Ecosystem

Close the Gaps in Your Product Development Cycle with Jama Connect™ and LDRA

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Product development

Close gaps in product development with Jama Connect™ and LDRA

Interested in closing gaps in your product development lifecycle? It’s no secret that developers of mission-critical software are facing increasingly complex system requirements and stringent standards for safety and efficacy. That’s why Jama Software has partnered with LDRA to deliver a test validation and verification solution for safety- and security-critical embedded software. LDRA has been a market leader in verification and software quality tools for over 40 years. They serve customers across the aerospace and defense, industrial energy, automotive, rail, and medical device industries.

Integrating TÜV SÜD-certified Jama Connect with the LDRA tool suite gives teams bidirectional traceability across the development lifecycle. This transparency helps development teams build higher-quality products and get to market faster while mitigating risk. Whether teams are working from a standards-based V model or applying an Agile, Spiral, or Waterfall methodology, employing Jama Connect in concert with the TÜV SÜD- and TÜV SAAR-certified LDRA tool suite closes the verification gaps in the development lifecycle, helping to ensure the delivery of safe and secure software.

Let’s dive into some details to understand the value of using Jama Connect and the LDRA tool suite.

Requirements and test cases form the bond between Jama Connect™ and LDRA

Product managers and engineers use Jama Connect to manage requirements and testing from idea through development, integration, and launch. Managing requirements in the Jama Connect platform allows users to align teams, track decisions, and move forward with confidence that they are building the product or system they set out to build.

LDRA imports Jama requirements and test cases, mirroring the structure and levels of traceability established from the decomposition of stakeholder requirements down to software requirements and test cases. With the Jama artifacts in the LDRA tool suite, traceability down to the code can be realized and verification and validation of requirements can begin.

During the Jama test case import, the user can choose the type of test case it corresponds to (e.g. unit test, system test, code review test) and let LDRA create a test artifact that will invoke the proper part of the LDRA tool suite and realize that test case type.

Part of realizing Jama test cases in the LDRA tool suite includes the ability to follow the steps defined in the Jama test case description (e.g. inputs, outputs, expected results). Test cases executed by the LDRA tool suite can be executed either on a host machine, in a virtual environment, or on the actual target hardware. Verification results are captured, and Pass/Fail status results are produced. The verification results can then be exported from the LDRA tool suite into the Jama test case verification status field.

By way of the Jama Test Run feature, the change in verification status and included user notes can be logged and committed. Additionally, if the user desires, the LDRA tool suite verification results can also be exported into the Jama requirement verification status field, giving the Jama user additional touch points to analyze.

Another benefit of the integration is Jama’s ability to create, link, assign, track, and manage defects discovered during testing with the LDRA tool suite.

Partnering with standards and safety experts on product development

Many industries and their applications have safety-critical requirements drawn from process standards like ISO 14971 and ISO 26262. These requirements demand a higher level of visibility and traceability that can be achieved with the Jama-LDRA integration.

LDRA is heavily involved in the international standards body. They help lead the DO-178 standard in the aerospace market for safety in avionics. LDRA is also a significant contributor to the MISRA software coding standard and other standards like CERT. Their tool suite is ISO 9001:2008-certified as a quality management system and TÜV SÜD- and TÜV SAAR-certified.

The Jama-LDRA partnership benefits not only LDRA customers in the military and aerospace needing to comply with standards like DO-178B/C, but also one of the fastest-growing industries, and the one that keeps LDRA the busiest: the automotive industry and their need to comply with ISO 26262. The Jama-LDRA partnership also addresses applications for safety and security in the medical device industry (IEC 62304), rail (EN 50128), and industrial controls and energy (IEC 61508).

RELATED: Increasing Efficiency in Testing and Confidence in Safety Standard Compliance

Certification and code analysis

LDRA helps users achieve certification in standards like DO-178B/C, DO-331, ISO 26262, Future Airborne Capability Environment (FACE), IEC 61508, and others. The LDRA tool suite lays out a set of objectives for the relevant process standard, along with corresponding artifact placeholders and sample template documents. This guiding project structure with built-in progress metrics gives the user an intuitive understanding of what is required to achieve certification and the day-to-day gains toward that goal.

A major key benefit to customers is LDRA’s ability to perform on target hardware testing or Run-For-Score (RFS). These customers have a very strict process for achieving certification wherein step-by-step testing is followed and results are logged and eye-witnessed.

LDRA also has its own proprietary code analysis engine. Starting with static code analysis, a debugging method that examines the source code before the program is run, LDRA generally finds potential coding flaws and security vulnerabilities prior to code compilation. Once the code has been compiled, testing can be further complemented by LDRA’s dynamic testing, structural coverage, and unit testing.

Build with certainty

The complementary capabilities and automation offered by Jama and LDRA deliver a powerful solution for the development and test verification of software systems in the product development lifecycle. Whatever software development approach your team chooses to employ, requirements- combined with Jama’s product lifecycle management capacities can help you deliver safe, compliant products on time and on budget.

To learn more about test management with Jama, take a deeper look at our solution and download the datasheet.

To learn more on the topic of test management, we’ve compiled a handy list of valuable resources for you!
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