This Treasury Board Information Technology Standard (TBITS-22) supports the Treasury Board policy requirement that quality management practices including system controls which promote innovative and efficient acquisition, deployment and administration of information technology resources be adopted.

TBITS-18 focuses on the concept of Quality Management as an approach to promote and improve ongoing performance. This approach has application to all phases of an organization's operations and is especially relevant in the overall area of Information Technology Management.

The process of development and maintenance of software is a major factor in government operations and it is therefore necessary to provide guidance for quality systems where software products are involved. This standard supports the application of TBITS-18 to provide additional guidance for quality systems.

This standard is intended to provide guidance where a contract between a software supplier and the user require the demonstration of a supplier's capability to develop, supply and maintain the software. This is done primarily by preventing non-conformity at all stages from development through maintenance.

The guidelines in this standard are applicable in contractual situations for software products when

1. the contract specifically requires design effort and the product requirements are stated principally in performance terms or they need to be established;
2. confidence in product conformity can be attained by adequate demonstration of certain supplier's capabilities in development, supply and maintenance.

This standard defines the software quality assurance concepts and is based on ISO 9000-3 standard. No changes have been made to the international standard.

In certain circumstances, departments and agencies may wish to make exceptions to the use of this standard. This may be done when it can be clearly demonstrated that there are appreciable performance or cost advantages to be gained, when the overall interests of the Government of Canada are best served, or when the department or agency is a party to an international treaty or obligation (e.g. NATO)

The effective date of this standard is December 1991.

F. Tayabali TBS (Chairperson)
B. Abela SEC
A. Borde CIDA
R. Donelly TC
J. Doyle SSC
J. Harder Lab
L. Hunter AGR
P. Lamoureux DND
K. Lavalley DND
D. Ledoux NA
S. Parisien NA
R. Quirt PWC
H. Savoie DND
S. Valentine NLC
A.E. Winsor VAC

Copies of the technical specifications may be obtained as follows:

ISO 9000-3
Guidelines for the Application of ISO 9001 to the Development, Supply and Maintenance of Software