JOURNAL OF COMPUTER SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING, VOLUME 11, ISSUE 2, FEBRUARY 2012

1
2012 JCSE
www.journalcse.co.uk

Reliability Analysis Based on
Jump Diffusion Model for
an Open Source Software
Yoshinobu Tamura and Shigeru Yamada
AbstractMany open source softwares are developed in all parts of the world, e.g., Firefox, Apache HTTP server, Linux,
Android, etc. Open source software is now attracting attention as the next-generation software development paradigm because
of the cost reduction, quick delivery, work saving. This paper focuses on the irregular fluctuation of version upgrade and the
total track of fault data for open source software. A new approach to software reliability assessment by using the jump diffusion
model based on the stochastic differential equations in order to consider the change of requirements specification and the
irregular fluctuation of version upgrade is presented. Also, actual software fault-count data is analyzed in order to show
numerical examples of software reliability assessment for several open source softwares. In particular, several reliability
assessment measures are derived from our jump diffusion model. Moreover, this paper shows that the proposed the method of
reliability analysis can assist quality improvement for the open source software project.
Index TermsReliability, open source software, jump diffusion model, stochastic differential equations.

1 INTRODUCTION
T present, various open source softwares (OSS's) are
developed and released around the world. In recent
years, the next-generation software development
environment by using network computing technologies
such as a cloud computing is now attracting attention.
Also, the successful experience of adopting OSS includes
GNU/Linux operating system, Apache HTTP server, and
so on[1]. However, the poor handling of the quality and
customer support prohibits the progress of OSS. This pa-
per focuses on the problems of software quality, which
prohibit the progress of OSS. In particular, many OSS's
are used because of the cost reduction, quick delivery,
and work saving. Also, the development cycle of OSS has
been continued without a break. It is important for soft-
ware project managers to assess the reliability by using
the total record of OSS fault data instead of the data of
specified version of OSS. Then, it is need to consider the
irregular fluctuation associated with the version upgrade
of OSS. Thereby, the software project managers can con-
sider the total requirements specification of OSS. In case
of considering the effect of the debugging process on en-
tire system in the development of a method of reliability
assessment for OSS, it is necessary to grasp the situation
of registration for bug tracking system, the combination
status of OSS's, the degree of maturation of OSS, etc.
Moreover, if the size of the software system is large, the
number of faults detected during the operating phase
becomes large, and the change of the number of faults
which are detected and removed through each debugging
becomes sufficiently small compared with the initial fault
content at the beginning of operation. Therefore, in such a
case, it is appropriate use a stochastic model with conti-
nuous state space in order to describe the stochastic be-
havior of the fault-detection process such as the total
track record of OSS. In particular, the total track record of
OSS is treated in order to consider the total domain of
fault-prone requirements specification for OSS. For ex-
ample, the software managers cannot comprehend it by
only using the fault data of specified version for OSS.
Many software reliability growth models (SRGM's)[2]
have been applied to assess the reliability for quality
management and testing-progress control of software
development. On the other hand, the effective method of
dynamic debugging management for new distributed
development paradigm as typified by the open source
project has only a few presented[3], [4], [5], [6].
This paper focuses on the total track data of OSS de-
veloped under an open source project. Also, a useful me-
thod of software reliability assessment considering the
version upgrade of OSS is discussed. A software reliabili-
ty growth model based on stochastic differential equa-
tions in order to consider the total track record of OSS is
presented in this paper. Then, it is assumed that the soft-
ware fault-detection rate depends on the time, and the
software fault-reporting phenomena on the bug tracking
system keep an irregular state. Also, actual software fault-
count data to show numerical examples of software relia-
bility assessment for the OSS is analyzed. In particular,
several numerical examples of reliability assessment con-
sidering the change of requirements specification and the
version upgrade of OSS are shown. Moreover, several
reliability assessment measures are derived from the pro-

