Information Assurance

12.2. Evaluation Goals

Clearly articulating the goals for an evaluation greatly simplifies the overall evaluation steps. The goals of a study are typically set by the person or company ordering the study. When a study is conducted as a part of a larger project, its goals may be guided by the goals of the project as well. One can distinguish two main classes of goals: comparative and quantitative.

Comparative goals aim to set up a basis for comparing systems (or components). Important aspects include specifying system boundaries such that the comparison can be made across several systems. In Gu et al. [16], the robustness of the Linux kernel was investigated on two different hardware platforms. Another level for comparison is to specify a certain ...