Software acquisition: evolution, Total Quality Management and applications to the Army Tactical Missile System

Abstract

Software acquisition has become the critical path in the procurement of Department of Defense (DOD) weapon systems. Software requirements and their complexity have increased at an exponential rate and support requirements now constitute up to 70 percent of the software life cycle costs. This thesis presents the concept of software Total Quality Management (TQM) which focuses on the entire process of software acquisition, as a partial solution to the software acquisition crisis. A software case study, analysis, and lessons learned with applications to the Army Tactical Missile System (TACMS) is presented. A software process control maturity model, a standard software language, and a set of software metrics are presented. A discussion of program manager's responsibilities to implement a process control mechanism to produce quality software products is presented. The principal finding is that software acquisition is the major challenge to a program manager for waepon systems procurement. The major recommendation of this study is that software TQM can be applied to software acquisition