Architecture-based approach to reliability assessment of software systems

With the growing emphasis on reuse, software development process moves towa rd component-based software design. As a result, there is a need for modeli ng approaches that are capable of considering the architecture of the softw are and estimating the reliability by taking into account the interactions between the components, the utilization of the components, and the reliabil ities of the components and of their interfaces with other components. This paper details the state of the architecture-based approach to reliability assessment of component based software and describes how it can be used to examine software behavior right from the design stage to implementation and final deployment. First, the common requirements of the architecture-based models are identified and the classification is proposed. Then, the key mo dels in each class are described in detail and the relation among them is d iscussed. A critical analysis of underlying assumptions, limitations and ap plicability of these models is provided which should be helpful in determin ing the directions for future research. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.