics and Models in Software Quality Engineering. Addison-Wesley, Boston, MA, second edition, 2002.
Stefan Wagner. Software Product Quality Control. Springer, 2013.
References
Notes
Bibliography
External links |
9842_40 | When code is king: Mastering automotive software excellence (McKinsey, 2021)
Embedded System Software Quality: Why is it so often terrible? What can we do about it? (by Philip Koopman)
Code Quality Standards by CISQ™
CISQ Blog: https://blog.it-cisq.org
Guide to software quality assurance (ESA)
Guide to applying the ESA software engineering standards to small software projects (ESA)
An Overview of ESA Software Product Assurance Services (NASA/ESA)
Our approach to quality in Volkswagen Software Dev Center Lisbon
Google Style Guides
Ensuring Product Quality at Google (2011)
NASA Software Assurance
NIST Software Quality Group
OMG/CISQ Automated Function Points (ISO/IEC 19515)
OMG Automated Technical Debt Standard
Automated Quality Assurance (articled in IREB by Harry Sneed)
Structured Testing: A Testing Methodology Using the Cyclomatic Complexity Metric (1996)
Analyzing Application Quality by Using Code Analysis Tools (Microsoft, Documentation, Visual Studio, 2016) |
9842_41 | Systems thinking
Quality
Source code |
9843_0 | Perspective-taking is the act of perceiving a situation or understanding a concept from an alternative point of view, such as that of another individual. There is a vast amount of scientific literature that has looked at perspective-taking and suggests that it is crucial to human development, and that it may lead to a variety of beneficial outcomes. Perspective-taking is related to other theories and concepts including theory of mind and empathy. Both theory and research have suggested ages when children are able to begin to perspective-take and how that ability develops over time. Research has also suggested that certain people that have attention deficit hyperactivity disorder with comorbid conduct problems (such as Oppositional Defiant Disorder) or autism may have reduced ability to engage in perspective-taking. Additionally, studies have been conducted to assess the brain regions involved in perspective-taking. These studies suggest that several regions may be involved, including |
9843_1 | the prefrontal cortex and the precuneus. Additionally, studies suggest that perspective-taking may be possible in some non-human animals. |
9843_2 | Definition
Perspective-taking is the step by which an individual views a situation from another's point-of-view. Within the scientific literature, perspective-taking has been defined along two dimensions: perceptual and conceptual. Perceptual perspective-taking is defined as the ability to understand how another person experiences things through their senses (i.e. visually or auditorily). Most of this literature has focused on visual perspective-taking: the ability to understand the way another person sees things in physical space. Conceptual perspective-taking is defined as the ability to comprehend and take on the viewpoint of another person's psychological experience (i.e. thoughts, feelings and attitudes). For instance, one can visualize the viewpoint of a taller individual (perceptual/visual) or reflect upon another's point of view on a particular concept (conceptual).
Related terms |
9843_3 | Theory of mind
Theory of mind is the awareness that people have individual psychological states that differ from one another. Within perspective-taking literature, the term perspective-taking and theory of mind are sometimes used interchangeably and some studies use theory of mind tasks in order to test if someone is engaging in perspective-taking. Some research, however, has highlighted that the two concepts are related but different, with theory of mind being the recognition that another person has different thoughts and feelings and perspective-taking being the ability to take on that other person's point of view. |
9843_4 | Empathy
Empathy has been defined as the ability for someone to share the same emotions another person is having. Empathy and perspective-taking have been studied together in a variety of ways. Within the scientific literature, there are not always clear lines of distinction between empathy and perspective-taking, and the two concepts are often studied in conjunction with one another and viewed as related and similar concepts. Some research has distinguished the two concepts and pointed out their differences, while other literature has theorized that perspective-taking is one component of empathy.
In development
Visual
Previous studies have assessed the age at which humans are capable of visual perspective-taking. Various studies within the literature have drawn different conclusions. |
9843_5 | In 1956, Jean Piaget and Bärbel Inhelder conducted a study to assess the visual perspective-taking abilities of young children which has come to be known as the three mountain problem. This study found that by the ages of 9-10, children were able to successfully complete the three mountain problem and seemed able to understand that when someone is standing in a different location (i.e. on a different mountain top) they would have a different view. However, children ages 8 and under struggled with this task. |
9843_6 | Since this classic study, a number of studies have suggested that visual perspective-taking may be possible earlier than the age of 9. For example, a study that used a different method to assess visual perspective-taking suggested that children may be able to successfully visually perspective-take by the age of 4.5 years old. In this study, 4.5-year-old children were able to understand that someone sitting closer to a picture would have a better view of that picture. However, these researchers found that children who were 3 and 3.5 years old struggled with this task which led them to conclude that the age range of 3 to 4.5 years old could be crucial in perspective-taking development. |
9843_7 | Additionally, developmental psychologist John H. Flavell suggested that there are two levels of visual perspective-taking that emerge as children develop. Level 1 perspective-taking is defined as the ability to understand that someone else may see things differently and what another person can see in physical space. For example, one could understand that while an object may be obstructing their own view, from where another person is standing they can see a cat in the room. Level 2 perspective-taking, however, is defined as the understanding that another person can see things differently in physical space and how those objects are organized from that other person's point of view. For example, a person can understand that from another person's point of view they can see a dog to the right but from their own point of view the dog is to the left. |
9843_8 | Studies have since been done to examine when children are able to demonstrate level 1 and level 2 perspective-taking. These studies have shown that children at 24 months old and 14 months old may be able to engage in level 1 perspective-taking. Research also suggests that children can engage in level 2 perspective-taking as early as 2.5 years old.
