The NHSE has designed a
software review policy that enables easy access by users to
information about software quality, but which is flexible enough to be used
across and specialized to different disciplines.
The three review levels recognized by the NHSE are the following:
Unreviewed,
Partially reviewed,
and Reviewed.
The Unreviewed designation means only that the software
has been accepted into the owning repository and is thus within the scope
of HPCC and of the discipline of that repository. The Partially
reviewed designation means that the software has been checked by a
librarian for conformance with the scope,
completeness, adequate documentation, and construction guidelines.
The Reviewed designation means that the software has
been reviewed by an expert in the appropriate field, for example by an author
of a review article in the electronic journal
NHSE Review 
,
and found to be of high quality.
Domain-specific repositories and expert reviewers
are expected to refine the NHSE
software review policy by adding additional review criteria,
evaluation properties, and evaluation methods and tools.
The NHSE also provides for soliciting and publishing author claims and
user comments about software quality. All software exported to the NHSE
by its owning repository or by an individual contributor is to be tagged
with its current review level and with a pointer to a review abstract
which describes the software's current review status and includes
pointers to supporting material.