[SystemSafety] Agile methods

[menckem at gmail.com]

I suppose before the system/software safety requirements are identified, it would be necessary, based on the system description, purpose, environment, etc. to identify which functions are expected to be safety related and which are not, and perform a hazard analysis in order to identify the safety requirements to be implemented in the system to mitigate the hazards identified. I would imagine that in practice changing methodology is a rather complex process which requires the support of the management and the drafting of new and updated procedures and processes which detail how compliance with the standard is interpeted and achieved in the company. That's based on my short experience, as I was born after 1960...
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-----Original Message-----
From: Michael Jackson <jacksonma at acm.org>
Sender: systemsafety-bounces at lists.techfak.uni-bielefeld.de
Date: Fri, 30 Aug 2013 21:52:46 
To: <martyn at thomas-associates.co.uk>; <systemsafety at lists.techfak.uni-bielefeld.de>
Subject: Re: [SystemSafety] Agile methods

Nancy, Martyn:

Some clarification, please. What does 'before anything else' mean in "a
complete and thorough specification of all the system/software safety
requirements before anything else"? If nothing precedes it (specifically,
there is no preceding description or even identification of the system's
purpose, participants, environment, context or functionality) then what
subject matter will the safety requirements have to talk about?

Regards,

-- Michael




At 18:37 30/08/2013, Martyn Thomas wrote:
>I agree with Nancy.
>
>At the workshop for the NAS/CSTB study into Certifiably Dependable
>Software, the inventor of Extreme Programming, Kent Beck, said that he
>wouldn't suggest using XP for safety-critical work because it's use
>didn't create adequate evidence to support a safety argument.
>Theworkshop report (which may contain this comment, though I haven't
>checked) and the final report are both downloadable free, here
>(requires free registration):
>http://sites.nationalacademies.org/cstb/CompletedProjects/CSTB_042247
>
>Regards
>
>Martyn
>
>On 30/08/2013 18:14, Nancy Leveson wrote:
> > Definitions always differ among the users of terms. But if the Agile
> > methods being considered do not start with a complete and thorough
> > specification of all the system/software safety requirements before
> > anything else, then the system resulting system/software design will
> > almost surely be less safe than one that does. Whether it coincides
> > with other standards (most of which are very deficient with respect to
> > safety) is not really important, is it?
> >
> > Nancy
>
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