Yoshinobu Tamura is with the Graduate School of Science and Engineer-
ing, Yamaguchi University, Tokiwadai 2-16-1, Ube-shi, Yamaguchi, 755-
8611 Japan.
Shigeru Yamada is with the Graduate School of Engineering,Tottori Uni-
versity, Minami 4-101, Koyama, Tottori-shi, 680-8552 Japan.
A
2

posed jump diffusion model. Then, it is shown that the
proposed method of reliability analysis can assist quality
improvement for OSS's.
2 MODEL DESCRIPTION
2.1 Stochastic Differential Equation Modeling
Let ) (t N be the number of detected faults in the OSS by
operational time ) 0 ( t t in the bug tracking system.
Suppose that ) (t N takes on continuous real values. Since
latent faults in the OSS are detected and eliminated dur-
ing the operational phase, ) (t N gradually increases as
the operational procedures go on. Thus, under common
assumptions for software reliability growth modeling, it
is considered the following linear differential equation:
{ }, ) ( ) ( ) (
) (
t N t D t b
dt
t dN
= (1)
where ) (t b is the software fault-detection rate at opera-
tional time t and a non-negative function, ) (t D , means
the amount of change of requirements specification. Also,
it is defined ) (t D as follows:
, ) (
t
e t D

= (2)
where is the number of latent faults in the OSS, and
the changing rate of requirements specification. It is
assumed that the fault-prone requirements specification
of OSS grows exponentially in terms of t as shown in
Figure 1[7], [8]. Thus, the OSS shows a reliability regres-
sion trend if is positive value. On the other hand, the
OSS shows a reliability growth trend if is negative
value.
This paper focuses on the total track record of faults to
be detected. In this case, the amount of fault data is huge
size. Considering the characteristic of such OSS, the soft-
ware fault-reporting phenomena keep an irregular state
in the early stage of operational phase. Moreover, the ad-
dition and deletion of software components are repeated
under the development of OSS system, i.e., the OSS re-
quirements specification depends on the operation time.
Therefore, Eq.(2) is extended to the following stochastic
differential equation[9], [10]:
{ }{ }, ) ( ) ( ) ( ) (
) (
t N t D t t b
dt
t dN
+ = (3)
where is a positive constant representing a magnitude
of the irregular fluctuation, and ) (t a standardized
Gaussian white noise.
Eq.(3) is extended to the following stochastic differen-
tial equation of an Ito type:
{ }
{ } ), ( ) ( ) (
) ( ) (
2
1
) ( ) (
2
t dW t N t D
dt t N t D t b t dN
=

)
`

(4)
where ) (t W is a one-dimensional Wiener process which
is formally defined as an integration of the white noise
) (t with respect to time t . The Wiener process is a
Gaussian process and has the following properties:
[ ] , 1 0 ) 0 ( Pr = = W (5)
[ ] , 0 ) ( E = t W (6)
[ ] [ ], , Min ) ( ) ( E t t t W t W = (7)
where ] Pr[ and ] [ E represent the probability and ex-
pectation, respectively.
By using Itos formula[9], [10], the solution of Eq.(4) is
obtained under the initial condition 0 ) 0 ( = N as fol-
lows[11]:
{ } . ) ( ) ( exp 1 ) ( ) (
0 (

t W ds s b t D t N
t
(8)
Using solution process ) (t N in Eq.(8), several software
reliability measures can be derived.
Moreover, the intensity of inherent software failures in
case of ) ( ) (
1
t b t b and ) ( ) (
2
t b t b are defined as:
,
) (
) (
) (
) (
) (
0
1

=
t
e
e
e
e
t H a
dt
t dH
t N a
dt
t dN
ds t b (9)
,
) (
) (
) (
) (
) (
0
2

=
t
s
s
s
s
t H a
dt
t dH
t N a
dt
t dN
ds t b (10)
where ) (t H
e
and ) (t H
s
mean the exponential SRGM
and the delayed S-shaped SRGM, respectively, based on
nonhomogeneous Poisson process (NHPP).
Therefore, the transition probability distribution of
these two models are obtained as follows:
{ } [ ], ) ( exp 1 ) ( ) ( t W bt t D t N
e
= (11)
{ } [ ]. ) ( exp ) 1 ( 1 ) ( ) ( t W bt bt t D t N
s
+ = (12)

