ABBET´s support for the full product life cycle

The ABBET (A Broad Based Environment for Test) standard is being developed by the ABBET Subcommittee of the IEEE SCC20 Standards Coordinating Committee. ABBET´s goal is to establish a standard environment that supports product test related needs over the full product life cycle. The ABBET environment will be based on an open framework that manages a test knowledge repository and physical test resources in accordance with accepted test related standards. The environment will support user needs such as testability analysis of new products, specification of test requirements, development of maintenance strategies, test program generation, libraries of reusable test objects, implementation on heterogenous platforms, advanced diagnostic techniques, and continuous improvement of the test process. The development methodology for ABBET entails development of a process activity model and an information model. A programming language binding for software tools will be derived from the language-independent information model. Opportunities for reduced support costs and more effective support are based on the systematic capture and reuse of test knowledge throughout the product life cycle. The ultimate success of ABBET will depend upon its acceptance and support by the commercial market