scope:

A critical issue in industrial coordinate metrology is the measurement of a work piece to assure compliance with its dimensional requirements. When using a computerized coordinate measuring system (CMS), the usual practice is to correlate computer-calculated outputs with the dimensional requirements of the workpiece. This correlation is performed by various computer routines that process dimensional coordinate data sets consisting of measurement samples of the object being evaluated.

The purpose of this Standard is to provide guidelines for evaluating the quality of solutions generated by CMS software and to define minimal documentation requirements for software providers. Additionally, this Standard gives default definitions for collections of data sets that span a variety of real-world measuring scenarios. These data sets are dependent on the fitting algorithm being tested. This Standard is concerned with testing the behavior of algorithm implementation, not the testing of algorithms themselves. Thus, the software is treated as a black box; only the input and output are observed and evaluated. It is not the intent of this Standard to endorse or rate any computational method or system.

Software performance evaluation is useful because it

(a) allows objective validation of software

(b) reduces the possibility of error in software application

(c) defines a method of comparing CMS software

This Standard covers the following areas: input data, feature construction, software documentation, performance characterization, and test methodologies.