ABSTRACT
This chapter shows how to do exactly that, and how to improve an existing data collection process or modify an existing process for reliability measurement. The data collection process must include a problem-reporting mechanism and may include a software configuration management system and possibly automated tools. The chapter discusses the collecting and measuring error data, product data, and process data. The data collection process is the most critical prerequisite to measuring software reliability. The effectiveness of any reliability measurement will be directly related to the effectiveness of collecting the data necessary for measurement. Software reliability measures will only be as accurate as the data that are input into them. The less variance in the data, the more accurate and usable the model will be. A problem-reporting process as well as some tools for collecting the data will be necessary. The problem report should have three parts: the error detection section, the error correction section, and the error correction verification section.
