Pattern of transformation of failures based on severity in real-time embedded software projects

Real time software systems is an integral part of each and every application domain which includes aerospace and defence, power and energy sector, medical sector, industrial automation, etc. Design and development of any software system requires time, domain expertise, tools, capital and infrastructure. Nevertheless, the software industry has been constantly improving; the percentage of software failures has also increased. This in turn has led to a major loss of capital, time, good-will, loss of information and in some cases severe failures of critical applications leading to the loss of lives. This is because, software could fail due to faults injected in various phases of software or product development life cycle starting from project initiation to deployment. This paper therefore aims to show the transformation of failures based on severity in Real-time embedded software projects through a case study. This study thus brings in awareness in the pattern of failure transformation based on their severity. This knowledge enables one to take preventive and corrective measures during the software development process such that it reduces the probability of their occurrences and further aids the developing team to provide strategies that can resolve the impact of severity of the existence failures during the development process.