A multi-release reliability model of open source software with fault detection obeying three-parameter lifetime distribution.

With the development of open source software (OSS), software reliability has become an important issue. Due to the complexity of OSS development and testing environment, the fault detection rate of OSS will show a variety of changes. The existing OSS reliability models cannot fully adapt to the complex changes of OSS fault detection. In this paper, we proposed a multi-release OSS reliability model based on three-parameter lifetime distribution. The proposed model can effectively adapt to the complicated changes of fault detection in the processes of development and testing of OSS. Experimental results indicate that the proposed model has the better fitting and predictive performance compared with other multi-release OSS reliability models. Moreover, the proposed model can better adapt to the variety of OSS fault detection environment, and assist developers to evaluate the reliability of OSS.