As with any design development, the firmware must undergo validation and verification testing to ensure the controller and the system performance is safe, predictable and efficient. Thus Firmware Development Process process is important for any product.
Firmware is usually developed using either the classical waterfall or the incremental model of development. Firmware development includes a series of steps. Once the firmware has been developed, testing is done during the verification stage of the development cycle. Usually black-box testing is done at this stage. Regression tests are also performed. These tests may be manual or automatic. Since automatic testing is faster, many of these tests are automated. However, most of the tests cannot test the firmware in situation, i.e., as the firmware is running. For example, if boundary value testing is to be done, then an automated test will test the software for the extreme values but it does not test how the software will behave if these boundary values are given when the system is running. Of course, the system can be manually tested by actually entering the boundary values (for a system that lets users set values of data) and checking to see if the system behaves as expected. But this is very time consuming. Another alternative is to have the system test itself upon start-up or upon pressing a special key but this will require a pre-defined sequence of tests and will be extremely inflexible. Therefore, the task of choosing an embedded firmware development process must be done with proper care and intelligence.
Firmware is usually developed using either the classical waterfall or the incremental model of development. Firmware development includes a series of steps. Once the firmware has been developed, testing is done during the verification stage of the development cycle. Usually black-box testing is done at this stage. Regression tests are also performed. These tests may be manual or automatic. Since automatic testing is faster, many of these tests are automated. However, most of the tests cannot test the firmware in situation, i.e., as the firmware is running. For example, if boundary value testing is to be done, then an automated test will test the software for the extreme values but it does not test how the software will behave if these boundary values are given when the system is running. Of course, the system can be manually tested by actually entering the boundary values (for a system that lets users set values of data) and checking to see if the system behaves as expected. But this is very time consuming. Another alternative is to have the system test itself upon start-up or upon pressing a special key but this will require a pre-defined sequence of tests and will be extremely inflexible. Therefore, the task of choosing an embedded firmware development process must be done with proper care and intelligence.