Allen P. Nikora

vox: (818)393-1104
fax: (818)393-4085

e-mail:
Allen.P.Nikora@jpl.nasa.gov
a.nikora@computer.org

 

Current Activities

I defended my dissertation in Computer Science at the University of Southern California at the end of January, 1998, and received my Ph.D. in May, 1998. My advisor was Dr. Ellis Horowitz, and the other members of my committee were Dr. Barry Boehm and Dr. Robert Scholtz (Electrical Engineering). I received a BS in Engineering and Applied Science from the California Institute of Technology in 1977, and an MS in Computer Science from USC in 1991.  My research interests include measuring and estimating the defect content and reliability of software systems, and developing tools to support these activities. In my dissertation, I developed methods for using measurements of a software system's structural evolution to estimate the rates at which defects are inserted into that system during its development.

Currently, I work at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in the Autonomy and Control Section. Right now, I'm dividing my time between supporting the Mission Data System (MDS), an software development effort that will provide flight and ground software for future missions, and continuing my research in software reliability engineering.  For the MDS, I'm supporting the development of the test environment that we'll be using.  My research, funded by NASA Code IT, is focused on addressing the practical issues of implementing techniques for estimating software system residual fault content, risk of exposure to residual faults, and using measures of software structure to differentiate between software components that are fault-prone and those that are not.  These techniques were developed in an RTOP funded by NASA Code IT, "IV&V Issues in Achieving High Reliability and Safety in Critical Control System Software".  I'm also maintaining and enhancing the software reliability measurement tool, CASRE (Computer Aided Software Reliability Engineering), whose development is funded by the U.S. Air Force Operational Test and Evaluation Center (AFOTEC).  Please feel free to call or write if there are aspects of software reliability about which you're curious; I'd be interested in discussing them with you.  I've also done some work in the formal specification and analytical verification of software systems.  Specifically, I helped to develop a libary of reusable formal specifications for the fault protection component of planetary spacecraft flight software.

I belong to the IEEE Computer and Reliability Societies, and have helped organize Computer Society sponsored conferences on software reliability, software maintenance, and the engineering of complex computer systems.  I'm General Chair of the International Symposium on Software Reliability Engineering, to be held jointly with the International Conference on Software Maintenance, October 8-14, 2000 in San Jose.  I've also been a member of IEEE and AIAA standards committees related to software reliability.  I've been named as chair of an IEEE standards working group responsible for reballoting IEEE Std 1044-1993, "Standard Classification for Software Anomalies".

Here are some links to Web pages related to software reliability engineering and formal methods/analytical verification.

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Web Pages Related to Software Reliability Engineering

Organizations

Conferences
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    Publications

