Conformance Testing versus Interoperability Testing

[robert_weir@us.ibm.com]

This NIST page has a good set of definitions for these two concepts.  I 
know that we've sometimes struggled to put into words exactly how these 
differ.  Perhaps we can adopt these definitions:

"Conformance testing assesses whether tool characteristics' violate 
normative statements of the specification."

"Interoperability testing assesses the ability of tools to share 
information among each other, and thus the ability of parties possessing 
differing tools to work jointly toward a goal."

http://syseng.nist.gov/se-interop/plugfest


-Rob