Studies have also suggested that visual perspective-taking ability improves from childhood to adulthood. For example, in comparing 6-year-olds, 8-year-olds, 10-year-olds and adults (averaging at 19 years of age) researchers found that as people's age increased, visual perspective-taking tasks could be done with more accuracy and speed. |
9843_9 | Conceptual
In Piaget's theory of cognitive development, he suggests that perspective-taking begins in the concrete operational stage (third stage) which ranges from ages 7–12. It is within this stage that the idea of decentration is introduced as a cognitive ability. Decentration was defined as the ability to take into account the way others perceive various aspects of a given situation. |
9843_10 | Another developmental perspective-taking theory was created by Robert L. Selman and entitled social perspective-taking theory (also known as Role-taking theory). This theory suggests that there are five developmental stages involved in perspective-taking ranging from ages 3–6 (characterized by egocentrism or an inability to think of things from another's point of view) to teenagers and adults (where people can understand another person's point of view and this understanding is informed by recognizing another person's environment and culture). The theory suggests that as humans age from childhood to adulthood their ability to perspective-take improves. Studies by Selman and colleagues suggest that children are able to perspective-take in different ways at different ages.
Other studies assess that children can begin to take on the viewpoint of another person considering their feelings, thoughts and attitudes as 4-years-olds.
Brain regions |
9843_11 | Visual
Visual perspective-taking studies that focus on brain regions are generally performed by collecting functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) data while participants perform perspective-taking tasks. For example, a participant may be shown a picture of another person with objects around them and asked to take on the viewpoint of that person and indicate the number of objects they see (Level 1 visual perspective-taking) and if the objects are located to the right or left of the other person (level 2 visual perspective-taking). While the participant is completing this task they are also having an fMRI scan. |
9843_12 | A meta-analysis that looked at existing fMRI research on visual perspective-taking as of 2013 suggested that several areas of the brain have clustered activation during these perspective-taking tasks. These areas included the left prefrontal cortex, the precuneus, and the left cerebellum. Studies suggest these areas of the brain are involved in decision making, visual imagery, and attention respectively.
Conceptual
Research assessing the brain regions involved in conceptual perspective-taking also suggests that multiple brain areas are potentially involved. Studies have been conducted by administering a positron emission tomography (PET) scan and asking participants to engage in perspective-taking tasks. For example, in one study, participants who were all medical students were asked to consider the knowledge base someone who was not in the medical field would have on a list of medical questions. |
9843_13 | Studies have suggested that regions that are activated during cognitive perspective-taking include the right parietal lobe and the posterior cingulate cortex among others. The literature also points out that some areas seem to be involved both when people imagine themselves and when they imagine the perspective of others. For example, when participants were asked to imagine themselves engaging in an activity versus imagining another person engaging in that activity the precuneus and the supplementary motor area (SMA) were activated, suggesting visual imagery and motor movement thoughts were involved in both tasks.
Deficits |
9843_14 | Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)
Research has highlighted that perspective-taking may be more difficult for certain subsets of children that have attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) plus co-occurring conduct disorders. ADHD research has shown that children with this diagnosis have shown impairments in attention and communication. Perspective-taking research found that that these children have a harder time taking on the viewpoint of others than children who do not. |
9843_15 | Autism
There is evidence to suggest that children with autism may be able to engage in visual perspective-taking but may have difficulty engaging in conceptual perspective-taking. For example, a study that compared perspective-taking scores in children who had been diagnosed with autism as compared to children who did not have this diagnosis found no significant difference in scores on level 1 and level 2 visual perspective-taking. However, the study found it was much harder for autistic children to engage in conceptual perspective-taking tasks. |
9843_16 | Some studies have been done to explore potential interventions that could help improve perspective-taking abilities in children with autism. These studies suggested that the use of video may be helpful in teaching perspective-taking skills in children with autism. For example, an intervention study with autistic children, found that showing the children a video of someone engaging in perspective-taking tasks and explaining their actions led to improved perspective-taking ability.
