Base Process Library updated to V1.4.1

V1.4.1 of the Base Process Library (BPL) has now been released. This release provides a mapping to both ISO/IEC/IEEE 12207 (Systems and software engineering Software life cycle processes) and ISO/IEC/15288 (Systems and software engineering System life cycle processes). While completing these mappings it was necessary to make a few changes to the Base Practices of several Base Processes. This will require all users of V1.4.0 to review these changes and to decide what, if any, action is needed to comply with V1.4.1. It is worth noting that these changes will probably simply represent what is already being done in practice and therefore a simple confirmation of this at a management review is all that may be considered necessary.

As the number of mapped standard continues to increase, the BPL was becoming extensive and it was decided that an alternative approach to BPL was needed. However, the fundamental concept of a document that clearly shows the mappings between the Base Processes, Base Practices and the requirements of the mapped standards in a simple manner was something that the ITA committee wanted to maintain. The solution was to introduce the concept of a main BPL and several BPL variants. With the release of BPL V.1.4.1, this approach has been adopted. There is now the main BPL covering the core ISO 9001 standard and two very closely aligned standard; ISO/IEC 20000-1 and ISO/IEC 27001. Additionally, there are 2 variants. Variant A (Advanced Software Engineering) covering ISO 9001, ISO/IEC/IEEE 12207, ISO/IEC/IEEE 15288 (both noted above) and BS 10754 for Information technology: Systems trustworthiness - Governance and management specification. Variant B (Safety) covers ISO 9001 and ISO 26262 Road vehicles functional safety. Note that all variants will include ISO 9001 as it is the core standard used by TickITplus.

The ITA is happy to consider the production of other variants involving different combinations of the mapped standards.

Work is now progressing on mapping AQAP 2210 (NATO Supplementary software quality assurance requirements to AQAP-2110 OR AQAP-2310) and AS9115 (Quality Management Systems – Requirements for Aviation, Space and Defence Organizations – Deliverable Software - Supplement to 9100). It is likely that this will result in a further release of the BPL to V1.4.3 covering main BPL and all variants. Additionally, a further variant expected, Variant C covering ISO 9001, AQAP-2210 and AS9115 along with ISO/IEC/IEEE 12207 and ISO/IEC/IEEE 15288 with a working title of Software Engineering in Defence or just Defence.