2.2 Jump-Diffusion Modeling
The jump term can be added to the proposed stochastic
differential equation models in order to incorporate the
irregular state around the version-upgrade time. Then,
the following jump-diffusion process[12] is given as fol-
lows.
{ }
{ }
( ) , 1
) ( ) ( ) (
) ( ) (
2
1
) ( ) (
) (
1
2
)
`

+
+

)
`

t
M
i
i
j
j j
V d
t dW t N t D
dt t N t D t b t dN
(13)

Fig. 1. The basic concept of the fault-prone requirements specifica-
tion and OSS fault-reporting domain.
3

where ) (
t
M is a Poisson point process with parameter
at operation time t . Also, ) (
t
M the number of oc-
curred jumps, the jump rate. ) (
t
M , ) (t W , and
i
V
are assumed to be mutually independent. Moreover,
i
V is
i-th jump range.
By using Ito's formula[9], [10], the solution of the fol-
lowing equation can be obtained from Eq.(13):
{
. log
) ( ) ( exp 1 ) ( ) (
) (
1
0
(
(

(
)
`

t
M
i
i
t
j
V
t W ds s b t D t N
(14)

Therefore, the transition probability distribution of these
two models are respectively obtained for the exponential
SRGM and the delayed S-shaped SRGM as follows:
{ [
, log
) ( exp 1 ) ( ) (
) (
1 (
(

(
)
`

t
M
i
i
je
V
t W bt t D t N
(15)
{ [
, log
) ( exp ) 1 ( 1 ) ( ) (
) (
1 (
(

(
)
`

+ =

t
M
i
i
js
V
t W bt bt t D t N
(16)
3 PARAMETER ESTIMATION
3.1 Method of Maximum-Likelihood
In this section, the estimation method of unknown para-
meters , , b , and in Eq. (8) is presented. The
joint probability distribution function of the process
) (t N is denoted as
]. 0 ) ( | ) ( , , ) ( Pr[
) , ; ; , ; , (
0 1 1
2 2 1 1
= t N y t N y t N
y t y t y t P
K K
K K
L
L
(17)
Its density of Eq. (17) is denote as
.
) , ; ; , ; , (

) , ; ; , ; , (
2 1
2 2 1 1
2 2 1 1
K
K K
K
K K
y y y
y t y t y t P
y t y t y t p

L
L
L

(18)
Since ) (t N takes on continuous values, the likelihood
function, l , for the observed data
) , , 2 , 1 ( ) , ( K k y t
k k
L = is constructed as follows:
). , ; ; , ; , (
2 2 1 1 K K
y t y t y t p l L = (19)
For convenience in mathematical manipulations, the fol-
lowing logarithmic likelihood function is used:
. logl L = (20)
The maximum-likelihood estimates ,

, b

, and
are the values making L in Eq. (20) maximize. These can
be obtained as the solutions of the following simultane-
ous likelihood equations[11]:
. 0 = = = =

L
b
L L L
(21)

3.2 Estimation of Jump-Diffusion Parameters
Generally, it is difficult to estimate the jump-diffusion
parameters of stochastic differential equation model. The
method of estimation of jump-diffusion parameters are
proposed by several researchers. However, the effective
method of estimation has only a few presented. A genetic
algorithm (GA) in order to estimate the jump-diffusion
parameters of the proposed model is used in this section.
The procedure of GA algorithm is given in the follow-
ing[13].
It is assumed that the proposed jump-diffusion model
includes the parameters , , and . and mean
the parameters included in i-th jump range
i
V .
1. The initial individuals are randomly generated.
Also, the set of initial individual to the binary
digit is converted.
2. Two parental individuals are selected, and new
individuals are produced by the crossover re-
combination. The value of fitness is calculated
from the evaluated value of each individual. The
following value of fitness as the error between
the estimated and the actual data is defined in
this paper.
{ } , ) (
), ( min
0
2

