ABSTRACT
This chapter describes classification of Software Reliability Models and two such models, which have found a wide variety of applications: the waterfall life cycle model and the spiral model. Predictive models could be used to assess the risk of developing software under a given set of requirements and for specified personnel before the project truly starts. The chapter examines the data needed to perform a software reliability assessment with the models just described. Existing software reliability models will either base reliability predictions on historical data existing for similar ware or on failure data associated with the specific software being developed. The Air Force’s Development Center proposed one of the first predictive models. Software reliability models belong to two different categories: the software prediction models that assess reliability early in the life cycle and software assessment models that assess reliability on the basis of failure data obtained during test and operation.
