From Milestones to a Continuous Quality Assurance Flow

This paper discusses how industrial enterprises can overcome the challenges of implementing continuous delivery and DevOps practices while maintaining high quality standards. The author, Dr. Peter Fassbinder, introduces the concept of continuous conformance, which applies the “green to green” and “shift left” paradigms to non-software artifacts required for releasing and deploying software changes.

The continuous conformance concept involves analyzing the impact of code changes on non-software artifacts and updating affected artifacts to maintain a valid baseline. By integrating this approach with a continuous delivery pipeline, a continuous quality assurance flow is created, enabling more frequent product enhancements without compromising quality.

The paper outlines four types of non-software artifacts and their management within the continuous conformance stream. It also discusses the importance of establishing continuous program and continuous marketing streams to address aspects not directly tied to individual software deployments.

The author provides key recommendations for implementing the continuous quality assurance flow, including integrating the management and tracking of non-software artifacts into the continuous delivery pipeline and creating real-time dashboards for monitoring the status of all aspects required for deployment decisions.

Overall, this paper offers valuable insights and guidance for industrial enterprises looking to adopt continuous delivery and DevOps practices while ensuring high quality standards.