=
=
n
i
i j i
i
y i N F
F

(22)
where ) (i N
j
is the number of detected faults at
operation time i in the proposed jump-diffusion
model,
i
y the number of actual detected faults.
Also, means the set of parameters , , and
.
3. Step.2 and Step.3 are continued until reaching the
specific size.
The jump-diffusion parameters , , and are esti-
mated by using above mentioned steps.
4 SOFTWARE RELIABILITY ASSESSMENT
MEASURES
4.1 Stochastic Differential Equation Model
Considering the expected number of faults detected up
to operation time t , the density function of ) (t W is giv-
en by:
.
2
) (
exp
2
1
)) ( (
2
)
`

=
t
t W
t
t W f

(23)
Information on the cumulative number of detected faults
in the system is important to estimate the situation of the
progress on the debugging procedures. Since ) (t N is a
random variable in the proposed model, its expected val-
ue can be a useful measure. It can be calculated from
Eq.(28) as follows[11]:
4

,
2
) ( exp 1 ) ( ) (
2
0
(

)
`

+ =

t ds s b t D t N
t

(24)
where )] ( [ E t N is the expected number of faults detected
up to time t .
It is important for software managers to assess the
number of latent faults according to the change of specifi-
cation of OSS. Considering the change of requirements
specification, the number of latent faults is given by
. ) (
t
e t D

= (25)
Also, the number of remaining faults considering the
change of requirements specification can be obtained as
follows:
)]. ( ) ( [ E )] ( [ E t N t D t N
r
= (26)
Moreover, the mean time between software failures is
useful to measure the property of the frequency of soft-
ware failure-occurrence (or fault-detection). Then, the
cumulative MTBF(denoted by
C
MTBF ) is approximate-
ly given by:
.
)] ( [ E
1
) (
t N
t MTBF
C
= (27)

4.2 Jump-Diffusion Model
Similarly, the cumulative number of detected faults in the
system is important to estimate the situation of the
progress on the software debugging procedures. Since
) (t N
j
is a random variable in the proposed model, it is
calculated as Eq.(14)[11].
Also, it is important for software managers to assess
the number of latent faults according to the change of
specification of OSS. the number of remaining faults
based on the jump-diffusion model considering the
change of requirements specification can obtain as fol-
lows:
{
. log
) ( ) ( exp ) (
) ( ) ( ) (
) (
1
0
)
`

=
=

t
M
i
i
t
j rj
V
t W ds s b t D
t N t D t N
(28)
Also, the mean time between software failures is useful
to measure the property of the frequency of software fail-
ure-occurrence. Then,
C
MTBF is approximately given
by:
.
) (
1
) (
t N
t MTBF
j
Cj
= (27)
5 NUMERICAL ILLUSTRATIONS
5.1 Data for Numerical Illustrations
The successful experience of OSS's include Firefox,
OpenOffice, Ubuntu, Android, etc. In this way, the OSS is
closely watched from the point of view of the cost reduc-
tion and the quick delivery.
There are many open source projects around the
world. In particular, we focus on several OSS's in terms of
the application software, server one, and embedded one
in order to evaluate the performance of the proposed me-
thod. The numerical examples by using the data sets for
several OSS's are shown.
This paper focuses on Android mobile phone OS[14],
Apache HTTP server[15], Firefox Webbrowser[16], and
Thunderbird mailer[17]. The fault-count data used in this
paper are collected in the bug tracking system on the
website of each open source project. Table 1 shows the
OSS versions for the total record of actual fault data used
in this paper.

