This paper classifies software researches as theoretical researches, experimental researches, and engineering researches, and is mainly concerned with the experimental researches with focus on software reliability experimentation and control. The state-of-the-art of experimental or empirical studies is reviewed. A new experimentation methodology is proposed, which is largely theory discovering oriented. Several unexpected results of experimental studies are presented to justify the importance of software reliability experimentation and control. Finally, a few topics that deserve future investigation are identified.
