The DataGrid project's approach to software quality has
been raised several times during the preparation of release 1.2 of the software and most
recently at the Project Technical Board. Improvements have been made to our procedures and
style of work during the development of release 1.2 based on our experience with the
previous release. DataGrid has a quickly growing community of users and dependent projects
and hence with the expected large scale deployment of release 1.2 it is now necessary to
concentrate the project's efforts on its maintenance and support to allow the application
groups to fully exploit the potential of this new software.
To this end, the middleware work packages have been asked to identify
resources for ensuring the continued support of deployed software and the implementation
of software quality measures such as unit testing and adherence to project guidelines. WP6
has been asked to create end-user support structures, a testing group and overall testbed
control mechanisms. It is understood that resources are not infinite and that increased
emphasis on quality and support aspects will mean that advanced functionality resulting
from research work will take longer than originally foreseen in the project plans.
The project management is convinced that making quality and
support our highest priority is clearly within the projects goals and one of the most
useful contributions the project can make to the grid arena and Europe's aspirations in
this domain.
