For example, in the United States, the Federal Aviation Administration is responsible for reviewing and signing off on aircraft systems. Documents DO-178B (and now DO-178C) describe the overall methods by which software that runs in avionics systems needs to be developed.

FAA personnel (or more frequently, trained FAA representatives within the avionics company) conduct reviews to ensure that the software is in fact being developed according to the prescribed methods, including requirements capture, coding standards, configuration management, verification, etc. Software is tested in simulation environments, and in partial hardware setups, and eventually on actual airplanes, before receiving FAA sign-off.