Outcomes
An abundance of literature has linked perspective-taking abilities with other behaviors. Much of this literature specifically focuses on conceptual perspective-taking (or taking on the viewpoint of another person's thoughts, feelings and attitudes). |
9843_17 | Benefit
Visualizing a situation from another person's point of view (conceptual perspective-taking) gives one the ability to better understand the reason behind that person's actions. This also aids in a way to engage in social conversations at different levels in a more acceptable and friendly way. |
9843_18 | Empathy
Many studies have associated perspective-taking with empathy. Psychologist Mark Davis suggested that empathy consists of multiple dimensions. To assess this, Davis developed the Interpersonal Reactivity Index (IRI). The IRI consists of four subscales: fantasy, empathic concern, personal distress, and perspective-taking. The perspective-taking subscale asks participants to report how likely they are to engage in trying to see things from another person's point of view. Studies using this widely cited measure have found that perspective-taking is associated with many prosocial behaviors. One study, which assessed cross-cultural data in 63 countries using the IRI, concluded that perspective-taking and empathic concern was associated with volunteerism and agreeableness as well as self-esteem and life satisfaction. |
9843_19 | Additionally, research has suggested that perspective-taking leads to empathic concern. This research further suggests that in looking at perspective-taking and empathy it is important to distinguish between two different types of perspective-taking. The research posits that there is a difference between thinking of how one would act, feel and behave if placed in someone else's situation and thinking of the way that another person thinks, feels, and behaves in their own situation. The results of this research reveals that thinking of how another person behaves and feels in their own situation leads to feelings of empathy. However, thinking of how one would behave in another person's situation leads to feelings of empathy as well as distress. |
9843_20 | Research has also found that in interactions involving negotiations, taking on the perspective of another person and empathizing with them may have differential outcomes. One study found that people who engaged in perspective-taking were more effective in making a deal with another person and finding innovative agreements that satisfied both parties as compared to those who empathized with someone else.
Sympathy and caring
Research has revealed that perspective-taking was associated with sympathy toward others and prosocial behavior in children as young as 18 months old. Another study looking at sibling interactions found that toddlers who were older siblings were more likely to help take care of their younger siblings when they demonstrated higher perspective-taking abilities. |
9843_21 | Creativity
Perspective-taking has also been associated with creativity. For example, perspective-taking has been found to increase the amount of creative ideas generated in team activities. Another study suggested that perspective-taking could lead to more creative and innovative ideas particularly in participants who were internally driven to complete a task. |
9843_22 | Bias and stereotype reduction |
9843_23 | Many studies within perspective-taking literature have focused on the potential effects of perspective-taking on the perceptions of outgroup members and have found that there are many potential benefits to perspective-taking. Literature on perspective-taking and bias and stereotyping is generally done by asking participants to take the perspective of another person who is different from them in certain domains (i.e. asking young adult participants to take on the perspective of an elderly person or asking White participants to take on the perspective of a Black person as seen in a photograph or video). These studies have shown that perspective-taking can lead to reduced stereotyping of outgroup members, improved attitudes towards others, and increased helping behavior of outgroup members. Research also suggests that perspective-taking can lead to a reduction of in-group favoritism. Additionally, research that focused on implicit (or unconscious) biases found that perspective-taking can |
9843_24 | lead to reduced implicit bias scores (as measured by the Implicit-association test) as well as more recognition of subtle discrimination. |
9843_25 | In disagreements
Research has looked at the potential differences that could arise when one is having a conversation with another person whom they agree with versus having a conversation with someone with whom they disagree. This research found that participants who interacted with people with whom they disagreed had enhanced perspective-taking ability and could better remember the conversation.
Drawbacks
Some researchers have suggested that there may be some drawbacks to perspective-taking. For example, studies have found that asking people to engage in perspective-taking tasks can lead to increased stereotyping of the target if the target is deemed as having more stereotypic qualities and adopting stereotypic behaviors of outgroup members. |
9843_26 | Other animals
Although studies have been done to assess if nonhuman animals are able to successfully engage in perspective-taking the literature has not drawn consistent conclusions. Many of these studies assess perspective-taking by training animals on specific tasks or by measuring the consistency of animals to follow the eye gaze of humans. Researchers highlight that being able to successful follow another's eye gaze could indicate that the animal is aware that the human is seeing and paying attention to something that is different from what they see.
One study that assessed the perspective-taking abilities in spider monkeys and capuchin monkeys found that these primates successfully performed eye gazing tasks which led researchers to conclude that the monkeys demonstrated some ability to consider another person's viewpoint. However, another study that utilized an eye gazing method in assessing perspective-taking found that Rhesus monkeys were unsuccessful at eye gazing tasks. |
9843_27 | Other studies suggest that dogs have complex social understanding. One study assessed the potential for perspective-taking in dogs by telling a dog that they were not allowed to eat a treat and then placing the food in a location that the dog could reach. These researchers found that dogs were more likely to eat the treat after being instructed not to if there was a barrier that hid the dog from the instructor. Additionally, dogs were less likely to eat the treat if the barrier was of smaller size or had a window in it. However, this study also showed that dogs struggled in other tasks that focused on the dog's own visual attention. These researchers suggest that this study provides evidence that dogs may be aware of other's visual perspectives.
See also
Role reversal
Role-taking theory
References
Cognition
Group processes
Human communication |
9844_0 | List of Guggenheim Fellowships awarded in 1951.
1951 U.S. and Canadian Fellows |
Subsets and Splits