Comment by Nokinside
7 years ago
SQlite is very high quality software, but they use DO-178b "inspired" testing process. As far as I know they don't have version of software that is or can be used in safety critical parts despite their boasting.
They say in their site that:
> Airbus confirms that SQLite is being used in the flight software for the A350 XWB family of aircraft.
Flight software does not imply safety critical parts of avionics. It can be the entertainment system or some logging that is not critical.
Correct. The key word is "inspired". Multiple companies have run a DO-178B cert on SQLite, I am told, but the core developers did not get to participate, and I think the result was level-C or -D.
While all that was happening 10+ years ago, I learned about DO-178B. I have a copy of the DO-178B spec within arms reach. And I found that, unlike most other "quality" standards I have encountered, DO-178B is actually useful for improving quality.
I originally developed the TH3 test suite for SQLite with the idea that I could sell it to companies interested in using SQLite in safety-critical applications, and thereby help pay for the open-source side of SQLite. That plan didn't work out as nobody ever bought it. But TH3 and the discipline of 100% MC/DC testing was and continues to be enormously helpful in keeping bugs out of SQLite, and so TH3 and all the other DO-178B-inspired testing and refactoring of SQLite has turned out to be well worth the thousands of hours of effort invested.
The SQLite project is not 100% DO-178B compliant. We have gotten slack on some of the more mundane paperwork aspects. Also, we aggressively optimize the SQLite code base for performance, whereas in a real safety-critical application the focus would be on extreme simplicity at the cost of reduced performance.
However, if some company does call us tomorrow and says that they want to purchase a complete set of DO-178B/C Level-A certification artifacts from us, I think we could deliver that with a few months of focused effort.
I just bought a copy of DO-178C after reading these posts here and the Wikipedia article on it. $290, but if it's good, it should be worth it, right?
I haven't seen -C only DO-178B, though I'm told there isn't much difference. It is not a page-turner. It took me about a year to really understand it.
Yeah DO-178B gives several levels for software from DALA (highest) to DALE (lowest). If DALA software fails the results are catastrophic if DALE fails there is no effect on the aircraft. Since DALE is usually just test equipment and such they might be at a DALD level. So still requires a lot of testing but not nearly to the level that DALA requires.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DO-178B
I think it's possible that parts of SQLite, for example file format in read only mode and few constant queries are certified as part of some safety critical software.
Hipp's Hwaci consulting company would probably help to do the work, but it has no relation to the SQLite as a library.
Good point. The video I linked to merely says that he was contacted by someone in the aviation space about the standard, which I took to mean that it was used in avionics.