5.2 Reliability Assessment Results
The estimated expected cumulative numbers of de-
tected faults in Eqs. (24), )] ( [ E

t N , in case of
) ( ) (
1
t b t b and ) ( ) (
2
t b t b in Eqs. (9) and (10) for
each OSS are shown in Figures 2~5, respectively. Also,
the sample paths of the estimated numbers of detected
faults based on the proposed jump-diffusion model in
Eqs. (15) and (16), )] ( [ E

t N
je
and )] ( [ E

t N
js
, in case of
) ( ) (
1
t b t b and ) ( ) (
2
t b t b for each OSS are shown in
Figures 6~13, approximately.
From Figures 2~13 are shown that Eq. (11) fits better
than Eq. (12) on the whole. In particular, Android mobile
phone OS has the characteristic growth curve. However,
the proposed model fits into the characteristic growth
curve of Android. Also, above mentioned results show
that the proposed model can cover the OSS growth curve
by using either Eq. (11) or Eq. (12).
TABLE 1
OSS VERSIONS FOR THE TOTAL TRACK RECORD OF
ACTUAL FAULT DATA.
5


Fig. 3. The estimated cumulative number of detected faults,
)] ( [ E

t N , in case of ) ( ) (
1
t b t b and ) ( ) (
2
t b t b , (Apache
HTTP server).

Fig. 4. The estimated cumulative number of detected faults,
)] ( [ E

t N , in case of ) ( ) (
1
t b t b and ) ( ) (
2
t b t b , (Firefox
Web browser).

Fig. 5. The estimated cumulative number of detected faults,
)] ( [ E

t N , in case of ) ( ) (
1
t b t b and ) ( ) (
2
t b t b , (Thun-
derbird mailer).

Fig. 6. The sample path of the estimated number of detected faults,
) (

t N
e
, in case of ) ( ) (
1
t b t b (Android mobile phone OS).

Fig. 7. The sample path of the estimated number of detected faults,
) (

t N
s
, in case of ) ( ) (
2
t b t b (Android mobile phone OS).


Fig. 2. The estimated cumulative number of detected faults,
)] ( [ E

t N , in case of ) ( ) (
1
t b t b and ) ( ) (
2
t b t b , (An-
droid mobile phone OS).
6


Fig. 8. The sample path of the estimated number of detected faults,
) (

t N
e
, in case of ) ( ) (
1
t b t b (Apache HTTP server).

Fig. 9. The sample path of the estimated number of detected faults,
) (

t N
s
, in case of ) ( ) (
2
t b t b (Apache HTTP server).

Fig. 10. The sample path of the estimated number of detected faults,
) (

t N
e
, in case of ) ( ) (
1
t b t b (Firefox Web browser).

Fig. 11. The sample path of the estimated number of detected faults,
) (

t N
s
, in case of ) ( ) (
2
t b t b (Firefox Web browser).

Fig. 12. The sample path of the estimated number of detected faults,
) (

t N
e
, in case of ) ( ) (
1
t b t b (Thunderbird mailer).

Fig. 13. The sample path of the estimated number of detected faults,
) (

t N
s
, in case of ) ( ) (
2
t b t b (Thunderbird mailer).

Moreover, it is important for software managers to as-
sess the irregular fluctuation in terms of the number of
detected faults according to the version upgrade of OSS.
Then, Figures 6~13 show that the irregular fluctuation of
7

