It is infeasible to develop quality software without software testing. Software testing typically consumes 40-50% of development efforts, even more efforts for systems that require higher levels of reliability. It is a significant part of the software development process. If a software defect is found in latter stages of development process it costs more than if it is found in earlier stages of development. Thus the earlier we introduce testing, the less the defects found, which in turn reduces the development time and cost. Risk minimization is another approach for efficient software development. Traditionally risk management and test management are addressed separately, but if the two approaches were integrated it would further reduce time and cost of software development. There are a number of testing approaches and models for software development but no testing process model addresses defect prevention and risk minimization simultaneously. In this paper we propose a methodical or formal approach of software testing that introduces testing from the very beginning of software development life cycle as well as integrates risk management with test management. The proposed model has been evaluated in a number of software and it outperforms the existing models.

Software testing validation software risk management software life cycle unit testing integration testing system testing regression testing.