    Refereed Papers

    1. A. Nikora, J. Munson, “Software Evolution and the Fault Process”, to be published in the proceedings of the 23rd Annual Software Engineering Workshop, NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD, December 2-3, 1998
    2. A. Nikora, J. Munson, “Determining Fault Insertion Rates For Evolving Software Systems”, proceedings of the Ninth International Symposium on Software Reliability Engineering, Paderborn, Germany, November 4-7, 1998
    3. W. Everett, S. Keene, A. Nikora, “Applying Software Reliability Engineering in the 1990s”, IEEE Transactions on Reliability 50th Anniversary Special Publication, vol. 47, no. 3-SP, Part II of Two Parts, September, 1998, pp. 372-378
    4. J. Munson, A. Nikora, “Estimating Rates of Fault Insertion and Test Effectiveness in Software Systems”, invited paper published in the proceedings of the Fourth ISSAT International Conference on Quality and Reliability in Design, Seattle, WA, August 12-14, 1998
    5. A. P. Nikora, "Software System Defect Content Prediction From Development Process and Product Characteristics", Ph.D. Dissertation, May 1998
    6. A. P. Nikora, J. C. Munson, "Finding Fault with Faults: A Case Study", proceedings of the Annual Oregon Workshop on Software Metrics, Coeur d’Alene, ID, May 11-13, 1997
    7. A. P. Nikora, N. F. Schneidewind, J. C. Munson, "IV&V Issues in Achieving High Reliability and Safety in Critical Control System Software", proceedings of the Third ISSAT97 International Conference on Reliability and Quality in Design, Anaheim, CA, March 12-14, 1997
    8. A. P. Nikora, M. R. Lyu, "An Experiment in Determining Software Reliability Model Applicability", proceedings of the Sixth International Symposium on Software Reliability Engineering, Toulouse, France, October 24-27, 1995
    9. A. P. Nikora, M. R. Lyu, "CASRE - A Windows Tool for Software Reliability Measurement", invited speaker, meeting of IFIP Working Group 10.4, Lake Tahoe, CA, June 22-25, 1995
    10. A. P. Nikora, "A JPL Software Reliability Study and a Windows-Based Software Reliability Tool," proceedings of Software Reliability & Safety for the 90s, Institute of Decision Science/Claremont McKenna College, Claremont, CA, Nov 12, 1993
    11. M. R. Lyu, A. P. Nikora, W. H. Farr, "A Systematic and Comprehensive Tool for Software Reliability Modeling and Measurement," with M. R. Lyu and W. H. Farr; proceedings of the Twenty-Third Annual International Symposium on Fault-Tolerant Computing, Toulouse, France, June 22-24, 1993
    12. A. P. Nikora, "The Design and Implementation of a Computer-Aided Software Reliability Estimation Tool," invited speaker at Corning workshop on software engineering, Corning, NY, June, 1992
    13. A. P. Nikora, M. R. Lyu, T. M. Antczak, "A Linear Combination Software Reliability Modeling Tool with a Graphically-Oriented User Interface," proceedings of the Symposium on Assessment of Quality Software Development Tools, New Orleans, LA, May 27-29, 1992
    14. M. R. Lyu, A. P. Nikora, "CASRE - A Computer-Aided Software Reliability Estimation Tool," proceedings of 1992 Computer-Aided Software Engineering Workshop (CASE92), Montreal, Quebec, Canada, July 6-10, 1992
    15. M. R. Lyu, A. P. Nikora, "Applying Reliability Models More Effectively," IEEE Software, vol 9, no 4, July, 1992, pp 43-52
    16. A. P. Nikora, M. R. Lyu, W. H. Farr, T. M. Antczak, "Linear Combination Software Reliability Models and a Proposed Reliability Modeling Tool," 14th Minnowbrook Workshop on Software Engineering, Blue Mountain Lake, NY; July 23-26, 1991
    17. M. R. Lyu, A. P. Nikora, "Software Reliability Measurements Through Combination Models: Approaches, Results, and a CASE Tool," proceedings of the Fifteenth Annual International Computer Software and Applications Conference; Tokyo, Japan; September 11-13, 1991
    18. M. R. Lyu, A. P. Nikora, "A Heuristic Approach for Software Reliability Prediction: The Equally-Weighted Linear Combination Model," proceedings of the 2nd International Symposium on Software Reliability Engineering; Austin, TX; May 17-18, 1991

    Textbooks, Book Chapters, and Articles

    1. “Reliability via Designed Experiments”, with J. C. Munson, invited article to be published in the Encyclopedia of Electrical Engineering, John Webster, ed., John Wiley and Sons, New York
    2. Contributing author, Handbook of Software Reliability Engineering, M. R. Lyu, ed., McGraw-Hill, 1996, ISBN-0-07-039400-8

    Tutorials

    1. “Software Reliability and Risk Measurement: Techniques and Tools”, with M. R. Lyu, given at the Ninth International Symposium on Software Reliability Engineering, Paderborn, Germany, November 4-7, 1998 (update of ISSRE97 tutorial).
    2. “Introduction to Software Reliability”, presented at the International Conference on Engineering of Complex Computer Systems (ICECCS), August 10-14, Monterey, CA.
    3. A. P. Nikora, M. R. Lyu, "Software Reliability and Risk Measurement: Techniques and Tools", given at the Eighth International Symposium on Software Reliability Engineering, Albuquerque, NM, November 2-5, 1997 (update of ISSRE95 tutorial).
    4. A. P. Nikora, M. R. Lyu, "S/W Reliability Techniques and Tools in Practice", given at the Sixth International Symposium on Software Reliability Engineering, Toulouse, France, October 24, 1995 (update of ISSRE94 tutorial).
    5. A. P. Nikora, M. R. Lyu, "Software Reliability Modeling Techniques and Tools", given at the Fifth International Symposium on Software Reliability Engineering, Monterey, CA, Nov 6, 1994
    6. A. P. Nikora, M. R. Lyu, "Software Reliability Modeling Techniques and Tools", given at the Fourth International Symposium on Software Reliability Engineering, Denver, CO, Nov 3, 1993
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