Table of contents:
Software verification is an essential step in the process of deploying new and updated software. This article goes over what exactly software verification is, how to know if you’re doing it and doing it properly, and how to recognise your own inefficient practices and turn them around for better deployments.
Let’s get started with pinpointing precisely what is meant by software verification.
Some people get software verification confused with software validation, but they’re not exactly the same thing. Each of them is a component of software testing.
Put simply, software verification is asking yourself the question, “Are we building the product right?” It’s something you should be doing along the way. Or in other words, software validation is comparing what you built to the requirements you set for the product. Software verification is about analysing the process you used to build your software. So how do you determine that?
Here’s our take on it.
Being aware of your software verification practices
If your team can show that you’re using a good process, chances are higher that at the end of the day you will have produced working software. You don’t want to get to the end of the process, perform software validation, and find out that everything is a mess. You can prevent that before you get to that point simply by using verification practices.
Take a look at the software verification best practices to get a better idea of what we need:
Perform code reviews efficiently
Code reviews are one of the best ways to do software verification right. But they get pushed to the side often simply because they’re time-consuming. To make the process more efficient, prioritise your code reviews. Let your developers know which sections of code are the top priority for verification.
You can also try having your developers read the code out loud and making sure the code gets checked by someone on the development team other than the original coder. These techniques help because it’s really hard to catch your own mistakes when you know what you meant to put there.
Automate efficiently
Automating workflows is one of the best ways to save time and make sure the process is done correctly every time. Sometimes errors can creep in while performing tedious tasks, just because a team member has done it so many times that they are not really paying close attention anymore.
The best way to make sure your automation works well is to use proven tools for them. For instance, Codekeeper integrates directly with developer workflows on existing tools that your team may already use, such as Github or other popular SCM platforms.
Improving your source code security with software verification
An additional layer of software verification that people may not think about is verifying your software escrow deposits. A source code escrow is a place where intellectual property is safeguarded and only released when release conditions are met.
As a business owner, you want to make sure that the code released to you is readable, complete, and usable. Of course, if you’re not a developer you may not know whether it is or not. With that in mind, it’s a good idea to secure escrow software verification services as well.
If you like to keep your software more secure and make sure that your source code is usable should you need to access it, then you can sign up for Codekeeper’s source code escrow and software verification services.
