Systems Testing and Validation.

Software and system assurance is a growing concern. A look at some of the domains involved, including at least medical devices, automotive, railway, aeronautical, space and telecommunications provides a feeling on the importance of the topic. For many of these domains, and partly because of the increasing complexity of software, validation is an open issue and not straightforward at all, both from a technical and from a managerial point of view. Another topic to consider is that validation is often performed at the end the development lifecycle, which results in obvious calendar problems. One of the consequences is that the relevance of lifecycle processes such as system testing and validation must be broadened. Therefore inputs from research and experience from industry is required in order to enable innovative, and often more rigorous, approaches.