the proposed model occur around the time of version
upgrade, respectively. In particular, these results mean
that the number of detected faults in terms of Android
mobile phone OS growth as operating procedures go on.
In particular, Figures 6~13 show that the number of de-
tected faults decrease in spots at the operation time, be-
cause of the jump diffusion state. This means the pheno-
mena in terms of the imperfect debugging, the change of
specification, etc.
Above mentioned results, the software project manag-
ers can confirm the frequency of irregular fluctuation by
using the sample path of the estimated number of de-
tected fault based on the proposed jump diffusion model.
Also, the software project managers can comprehend the
stability of OSS from Figures 6~13.
6 CONCLUDING REMARKS
The jump diffusion model in order to consider around the
time of version upgrade of OSS has been proposed. Also,
this paper focused on the requirements specification of OSS,
and discussed the method of reliability assessment based on
the stochastic differential equation model. At present, a new
paradigm of distributed development typified by such an
open source project will evolve at a rapid pace in the future.
In particular, it is difficult for the software project managers
to assess the reliability for the total record of OSS. The pro-
posed method may be useful as the method of reliability
assessment for the OSS.
A software reliability analysis based on stochastic diffe-
rential equations in order to consider the change of require-
ments specification of OSS has proposed in this paper. Then,
it has been assumed that the software fault-detection rate
depends on the time, and the software fault-reporting phe-
nomena on the bug tracking system keep an irregular state.
Also, actual software fault-count data has analyzed in order
to show numerical examples of software reliability assess-
ment for the total track record of OSS. Moreover, several
reliability assessment measures have been derived from the
proposed model.
In particular, it is important for software managers to as-
sess the irregular fluctuation in terms of the number of de-
tected faults according to the version upgrade of OSS. Then,
this paper has shown that the proposed model can compre-
hend the irregular fluctuation occurring around the time of
version upgrade. Thereby, the software project managers
can confirm the frequency of irregular fluctuation by using
the sample path of the estimated number of detected faults
based on the proposed jump diffusion model. Also, the pro-
posed model can describe both the reliability growth trend
and the reliability regression trend.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
This work was supported in part by the Grant-in-Aid for
Scientific Research (C), Grant No. 22510150 from the Min-
istry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technol-
ogy of Japan.
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Yoshinobu Tamura was received the B.S.E., M.S., and Ph.D. de-
grees from Tottori University in 1998, 2000, and 2003, respectively.
From 2003 to 2006, he was a Research Assistant at Tottori Universi-
ty of Environmental Studies. From 2006 to 2009, he was a Lecturer
and Associate Professor at Faculty of Applied Information Science of
Hiroshima Institute of Technology, Hiroshima, Japan. Since 2009, he
has been working as a Associate Professor at the Graduate School
of Science and Engineering, Yamaguchi University, Ube, Japan. His
research interests include reliability assessment for open source
software. He is a regular member of the Information Processing
Society of Japan, the Operations Research Society of Japan, the
Society of Project Management of Japan, and the IEEE. Dr. Tamura
received the IEEE Reliability Society Japan Chapter Awards in 2007
and the Research Leadership Award in Area of Reliability from the
ICRITO in 2010.


8

Shigeru Yamada was received the B.S.E., M.S., and Ph.D. degrees
from Hiroshima University in 1975, 1977, and 1985, respectively.
From 1988 to 1993, he was an associate professor at the Faculty of
Engineering of Hiroshima University, Japan. Since 1993, he has
been working as a professor at the Department of Social Manage-
ment Engineering, Graduate School of Engineering, Tottori Universi-
ty, Tottori-shi, Japan. He has published numerous technical papers
in the area of software reliability models, project management, relia-
bility engineering, and quality control. He has authored several
books entitled such as Introduction to Software Management Model
(Kyoritsu Shuppan, 1993), Software Reliability Models: Fundamen-
tals and Applications (JUSE, Tokyo, 1994), Statistical Quality Control
for TQM (Corona Publishing, Tokyo, 1998), Software Reliability:
Model, Tool, Management (The Society of Project Management,
2004), Quality-Oriented Software Management (Morikita Shuppan,
2007), and Elements of Software Reliability (Kyoritsu Shuppan,
2011). Dr. Yamada received the Best Author Award from the Infor-
mation Processing Society of Japan in 1992, the TELECOM System
Technology Award from the Telecommunications Advancement
Foundation in 1993, the Paper Award from the Reliability Engineer-
ing Association of Japan in 1999, the International Leadership Award
in Reliability Engg. Research from the ICQRIT/SREQOM in 2003,
the Best Paper Award at the 2004 International Computer Sympo-
sium, the Best Paper Award from the Society of Project Management
in 2006, the Leadership Award from the ISSAT in 2007, and the
International Leadership and Pioneering Research Award in Soft-
ware Reliability Engineering from the SREQOM/ICQRIT in 2009. He
is a regular member of the IPSJ, the ORSJ, the Japan SIAM, the
REAJ, JIMA, the JSQC, the SPM Japan, and the IEEE.